JAVS Fall 2024

the obscure, subtle symbols, and subsequently coming up with interpretations that are highly personal and individual. Therefore, the interpretations of the poems I have concluded may be different than someone else’s, but that remains part of the beauty of the Symbolist movement.

Music and Poetry: Analysis and Response In the following paragraphs I will explain my

interpretation of the poems and the music. In analyzing the poetry Loeffler used for his songs and how the music responds to Symbolist poems, the joy of reading and listening comes from the gradual process of deciphering

“Harmonie du Soir”

“Harmony of the Evening”

Voici venir les temps où vibrant sur sa tige Chaque fleur s'évapore ainsi qu'un encensoir; Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l'air du soir; Valse mélancolique et langoureux vertige! Chaque fleur s'évapore ainsi qu'un encensoir; Le violon frémit comme un coeur qu'on afflige; Valse mélancolique et langoureux vertige! Le ciel est triste et beau comme un grand reposoir. Le violon frémit comme un coeur qu'on afflige, Un coeur tendre, qui hait le néant vaste et noir! Le ciel est triste et beau comme un grand reposoir; Le soleil s'est noyé dans son sang qui se fige. Un coeur tendre, qui hait le néant vaste et noir, Du passé lumineux recueille tout vestige! Le soleil s'est noyé dans son sang qui se fige... Ton souvenir en moi luit comme un ostensoir!

Here comes the time when, vibrating on its stem, Each flower evaporates like a censer; The sounds and the perfumes revolve in the evening air; Melancholy waltz and languorous vertigo! Each flower evaporates like a censer; The violin trembles like an afflicted heart; Melancholy waltz and languorous vertigo! The sky is sad and beautiful like a great wayside-altar. The violin trembles like an afflicted heart, A tender heart, which hates the vast and black emptiness! The sky is sad and beautiful like a great wayside-altar. The sun has drowned in its blood, which congeals. A tender heart, which hates the vast and black emptiness, Collects all trace of the luminous past! The sun drowned in its blood, which congeals… Your memory shines within me like a monstrance!7

Figure 1. Charles Baudelaire, “Harmony du soir.” This example makes use of the following edition: Charles Martin Loeffler: Selected Songs with Chamber Accompaniment, edited by Ellen Knight. Recent Researches in American Music, vol. 16. Madison, WI: A-R Editions, Inc., 1988. Used with permission. www.areditions.com.

In this poem, Baudelaire focuses on three of our senses. He stimulates our sight by using flowers, the sky, and the sun; our hearing by mentioning the violin and a waltz; and our smell by referring to censors, and perfume. The combination of these sensations paint a harmonious, but melancholy evening. In the very last line, Baudelaire finally points to the main idea of the poem: the deep longing for a past romance. Baudelaire portrays a gorgeous romantic evening by using symbols such as flowers, perfume, dance music, violins, and the evening sky, all of which is his reminiscence of a happy and luminous past romance. By interplaying

with words such as “melancholy,” “languorous,” “afflicted hearts,” “sad,” “vast,” and “black emptiness,” the poet then etches his heartbreak onto the beautiful moment. The words “altar” and “monstrance” additionally indicate that the poet’s memory and love for the past lover is almost sacred and religious. Loeffler uses musical devices to transport the beauty in the poem in an original and novel way. In the music, Loeffler’s choice of ¾ meter corresponds to his choice of the word “waltz.” The characteristic waltz beating pattern of strong—weak—weak is especially evident in m.26 when the piano’s left-hand plays a strong down beat in a

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Journal of the American Viola Society / Vol. 40, No. 2, Fall 2024