Das Wandern ist des Müllers Lust

"Das Wandern ist des Müllers Lust" ("To wander is the miller's delight")[1] is the first line of a poem by Wilhelm Müller, written in 1821 with the title "Wanderschaft" as part of a collection, Die schöne Müllerin. While wandern means hiking now, it referred to the required journeyman years of craftsmen when written, in this case of a miller.

"Das Wandern ist des Müllers Lust"
Poem and song
Zöllner's melody in an 1877 song book
English"To wander is the miller's delight"
Textby Wilhelm Müller
Melody
Composed1823 (1823)

The poem was set to music often, notably by Franz Schubert in 1823 titled "Das Wandern", as part of his song cycle Die schöne Müllerin, and by Carl Friedrich Zöllner, who wrote a four-part setting in 1844. With his melody, the poem became a popular German Wanderlied and Volkslied.

History of the text

The beginning of the poetry is based on the play Rose, die schöne Müllerin,[2] which premiered in the house of Friedrich August von Staegemann in Berlin in the fall of 1816.[3] Inspired by Giovanni Paisiellos opera La Molinara, Ludwig Berger wrote the plot as a Liedspiel. Berger requested more texts related to the topic, which Müller wrote during a study trip to Italy, completed in Dessau in 1820.[3] In the context of the cycle, the beginning reflects, beyond the joy of Wandern, the strict scheme of required Journeyman years as part of the training of craftsmen, who often longed for rest.[3][4] The text mentions in four short stanzas that "to wander is the miller's delight", comparing the steady restless motion of walking to that of the water driving mills, their wheels and stones, and asks in the fifths and last stanza leave from the master and his wife.[1]

The poem was published in 1821 in Sieben und siebzig Gedichte aus den hinterlassenen Papieren eines reisenden Waldhornisten (Seven and seventy poems from the bequested papers of a travelling hornist).[4][5]

Musical settings

The poem was first set to music by Franz Schubert in 1923, titled "Das Wandern", as part of his song cycle Die schöne Müllerin, together with 19 other poems from the cycle.[4] Several others set it to music, including Heinrich Marschner,[6] Otto Nicolai and Karl Hellmuth Dammas.[7]

In 1844, Carl Friedrich Zöllner composed a four-part setting for men's chorus. With his melody, the poem became a popular German Wanderlied and Volkslied (folk song).[4][2][8] It was included in collections before 1900, such as Ludwig Erk's Singvögelein – Ein-, zwei- und dreistimmige Lieder (Little songbird – songs for one, two and three voices) which appeared in 1883 in its 59th edition, and in 1895 in Franz Magnus Böhme's Volksthümliche Lieder der Deutschen im 18. und 19. Jahrhundert (Folkloric songs of the Germans in the 18th and 19th centuries).[4] When the Wandervogel youth movement was founded in 1905, the song became part of many of its songbooks but not of the standard Der Zupfgeigenhansl.[4] It remained popular, but was not part of typical Nazi songbooks.[4] After World War II, the catalogue of Deutsches Musikarchiv listed around 350 recordings and 160 sheet music versions. It remained a favourite also in Austria and Switzerland.[4]

Monument
Miller's well with the beginning of the text

The Müllerbrunnen in Plauen shows the beginning of the text.

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References
  1. "Songs / Das Wandern (1823) D795a". oxfordlieder.co.uk. 2020. Retrieved 4 August 2020.
  2. "Das Wandern ist des Müllers Lust". BR (in German). 28 December 2011. Retrieved 4 August 2020.
  3. Erika von Borries (2007), Wilhelm Müller: Der Dichter der Winterreise. Eine Biographie (in German), München: C.H. Beck, pp. 126f
  4. Nagel, Georg (27 February 2016). "Das Wandern ist des Müllers Lust". lieder-archiv.de (in German). Retrieved 8 August 2020.
  5. Wilhelm Müller, ed. (1821), Sieben und siebzig Gedichte aus den hinterlassenen Papieren eines reisenden Waldhornisten (in German), Dessau: Christian, pp. 7f
  6. Friedrich Karl von Erlach, ed. (1836), Die Volkslieder der Deutschen (in German), 5, Mannheim: Heinrich Hoff, pp. 369f
  7. G. W. Fink (1841), "Mehrstimmige Lieder und Gesänge ohne Begleitung", Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung (in German), Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, Band 43, p. 981
  8. Brekle, Ursula. "Das Wandern ist des Müllers Lust". leipzig-lese.de (in German). Retrieved 4 August 2020.
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