Die Seejungfrau

Die Seejungfrau is a fantasy for large orchestra in three movements by Austrian composer Alexander von Zemlinsky, based on the folk-tale "The Little Mermaid" by Hans Christian Andersen.

Background

In April 1901 Zemlinsky began a romantic liaison with his pupil Alma Schindler, but Alma broke off the relationship that November after meeting Gustav Mahler, whom she would go on to marry four months later. Die Seejungfrau was, in part, an expression of the heartbreak and sense of rejection that Zemlinsky felt as a result. The work was begun in February 1902, with the orchestration completed in March 1903.
The work was first performed on 25 January 1905 at the Musikverein in Vienna with the Wiener Konzertverein Orchester conducted by the composer in a concert that also included the premiere of Arnold Schoenberg's Pelleas und Melisande. The critical response was largely favourable. Further performances followed in Berlin in December 1906, conducted by Walter Meyrowitz, and in Prague in November 1907, conducted by Artur Bodanzky.

Withdrawal and rediscovery

Some time after the Prague performance, Zemlinsky withdrew the work. Later, he gave the score of the first movement to his friend, Marie Pappenheim, as a gift. The second and third movements he took with him to New York after fleeing Austria in 1938. These were eventually deposited, along with the rest of Zemlinsky's manuscripts, with the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.
For many years after the composer's death, the score of Die Seejungfrau was presumed lost or destroyed. The second and third movements were assumed by Zemlinsky's widow Louise to be the surviving fragments of a symphony in E-flat major. In the early 1980s, two British Ph.D. students, Keith J. Rooke and Alfred Clayton, working separately, compared the items in Vienna and Washington and established that they belonged together. The first modern performance of the work was given by the Austrian Youth Orchestra conducted by Peter Gülke in 1984. Since then, the work has become one of Zemlinsky's most frequently performed and several recordings have appeared. A critical edition of the score, edited by Zemlinsky scholar Antony Beaumont, was published by Universal Edition in 2013. This includes a passage of 88 bars in the second movement, depicting the Mermaid's visit to the Mer-witch, which Zemlinsky expunged from the score before the première.

Instrumentation

;Woodwinds:
;Brass:
;Percussion:
;Strings:

Structure

The work consists of three movements:
The total playing time is around 47 minutes for the critical edition.