© Schiller Institute, Inc., 1992
MUSIC
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..
�-------�--
How Beethoven Set Schiller's Poetry
A
ccording to Ludwig van Bee­
thoven's biographer Alexander
Wheelock
penned
Thayer,
the
the
following
Gesang der Monche
composer
reflections
Rasch tritt der Tod den menschen an,
Es ist ihm keine Frist gegeben.
Es stiirzt ihn mitten in der Bahn,
Es reiBt ihn fort vom vollen Leben.
during early 1817:
"He who wishes to reap tears
should sow love.
Bereitet oder nicht zu gehen!
Er muB vor seinem Richter stehen!
"The Compassionate Brothers in
Tell, form a semi-circle around the
Monks'Song
Quickly comes Man's death,
He is given no reprieve.
It strikes him mid-course,
It rips him from the prime of life.
Whether ready to go or not!
He must stand before his judge!
dead man, and sing in deep tones:
[Beethoven here inscribes the lines
of Schiller's "Monks' Song," and
continues:]
"This one thing I feel and clearly
comprehend: Possessions are not the
Schmerz, und ewig ist die Freude"
frequent vIsitor to his apartment,
("The pain is short, but the joy is
was a willing sounding-board for his
eternal"), based on the final lines of
musical compositions.
highest things in life, but guilt is the
yet another Schiller play, The Virgin
greatest evil. ...
of Orleans.
"Sensual enjoyment
without
a
union of souls is bestial and will al­
ways remain bestial; after it, one ex­
periences not a trace of noble senti­
ment but rather regret."
These lines reveal the powerful
spiritual bond which united Beetho­
ven with the German poet Friedrich
Schiller, and indicate that during
these months, Beethoven was inten­
sively studying Schiller's three last
plays. With William Tell, Beethoven
refers to the final scene of Act IV, in
which the monks gather around the
corpse of the tyrant slain by Tell's
arrow. Beethoven's
comment
on
guilt is an almost exact quotation of
the final three lines of Schiller's play
The Bride of Messina. And only a few
months before this, Beethoven had
composed the canon "Kurz ist der
The study of classical settings of poetry
is perhaps the most efficient way. to
learn the principles of poetic composi­
tion. Selections offered here are either
previously unpublished, or no longer
available in print.
70
\
Beethoven's student Carl Czerny
reports that Krumpholz "was a mu­
Beethoven's musical setting of the
sical enthusiast whose passion for
"Monks' Song" typifies what united
music was carried to the most extrav­
him with Schiller: the drive to seek
agant lengths. ...[a}nd Beethoven,
universal truth in any material at
who ordinarily was most reticent
hand, thus transforming the lowly
with everyone regarding his musical
into the sublime and the beautiful.
projects, told Krumpholz about all
In William Tell, Tell's justified slay­
his ideas, played every new composi­
ing of the tyrant is foliowed not by
tion for him time and again, and
jubilation-which would have de­
improvised for him every day.'!·
graded the audience by celebrating
After the "Monks' Song," Beetho­
death-but rather by the monks' ad­
ven's next setting of a Schiller text
monition to the members of the audi­
was his greatest, the "Ode to Joy"
ence to reflect on whether they would
in the last movement of the Ninth
be able to bear the awful responsibil­
Symphony. This was the culmina­
ity to save the nation, borne by the
tion of his thirty-year effort to de­
patriot Tell.
velop an entirely fitting setting of a
Shortly after he wrote the above
Schiller poem-one which would
lines, Beethoven chose to compose
not just fit the words like a well­
a setting of the "Monks' Song" in
tailored jacket (as Goethe had mis­
dedication to his dear friend, the vio­
takenly
linist Wenzel Krumpholz, who died
would reflect Schiller's requirement,
suddenly on May 3, 1817. Krump­
expressed in a letter to Gottfried
holz had played an important role in
Korner, that
Beethoven's development beginning
paint in words and surrender itself
in 1795, when Beethoven began to
to petty game-playing, but rather, it
demanded),
but
which
"Music must never
take violin lessons with him. Krum­
must follow the spirit of the poetry
pholz soon became one of Beetho­
in its entirety!"
ven's staunchest defenders, and, as a
-John Sigerson
Gesang der Monche
aus SchUler's Wilhelm Tell
in Musik gesetzt von
Ludwig van Beethoven
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71