The waltz, however, was protected by its very fashionableness, by the ubiquity of dancing as an element of evening entertainment in and outside the home, and by its crossing of the lines of class status. Long before 1815, when the Congress of Vienna seems to have been characterized as much by dancing as by diplomacy, the passion for dancing had swept past the occasional complaints and sporadic censorship. Litschauer and Deutsch give some idea of the remarkable extent of activity during this period, in terms of the range and character of venues, the dance's popularity among all social classes, and the intimate connection to the contemporary folkloristic movement (1-17). To the latter, they write that "the first decades of the nineteenth century distinguish themselves through an aesthetic intertwining of social dance and folk dance such as had never happened before in the history of European dance culture. The deutsche, the ländler, the schottisch, the polonaise and the mazurka, the Styrische, the Schwäbische, the Strassburgoise, the Anglaise, the Française, and the waltz are only some of the dance categories that contributed to this folkloristically vibrant era" (11; my translation).
The great public dance halls of Vienna–-especially the Sperl (opened 1807) and the Apollo-saal (1808)–-could often hold a thousand people at a time (an astonishing six thousand in the Apollo-saal if one counts both grounds and dancehalls) and quickly became great gathering places for wealthier middle class citizens and occasionally for members of the aristocracy as well (Aldrich; Hanson, 163-7; Salmen, 98). In addition to the public venues, house balls and a wide array of private gatherings and dance parties were common and quite as important to dance culture as they were to music—as we know, since these latter were the venues that nurtured Schubert.
We do not know if Schubert ever found his way into any of the large halls (friends certainly had the social status to facilitate this, but he is known to have disliked dressing up for social events). We do know, however, that he regularly played (though he did not dance) at house balls and parties (Deutsch, Mem, 121; Hanson, 152; Litschauer and Deutsch, 28, 151). (The great dividing line in Schubert's social life is early 1823, when the first symptoms appeared of the syphilis he had apparently contracted in December 1822. At first because of disfigurement, then due to true ill-health, he avoided social and public gatherings for most of 1823 and early 1824 and was active only sporadically thereafter (Bevan, 245-8, 257-8).)
Schubert was not the only performer for dancing at the balls and dance parties of his friends. Josef von Gahy was an excellent pianist who performed many of Schubert's keyboard works and sometimes substituted for Schubert. Josef von Spaun, in fact, seems to hint that Gahy's playing was esteemed better than the composer's own: "from time to time [Schubert] surprised us dancing enthusiasts with the most beautiful Deutsche Tänze and Écossaises . . . . Gahy had the knack of playing these wonderful dances with such fire that the dancers were quite electrified by them" (Deutsch, Mem, 133). Franz von Schober also recalls that Gahy "used to play the Schubert dances so remarkably on the piano and . . . never tired of playing, in his masterly way, for nights on end at our dances" (Deutsch, Mem, 207). Spaun, similarly, writes that Gahy "often sacrificed himself to the young people's dancing for whole nights at a time, bringing fire and life to the party with the wonderful Schubert dances" (Deutsch, Mem, 358).
These events varied in their programs but were typically constituted as some combination of dance, party, and meal(s). Examples with contemporary descriptions are cited in Litschauer and Deutsch, 23-29. Here is one from Franz von Hartmann's diary: "I went to Spaun's, where there was a big, big Schubertiade ... There was a huge gathering ... When the music was done there was grand eating and then dancing" (Deutsch, Doc, 571-72). If there was no dancing, participants might disperse to taverns or coffee-houses (according to Hartmann's recollections (Deutsch, Mem, 274), where they almost certainly heard music.
Christopher Gibbs describes the Schubertiades as
unpublicized events devoted primarily or exclusively to his music. Usually given by the composer's more well-to-do friends and patrons (although not the high-ranking men that supported Beethoven), they offered an informal, sociable atmosphere that often included recitations, eating, drinking, and dancing. The number of participants at a Schubertiade could range from a handful to over a hundred, and their frequency varied; some years saw weekly gatherings (or more), other years saw none. (74)
All this is not to imply that Schubert's dances were strictly segregated from "concert" music: as Litschauer and Deutsch observe, "From the evidence of various diaries and memoirs [of his friends], we can deduce that [Schubert's dances] were primarily played as functional dance music, but sometimes also as performance pieces [Vortragsstücke]" (150; my translation). Hartmann recalled that, in February 1827, "there was a particularly successful dance at Schober's, when Schubert played his beautiful 'Valses nobles'" (Deutsch, Mem, 276)–-this set is more amenable to performance and less to dancing than any of Schubert's collections other than the posthumous Letzte Walzer. On the other hand, a reminiscence by Ludwig August Frankl describes an occasion where Schubert "had a great triumph. A large company was there, including the Duke of Reichstadt. [Schubert] sang and played his things. They got ready for dancing, whereupon he played and improvised waltzes; they listened, asked him to go on playing, completely forgot the dancing and so it went on till long after midnight. They departed enraptured, he likewise, the triumph had delighted him" (Deutsch, Mem, 265).
Postscript: In Warsaw at the same time–-and to a lesser extent in Paris–-Chopin served a role similar to that of Schubert at salon balls and private parties. Unlike Schubert, however, who according to accounts of several friends never danced, Chopin was a willing and expert dancer (McKee 109, 118).) To complicate matters, McKee observes that "Chopin was not only receptive to the needs of the dancers, but was also able to translate their bodily motions into an artistic musical vision. . . . Only after he left Warsaw in 1830 did Chopin begin consistently to introduce nondance elements. . . . Even so, many of Chopin's Viennese and Parisian waltzes are eminently danceable, and the distinction between functional and stylized was largely a matter of how they were used in their social context" (121).
References:
Aldrich, Elizabeth. "Social Dancing in Schubert's World." In Raymond Erickson, ed. Schubert's Vienna, 119-40. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997.
Bevan, Peter Gilroy. "Adversity: Schubert's Illnesses and Their Background." In Newbould, Brian, ed. Schubert the Progressive: History, Performance Practice, Analysis, 244-66. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998.
Deutsch, Otto. Rosamond Ley and John Nowell. trans. Schubert: Memoirs by His Friends. London: A. & C. Black, 1958.
Deutsch, Otto. Eric Blom, trans. Schubert: A Documentary Biography. London: J. M. Dent, 1946.
Gibbs, Christopher. The Life of Schubert. London: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
Hanson, Alice. Musical Life in Biedermeier Vienna. London: Cambridge University Press, 1985.
Litschauer, Walburga, and Walter Deutsch. Schubert und das Tanzvergnügen. Vienna: Holzhausen, 1997.
McKee, Eric. "Dance and the Music of Chopin: The Waltz." In Goldberg, Halina, ed. The Age of Chopin: Interdisciplinary Inquiries, 106-61. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004.
Salmen, Walter. Tanz im 19. Jahrhundert. Leipzig: VEB Deutscher Verlag für Musik, 1989.
