Paul Hindemith

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The Lieder of Paul Hindemith

Lieder - index:

1. An die Parzen
2. Auf der Treppe sitzen meine Öhrchen, op. 18 no. 4
3. Echo
4. Envoy
5. Nähe des Geliebten
6. On a fly drinking out of his cup
7. On Hearing "The Last Rose of Summer"
8. The Moon
9. The Whistlin' Thief
10. The Wild Flower's Song
11. To Music, to becalm his Fever

1. "An die Parzen"
 
Text by Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843)
Music by Paul Hindemith, 1935

See also:

Wolfgang Fortner (1907-1987), 1934
Josef Matthias Hauer (1883-1959), op. 23 no. 4, published 1929
Paul von Klenau 1883-1946, 1942
Hermann Reutter (1900-1985), op. 56 no. 1 (publ. 1944)

 
Nur einen Sommer gönnt, ihr Gewaltigen!
Und einen Herbst zu reifem Gesange mir,
Daß williger mein Herz, vom süßen
Spiele gesättiget, dann mir sterbe.
Die Seele, der im Leben ihr göttlich Recht
Nicht ward, sie ruht auch drunten im Orkus nicht;
Doch ist mir einst das Heilge, das am
Herzen mir liegt, das Gedicht gelungen,
Willkommen dann, o Stille der Schattenwelt!
Zufrieden bin ich, wenn auch mein Saitenspiel
Mich nicht hinabgeleitet; einmal
Lebt ich, wie Götter, und mehr bedarfs nicht.

2. "Auf der Treppe sitzen meine Öhrchen"
 
Text by Christian Morgenstern (1871-1914)
Music by Paul Hindemith, "Auf der Treppe sitzen meine Öhrchen", op. 18 no. 4 (1922)

See also:

Ernest Vietor (fl. 1905-1930), "Auf der Treppe", op. 11 no. 13 (1933-4)

 
 
Auf der Treppe sitzen meine Öhrchen,
Wie zwei Kätzchen, die die Milch erwarten...
Auf der Treppe sitzt mein Herz und harret,
Wie ein Geistchen, Kinn in Hand gestützet.
Doch der Bote mit den Briefen kommt nicht.
Taub und ohne Seele drin im Zimmer
Lieg ich. Wünsche nichts zurück zu haben.
Nicht die rosa Kätzch, nicht das Geistchen.

3. "Echo"
 
Text by Thomas Moore (1779-1852)
Music by Paul Hindemith
 

How sweet the answer Echo makes
To music at night,
When, roused by lute or horn, she wakes,
And far away, o'er lawns and lakes,
Goes answering light!
Yet love hath echoes truer far
And far more sweet,
Than e'er, beneath the moonlight's star,
Of horn, or lute, or soft guitar,
The songs repeat.
'Tis when the sigh, in youth sincere,
And only then,
The sigh that's breath'd for one to hear,
Is by that one, that only dear,
Breath'd back again.

4. "Envoy"
 
Text by Francis Thompson (1859-1907)
Music by Paul Hindemith

 
Go, songs, for ended is our brief, sweet play;
Go, children of swift joy and tardy sorrow:
And some are sung, and that was yesterday,
And some are unsung, and that may be tomorrow.
Go forth; and if it be o'er stony way,
Old joy can lend what newer grief must borrow:
And it was sweet, and that was yesterday,
And sweet is sweet, though purchased with sorrow.
Go, songs, and come not back from your far way:
And if men ask you why ye smile and sorrow,
Tell them ye grieve, for your hearts know Today,
Tell them ye smile, for your eyes know Tomorrow.

5. "Ich denke dein, wenn mir der Sonne Schimmer"
 
Text by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)
Music by Paul Hindemith, "Nähe des Geliebten", 1914

See also:

Amy Marcy Cheney Beach (1867-1944), "Nähe des Geliebten", op. 35 no. 3, (Eng. title: "With Thee")
Leopold Damrosch (1832-1885), "Nähe des Geliebten", op. 17 no. 1
Stephen (István) Heller (1813-1888), "Nähe des Geliebten" (1830-8?)
Friedrich Heinrich Himmel (1765-1814), "Nähe des Geliebten" (1807?)
Josephine Lang (1815-1880), "Nähe des Geliebten", op. 5 no. 1
Eduard Lassen (1830-1904), "Nähe des Geliebten", op. 62 no. 1
Johann Karl Gottfried Loewe (1796-1869), "Ich denke dein" (I think of you), op. 9 vol. III no. 1 (1817?)
Johann Friedrich Reichardt (1752-1814), "Nähe des Geliebten" (1795?)
Franz Schubert (1797-1828), "Nähe des Geliebten", D. 162 (1815), published 1821 as op. 5 no 2
Robert Schumann (1810-1856), "Ich denke dein", op. 78 no. 3 (1849)
Václav Jan K`rtitel Tomá`sek (1774-1850), "Nähe des Geliebten", op. 53 no. 2, from Gedichte von Goethe
Karl Friedrich Zelter (1758-1832), "Nähe des Geliebten" (1808)
Winfried (Petrus Ignatius) Zillig (1905-1963), "Nähe des Geliebten" (1941), from Zehn Lieder nach Gedichten von Goethe
 

 
Ich denke dein, wenn mir der Sonne Schimmer
Vom Meere strahlt;
Ich denke dein, wenn sich des Mondes Flimmer
In Quellen malt.
Ich sehe dich, wenn auf dem fernen Wege
Der Staub sich hebt;
In tiefer Nacht, wenn auf dem schmalen Stege
Der Wandrer bebt.
Ich höre dich, wenn dort mit dumpfem Rauschen
Die Welle steigt.
Im stillen Hain da geh ich oft zu lauschen,
Wenn alles schweigt.
Ich bin bei dir, du seist auch noch so ferne.
Du bist mir nah!
Die Sonne sinkt, bald leuchten mir die Sterne.
O wärst du da!

6. "On a fly drinking out of his cup"
 
Text by William Oldys (1696-1761)
Music by Paul Hindemith
 

Busy, curious, thirsty fly!
Drink with me and drink as I:
Freely welcome to my cup,
Couldst thou sip and sip it up:
Make the most of life you may,
Life is short and wears away.
Both alike are mine and thine
Hastening quick to their decline:
Thine's a summer, mine no more,
Though repeated to threescore.
Threescore summers, when they're gone,
Will appear as short as one!

7. "On Hearing "The Last Rose of Summer" "
 
Text by Charles Wolfe (1791-1823)
Music by Paul Hindemith
 

That strain again? It seems to tell
Of something like a joy departed;
I love its mourning accents well,
Like voice of one, ah! broken-hearted.
That note that pensive dies away,
And can each answering thrill awaken,
It sadly, wildly, seems to say,
Thy meek heart mourns its truth forsaken.
Or there was one who never more
Shall meet thee with the looks of gladness,
When all of happier life was o'er,
When first began thy night of sadness.
Sweet mourner, cease that melting strain,
Too well it suits the grave's cold slumbers;
Too well the heart that loved in vain
Breathes, lives, and weeps in those wild numbers.

8. "The Moon"
 
Text by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
Music by Paul Hindemith
 

And, like a dying lady, lean and pale,
Who totters forth, wrapp'd in a gauzy veil,
Out of her chamber, led by the insane
And feeble wanderings of her fading brain,
The moon arose up in the murky East,
A white and shapeless mass...
Art thou pale for weariness
Of climbing heaven and gazing on the earth,
Wandering companionless
Among the stars that have a different birth,
And ever changing, like a joyless eye
That finds no object worth its constancy?

9. "The Whistlin' Thief"
 
Text by Samuel Lover (1797-1868)
Music by Paul Hindemith
 

When Pat came over the hill,
His Colleen fair to see,
His whistle low, but shrill,
The signal was to be;
"Mary," the mother said,
"Someone is whistlin' sure;"
Says Mary, "'tis only the wind
Is whistlin' through the door."
"I've lived a long time, Mary,
In this wide world, my dear,
But a door to whistle like that
I never yet did hear."
"But, mother, you know the fiddle
Hangs close beside the chink,
And the wind upon the sthtrings
Is playing the tchune I think."
"Mary, I hear the pig,
Unaisy in his mind."
"But, mother, you know, they say
The pigs can see the wind."
"That's thrue enough in the day,
But I think you may remark,
That pigs, no more nor we,
Can see anything in the dark."
"The dog is barkin' now,
The fiddle can't play that tchune."
"But, mother, the dogs will bark
Whenever they see the moon."
"But how could he see the moon,
When, you know, the dog is blind?
Blind dogs won't bark at the moon,
Nor fiddles be played by the wind.
"I'm not such a fool as you think,
I know very well 'tis Pat:
Shut your mouth, you whistlin' thief,
And go along home out o' that!
"And you go off to your bed,
Don't play upon me your jeers;
For though I have lost my eyes,
I haven't lost my ears!"

10. "The Wild Flower's Song"
 
Text by William Blake (1757-1827)
Music by Paul Hindemith
 

 
As I wander'd the forest,
The green leaves among,
I heard a wild flower
Singing a song:
"I slept in the dark
In the silent night,
I murmur'd my fears
And I felt delight.
"In the morning I went
As rosy as morn
To seek for a new Joy,
But I met with scorn."

11. "Charm me asleep, and melt me so"
 
Text by Robert Herrick (1591-1674)
Music by Paul Hindemith, , "To Music, to becalm his Fever"

See also:

Elliott Carter (b. 1908), "To Music"
 

Charm me asleep, and melt me so
With thy delicious numbers,
That, being ravish'd, hence I go
Away in easy slumbers.
Ease my sick head,
And make my bed,
Thou power that canst sever
From me this ill,
And quickly still,
Though thou not kill
My fever.
Thou sweetly canst convert the same
From a consuming fire
Into a gentle licking flame,
And make it thus expire.
Then make me weep
My pains asleep;
And give me such reposes
That I, poor I,
May think thereby
I live and die
'Mongst roses.
Fall on me like [the] silent dew,
Or like those maiden showers
Which, by the peep of day, do strew
A baptism o'er the flowers
Melt, melt my pains
With thy soft strains;
That, having ease me given,
With full delight
I leave this light,
And take my flight
For Heaven.