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- Gerald Hugh Tyrwhitt-Wilson
Three Songs in The German Manner (1919)
- Chester Music Ltd (World)
Programme Note
i. Du bist wie eine Blume
ii. König Wismawitra
iii. Weihnachtslied
These three settings of Heinrich Heine, Berners’ only excursion into the German language, are evidence of his linguistic range and agility. However, parody is never far from his mind, and in the preface to the first song, the listener is given some clue as to what follows:
“According to one of Heine’s biographers, this poem was inspired by a white pig that the poet had met with in the course of a walk in the county. He was, it appears, for some time afterwards, haunted by the thought of the melancholy fate in store for it and the note of foreboding that runs through the poem is thus explained. This fact does not seem to have been sufficiently appreciated by those who have hitherto set the poem to music and the present version is an attempt to restore to the words their rightful significance, while at the same time preserving the sentimental character of the German lied.”
The second song describes the attempts of a king to own a girl’s cow, through bouts of fighting and fasting – a case of coveting one’s neighbour’s ox taken to extremes! The third song is a brilliant yet touching imitation of the naïve spirit of German folksong – in the case, a Christmas carol telling the story of the Wise men. The very full piano accompaniment (four-note chords and bass octaves) sounds strangely reminiscent of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition in places, particularly in the piano interlude towards the end.
© Philip Lane
ii. König Wismawitra
iii. Weihnachtslied
These three settings of Heinrich Heine, Berners’ only excursion into the German language, are evidence of his linguistic range and agility. However, parody is never far from his mind, and in the preface to the first song, the listener is given some clue as to what follows:
“According to one of Heine’s biographers, this poem was inspired by a white pig that the poet had met with in the course of a walk in the county. He was, it appears, for some time afterwards, haunted by the thought of the melancholy fate in store for it and the note of foreboding that runs through the poem is thus explained. This fact does not seem to have been sufficiently appreciated by those who have hitherto set the poem to music and the present version is an attempt to restore to the words their rightful significance, while at the same time preserving the sentimental character of the German lied.”
The second song describes the attempts of a king to own a girl’s cow, through bouts of fighting and fasting – a case of coveting one’s neighbour’s ox taken to extremes! The third song is a brilliant yet touching imitation of the naïve spirit of German folksong – in the case, a Christmas carol telling the story of the Wise men. The very full piano accompaniment (four-note chords and bass octaves) sounds strangely reminiscent of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition in places, particularly in the piano interlude towards the end.
© Philip Lane