Many aspects emerge for me from the music of Schubert: His tragic short life (Listen to the opening introduction to this symphony), and the marvelous interplay he frequently composed between the strings and the wind instruments.
Schubert was only 19 years old when he composed his Symphony No. 4, to which he himself appended the name “Tragic.” The slow introduction features a powerful feeling of melancholy, which gives way to the storminess of the Allegro vivace.
Schubert scholars, who find the shadow of Beethoven throughout the “Tragic” Symphony, compare this theme to Beethoven’s C minor String Quartet Op. 18 and the Coriolanus Overture in
the same key.
A typically lyrical theme dominates the Andante movement. After a Menuetto and Trio, the closing Allegro presents a main theme, a stormy development and a conclusion that are related
to the first movement.
Listen now to this timeless music:
 by Franz Schubert){kind=link}