Hugo Wolf knew how to write about personal abuse! Oh No! has that sting in the tail that puts personal abuse into perspective.
How many women have the courage to say 'Oh No!'?
Some things are too uncomfortable to be said but they can be sung! That is the power of this song.
Most English speaking lovers of German Lieder have no idea of the power of this song. The accompaniment is misleading and it is meant to mislead. German speakers get the message, sadly English speakers and many singers do not.
This tuneful song is about bullying and personal abuse of one's partner that is to say lovers put up with being told they are the problem in a very nasty way.
A couple have just made love, the man is sleeping peacefully and his lover watches him, the music is tender and expresses that moment after the passion of the sexual act. The man is asleep and the woman ponders her fate.
Shall she wake him now and have another bout of lovemaking? Oh No! She will let him sleep on.
She imagines what her lover is dreaming. Maybe it is of her golden tresses that she attempts to brush each day that the wind blows all over? He loves to caress her hair. It turns him on
Shall she wake him now? Oh No! Let him dream on.
Then the music suddenly changes! She tells how all night he complains about her, how she wastes his time, how he stays too long. In a minute of extreme racist bullying he says her skin is too dark and then to add insult to injury he likens her to a snake but after he comes back again and sleeps on. yShe is supposed to accept this abuse meekly and gratefully.
Shall she wake him now? Not bloody likely. Bastard.
And that dear friends is the message of this song. Bravo Hugo Wolf.
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