In the last thirty years or so, Schubert's harmony has been scrutinized from a number of different analytical perspectives, notably Roman numeral analysis, Schenkerian theory, and transformation or neo-Riemannian theory. David Damschroder laments that Schenkerian theory seems to be ‘neglected nowadays’ (p. 265) by the discipline generally, and his book is a spirited defence of the theory as a framework for understanding Schubert's harmonic language. Damschroder's book is in two parts of roughly equal length. The first lays out the theoretical foundations for his analytical system that combines an orthodox Schenkerian approach with a substantially reformulated approach to Roman numerals. The second part of the book is a series of analytical commentaries on eleven works or movements of works. This second part is entitled ‘Masterpieces’, which Damschroder explains (p. ix) is in homage to Schenker's landmark analytic essays in Das Meisterwerk in der Musik.Footnote 1

In order for readers to get the most out of the book, it is crucial to begin with the Preface. There, Damschroder explains his idiosyncratic analytical symbols. For example, the use of a hyphen or an en dash can make all the difference in following his analyses: C-E-G means a simultaneity, while C–E–G is a pitch succession. C<E<G and C>E>G are ascending and descending melodic succession respectively. There are numerous other new symbols (so, again, readers should take care to start with the Preface). The main thrust of Damschroder's new theoretical methodology may be ascertained by focusing on his treatment of diatonic and chromatic third relations and harmonic events on scale degree II. Part I reveals a significant reduction in the variety of Roman numeral labels: III, VI, or VII (or their chromatic variants) seldom appear; I, II, IV, and V are commonplace. The virtual absence of III and VI may seem especially curious in a book about a composer who is legendary for his use of third relations. This is not due to any lack of interest in these harmonies. On the contrary, Damschroder scrutinizes every plausible harmonic scenario in Schubert's œuvre, exemplified with copious musical examples. To my mind this inventory of Schubert's harmony is Damschroder's most significant contribution to Schubert studies.

I, II, IV and V prevail because harmonic events are characterized through the Tonic–Predominant–Dominant–Tonic formula. According to Damschroder's model, both upper- and lower-third relations feature mainly as neighbouring motions or sequential patterns within larger-scale prolongations (usually a tonic), and the predominant function is either IV or chord II and its variants. In short, Damschroder discards such traditional symbols as ii, V/V, vii°⁷/V, Ger⁺⁶ and so forth in favour of a family of eleven triadic, seventh, and ninth chords all emerging from scale degree II. Following the practice of Schenker, then, he eschews V/V in favour of II#. Also following Schenker, he eschews the distinction between major and minor through capital and miniscule numerals in favour of capitals accompanied by Arabic numbers and accidentals. A standard exposition of a sonata form in a major key would thus entail the following large-scale harmonic analysis: I–II#–V.

While Damschroder reduces the assortment of Roman numerals, there is no paucity of information in his system. At its most detailed, he employs three layers of data: (1) a notational layer, in the form of the score or a Schenkerian or harmonic reduction; (2) placed underneath the notational layer is a layer comprising figured bass; (3) beneath the figured bass appears an analysis of the chordal roots and voice-leading in an idealized format. According to Damschroder (p. 267, n. 6), the two sets of figures in layers (2) and (3) were inspired by the late- eighteenth-century Abbé Vogler's double analysis of figured and fundamental bassFootnote 2. Damschroder's method of representing the voice leading in layer (3) is his most important innovation. As a straightforward illustration of his method, take the large-scale harmonic move in the exposition of the first movement of Schubert's Unfinished: the move from B minor for the first theme to G major for the second is not I–VI (nor even i–VI) but rather arises through what Damschroder calls a ‘5–6 shift’, which he labels I^5–6. The ‘subdominant region’ therefore takes place within the tonic function. Numerous instances of I^5–6, especially those at the foreground level, appear throughout Part I, but many have the bracketed symbol (=VI) or its chromatic variants written underneath, presumably to remind readers of its more traditional analytical interpretation (see graphs on pp. 16–21, 27–28, 40, 42, 49, 87, 111).

Technically Damschroder's method can handle any harmonic move and any number of pitches in a chord. I^5–6, for instance, may be extended to any chromatic third relation. Damschroder provides an example from ‘Fülle der Liebe’ (bars 89–90) of the most distant third relation (p. 58). Known to neo-Riemannian theorists as the hexatonic poleFootnote 3 (denoted by PLP), Damschroder annotates the move from the root position A♭ major harmony to the first inversion E minor harmony as follows:

Damschroder's system can easily accommodate chords beyond trichords, which is certainly an advantage over neo-Riemannian theory, whose core focus has been consonant triadic entities. However, unlike the neo-Riemannian system, his method demands the identification of a key; one has to decide which harmony is the tonic, even if it is perfunctory. Schubert's music can be difficult to pin down in this respect. Damschroder's solution under such circumstances is not to employ Roman numeral labels. The opening harmony of the song ‘Ganymed’ is a case in point: ‘Under normal circumstances the initial A♭ chord might be labelled as a I. Yet … the lied's tonal focus is sufficiently elusive as to make such a decisive label inappropriate’ (p. 138). It is precisely where Roman numerals break down that neo-Riemannian steps in, for it is a system that focuses on voice leading rather than key.

Although Damschroder and neo-Riemannian theorists share a fascination with Schubert's voice leading, Damschroder's critique of transformation theory, which appears in Part II of the book, reveals that he is ill at ease with the conversion of pitches or chords from musical objects to relations between objects that transformation theory brings. He comments that David Kopp's musical examples ‘lack Roman numerals’ (p. 191).Footnote 4 Instead, Kopp's transformational analyses employ ‘letters such as D (for a dominant relationship of a descending perfect fifth) and M (for a mediant relationship of a descending major third) between adjacent (or sometimes non-adjacent) roots’ (p. 191). Confronted with these novelties, Damschroder writes: ‘I admit from the outset, however, that I find the absence of Roman numerals in his music examples an unnecessary hindrance to comprehension. I often inserted them as I read his discussion of a passage, without harm to his perspective’ (p. 191, my italics). The whole point of transformation theory is that it dispenses with the need for Roman numerals – in other words, for grounding passages in a key. We saw earlier the problem that a lack of tonal focus posed for placing a I under the opening A♭ of ‘Ganymed’. A circle of thirds, for instance, ‘warrants no harmonic interpretation’ and is likely to be analyzed as part of a tonic prolongation, as I–( )–II#–V–I. Passages where Damschroder is happy to leave an empty space within brackets is again precisely where transformation theory best fills in the blanks. Given Damschroder's need to translate the less familiar conception of transformation into the more familiar Roman numeral analysis, it is small wonder that he misinterprets the theoretical motivation behind Kopp's analysis of chromatic third relations as independent entities – in other words, it does harm his perspective. Similar misinterpretations of other scholars’ theoretical positions and analytical observations mar the other essays in the second half of the book.

As mentioned earlier, Part II of Damschroder's book is a series of analytical essays on individual pieces or movements of works by Schubert, styled after Schenker's Das Meisterwerk. Additionally, each chapter is a response to a specific scholar's analysis of that work. So prominent is Damschroder's exchange with these scholars that he lists their names in the chapter titles, as follows: Chapter 5, ‘“Ganymed” (D. 544) with Lawrence Kramer and Suzannah Clark’, followed by Chapter 6, ‘Quintet in A Major (“Trout”, D. 667), mvt 1 with David Beach’; Chapter 7, ‘Symphony in B Minor (“Unfinished”, D. 759), mvt 1 with Richard Taruskin’; Chapter 8, ‘Piano Sonata in A Minor (D. 784), mvt 2 with Robert S. Hatten’; Chapter 9, ‘“Die junge Nonne” (D. 828) with David Kopp’; Chapter 10, ‘Four Impromptus (D. 899) with Charles Fisk’; Chapter 11 ‘“Auf dem Flusse” from Winterreise (D. 911, No. 7) with David Lewin’; and Chapter 12, ‘Piano Sonata in B♭ Major (D. 960), mvt 1 with Richard L. Cohn’. Even the structure of each chapter echoes Schenker's Das Meisterwerk: Damschroder begins with his own analysis of the work and then explains where each scholar went wrong. Schenker took the same tactic in warding off competing analytical systems. By following Schenker's mode of attacking detractors, the second part of Damschroder's book is a disappointment: his criticisms of other scholars read very much as though he is grading exams – and only David Beach gets an A. But then again, only David Beach works within the confines of Schenker's theory, Damschroder's preferred method.

While Damschroder has certainly chosen to debate with important voices in Schubert scholarship, he explains that he will not comment on the scholarship of Susan McClary because she was his ‘official mentor’ at Minnesota before he was awarded tenure, and he will not include the work of Steven Rings or Walter Everett because they were his students (p. 284, n. 2). This is a highly unusual reasoning for bibliographic deselection and has the unfortunate effect of leaving out arguably the most influential voice in recent Schubert scholarship (McClary), a prominent Schenkerian and Schubert scholar (Everett), and a rising star in neo-Riemannian theory (Rings). Each of these scholars has written in depth about harmonic moves that are central to Damschroder's new theory.Footnote 5

Damschroder reserves most criticism for scholars who do not share his Schenkerian or Roman numeral perspective. Indeed, with the exception of David Beach, all scholars he criticizes are testing out new ways to analyze Schubert's music because they believe in one way or another that existing methods (such as Schenkerian and Roman numeral analysis) inadequately explain Schubert's harmony. When others use different analytical tools in order to drive at a different perspective on Schubert's harmony, Damschroder does not appreciate that their different perspectives are just that: a different perspective. Damschroder does not allow for alternatives: as he writes in the Epilogue, ‘Granted, adopting the analytical procedures that I have espoused in Harmony in Schubert means forsaking others’ (p. 265). Damschroder is so wedded to his Schenkerian viewpoint and to his idiosyncratic Roman numeral system that, when he applies it to Schubert's music, he considers his analysis to be correct and inevitable and the analyses of others to be flawed and inconsistent.

Although space does not permit me to point out all the occasions on which Damschroder misrepresents the arguments of other scholars, a few examples will suffice to illustrate representative problems. With respect to Lewin's analysis of Schubert's setting of Müller's question ‘Mein Herz, in diesem Bache erkennst du nun dein Bild?’Footnote 6, Damschroder concludes (p. 244):

However, one would only conclude that Lewin takes the negative view if one reads only p. 57 of his article. On p. 47, Lewin explains that the overall argument of his article will be to show that there are both positive and negative answers to this question, as follows:

With respect to my own analysis of ‘Ganymed’Footnote 8, Damschroder reads my graph through Schenkerian eyes and wonders ‘At what level is Clark intending to represent the lied?’ (p. 144). Furthermore, on finding few traditional progressions or linear/contrapuntal paths in my graph, he concludes that ‘she is consistent in her views, but in my opinion consistently mistaken’ (p. 147). However, my graph is not a Schenkerian one. My point was that while a traditional Schenkerian would read Schubert's double-tonic song (it begins in A♭ major and ends in F major) against Schenker's monotonal background, Schubert modelled his setting against his predecessor's Johann Friedrich Reichardt. Reichardt's setting also began and ended a third apart, albeit a major third from D major to B♭ major. My analysis therefore substitutes Reichardt's song as the conceptual ‘background structure’ for the Schenkerian background norm and illustrates that Schubert undoes traditional progressions and linear/contrapuntal paths. Similarly when criticizing Richard Cohn's hexatonic reading of Schubert's Sonata in B♭ MajorFootnote 9, he says that the harmonies that he interprets as operating within a standard diatonic progression are ‘bizarrely distributed among the regions of Cohn's matrix’ (p. 263). But they are only ‘bizarre’ if one is unable to slip into the shoes of another theoretical paradigm. For those passages where Damschroder's diatonic perspective leaves empty brackets, Cohn is able to show that they form neat, logical patterns on his carefully designed matrix.

At the outset of his book, Damschroder says – entirely reasonably – that he will not necessarily analyze every single detail in the passages of Schubert's music he examines. He often leaves out the figured bass (i.e. layer (2) of his three-tiered analysis) in the case of inversions, an omission of detail he allows himself ‘if that information is not germane to the topic under discussion’ (p. 5). He claims (p. 267, n. 7) that he was inspired by the historical precedent of Johann Christian Lobe, who would also leave out such details when not germane to his discussion. Yet Damschroder extends no such Lobe-esque license to his fellow Schubertians: his chief technique of critique is to chastise scholars for leaving things out. But if one reads their original articles and books, their omissions invariably were not germane to their discussion. Sometimes this is explicit: in the case of his critique of Hatten and TaruskinFootnote 10, Damschroder writes:

To the first question, one may invoke the Lobe defence.

Concerning Taruskin's analysis of the first movement of Schubert's Unfinished, Damschroder concedes that ‘Taruskin does not attempt as thorough an analytical presentation as mine’ (p. 174). Yet soon, apropos of the exposition's submediant region, Damschroder complains that:

Once again, there is no Lobe defence accorded to Taruskin. He was indeed not interested in attempting as through an analysis as Damschroder, for his focus was on the novel features of Schubert's symphonic form.

The book will be useful for those who are looking for analyses from a Schenkerian and Roman numeral perspective of some of Schubert's most famous works. Damschroder ends Harmony in Schubert by indicating that the ‘next phase of this study’ will focus on composers from Haydn to Chopin. If Damschroder again plans to critique the analytical studies of other scholars, it is imperative for the integrity of his project that he devotes more attention to characterizing their arguments faithfully.