Today we will hear the entirety of “Liederkreis an die ferne Geliebte” (Beethoven's title, which means Song Cycle to the distant Beloved), sung beautifully by Fritz Wunderlich. Beethoven pioneered the concept of the "Liederkreis" in which the songs flow one to the next without interruption, and may be the only one to have composed in this way.
The poetic sequence “An die ferne Geliebte” was written by a young physician named Alois Isidor Jeitteles, who came from a prominent Bohemian-Jewish family in Prague, and who, together with his cousin Ignaz Jeitteles, edited the Jewish weekly "Siona". Jeitteles would later distinguish himself by working tirelessly for his patients during a dreadful cholera epidemic in Brno. "An die ferne Geliebte" was written in 1815 when he was 21.
Please refer to the earlier postings this week for text and translations.
Fritz Wunderlich; "AN DIE FERNE GELIEBTE"; Ludwig van Beethoven
Fritz Wunderlich; "AN DIE FERNE GELIEBTE"; Ludwig van Beethoven
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John Scialdone published this page in Daily Beethoven 2021-05-16 09:43:20 -0400