- Wolf composed his Italienische Serenade for string quartet on May 2-4, 1887. He arranged the work for chamber orchestra in 1892.
- Wolf’s Oxford Music article calls this piece a “tongue-in-cheek caricature of a serenade.”
- Wolf loved and related deeply to Joseph von Eichendorff’s novella Aus dem Leben eines Taugenichts (From the Life of a Good-for-Nothing), which includes a scene with an group of serenaders playing outside a castle. Musicologist Eric Sams has suggested that the novella scene may have inspired this piece of music.
- Listen for: the serenade begins with open fifths, as though a makeshift ensemble is tuning their instruments to begin to play.1
Sources
- Eric Sams and Susan Youens, “Wolf, Hugo.” Grove Music Online (2001). accessed August 13, 2021, https://www.oxfordmusiconline./grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000052073.
Cut IDs
15872 17257 18361 20272 49938