Friedrich Rückert

From ChoralWiki

Aliases: Freimund Raimar

Life

Born: 16 May 1788

Died: 31 January 1866

Biography
Friedrich Rückert was a German poet, translator, and professor of Oriental languages. When Rückert began his literary career, Germany was engaged in her life-and-death struggle with Napoleon; and in his first volume, Deutsche Gedichte (German Poems), published in 1814 under the pseudonym Freimund Raimar, he gave, particularly in the powerful Geharnischte Sonette (Sonnets in Arms/Harsh Words), vigorous expression to the prevailing sentiment of his countrymen.

Rückert was master of thirty languages and made his mark chiefly as a translator of Oriental poetry and as a writer of poems conceived in the spirit of Oriental masters.

Rückert's poetry was a powerful inspiration to composers and there are about 121 settings of his work — behind only Goethe, Heine and Rilke in this respect. Among the composers who set his poetry to music are Schubert, Robert and Clara Schumann, Brahms, Mahler, Richard Strauss, Zemlinsky, Hindemith, Bartók, Berg, Hugo Wolf and Heinrich Kaspar Schmid.

View Wikipedia article for Friedrich Rückert.

Settings of his literary works

• Abendfriede (Josef Rheinberger)
• Der alte Barbarossa (Friedrich Silcher)
• An die Sterne, Op. 141, No. 1 (Robert Schumann)
• Du bist die Ruh (Franz Schubert)
• Fahr wohl, Op. 93a, No. 4 (Johannes Brahms)
• Gute Nacht, Op. 59, No. 4 (Robert Schumann)
• Die Rose stand im Tau, Op. 65, No. 1 (Robert Schumann)
• Symphony of Dreams (Huub de Lange)
• Widmung (Robert Schumann)

Publications

External links

add web links here