Opus 094 – “An die Hoffnung”: “Ob ein Gott sei?” – “Die du so gern in heil’gen Nächten feierst”, for voice and piano
Poco sostenuto – Larghetto
Opus 94 – An die Hoffnung: Ob ein Gott sei?: Die du so gern in heil’ gen Nächten – feierst for voice and piano Op. 94, dedicated to the princess Caroline Kinsky, autumn 1813-1815, published in Vienna, Steiner, April 1816. GA. n. 223 (serie 23/9) – Boett. IX/7 – B. 94 – KH. 94 -L. IV, p. 259 – N. 94 – T. 204.
The original manuscript is preserved in the Harvard University Library in Cambridge (Mass.). Sketches were reported by Nottebohm. The same subject, based on the same verses from Tiedge’s Urania, had already been treated by Beethoven in 1802, with different music, in a song of affectionate homage, probably intended for Josephine Brunsvik.
Taking it up again now, the composer—aside from the musical differences—considered the feeling of hope from a more general and impersonal point of view, creating a true little poem, to which Tiedge’s own title might perhaps be even more appropriate: Klage des Ziveifels.
To the invocation of hope (“Die du so gern”), with which Op. 32 began, he here precedes—setting it with striking musical force—the questioning (from Tiedge’s first song): “Ob ein Gott sei? ob er einst erfülle, was die Sehnsucht weinend sich verspricht? ob vor irgend einem Weltgericht, sich dies rätselhaftu Sein enthülle?” But he lets it be followed by a vigorous affirmation of faith (also from Tiedge’s text): “Hoffen soll der Mensch! er frage nicht!”
After this preamble, the song unfolds to the text of the three stanzas already set in 1802. But the music, as noted, is entirely different, and different for each stanza—melodically coloured, with variety of movement, tonal transitions, and expressive inflections.
[By Biamonti Giovanni – Catalogo cronologico e tematico delle opere di Beethoven comprese quelle inedite e gli abbozzi non utilizzati, Torino, ILTE 1968]
Official title: Opus 94 An die Hoffnung, Lied nach einem Gedicht von Christoph August Tiedge für Singstimme und Klavier Widmung: Maria Charlotte (Caroline) Fürstin Kinsky NGAXII/1 Nr. 61 AGA 223 = Serie 23/9
Origin and publication: This Lied was probably composed in the spring of 1815 in Vienna. The original edition was published in April 1816 by Steiner & Comp, Vienna. The autograph score and the few existing sketches—based on the type of paper used and on the accompanying notes to other, more precisely dated works—indicate a revision in the spring of 1815 of the poem (Op. 32), already set to music in 1805. The singer Franz Wild (1792–1860) reports on his first contact with Beethoven on the occasion of a concert on 23 December 1814 in Vienna: “Durch meinen Vortrag [der ,Adelaide‘ op. 46] zufriedengestellt, sprach er mir gegenüber die Absicht aus, das Lied zu instrumentiren. Dazu kam es zwar nicht, doch schrieb er für mich die Kantate An die Hoffnung1 (Text von Tiedge) mit Klavierbegleitung, welche ich, von ihm selbst accompagnirt, in einer Matinee [am 25. Mai 1816, siehe Erste Aufführung] vor einer gewählten Gesellschaft sang” (Franz Wild, “Autobiographie”, in: Recensions und Mittheilungen über Theater und Musik 6, 1860, p. 54; see also TDR III, pp. 488f). This information also supports the dating of the work to 1815 and not—as Gustav Nottebohm supposed—to 1813 (Nottebohm/Beethoveniana II, p. 121).
After Steiner had negotiated with Beethoven in April 1815 for the publication of various works, the publisher reserved the catalogue numbers (2361–2369) for Opp. 91 and 94, since the new publications assigned numbers 2370–2400 were all already announced during the second half of 1815. The original edition of Op. 94 did not appear until April 1816; the announcement in the Wiener Zeitung of 22 April 1816 read: “Ganz neu in unserm Verlage eben erschienen: An die Hoffnung […]. – Unser unerschöpflicher Hr. van Beethoven hat diese gemüthvolle Dichtung Tiedge’s mit einem Recitativo eingeleitet, das Gedicht, zart und warm gänzlich durchkomponirt, vortrefflich wiedergegeben.” Op. 94 is listed, together with Opp. 91, 92 and 95–100, in the catalogue of scores “Number 3”, which Steiner announced in the Wiener Zeitung on 13 March 1816.
Text: Christoph August Tiedge (1752–1841), Urania. Ein lyrisch-didaktisches Gedicht, Halle 1801, stanzas from the first song “Klagen des Verzweiflers”. Beethoven presumably read the text in the fourth revised edition of 1808. Unlike the first edition, it contains the first stanza in free metre, which Tiedge added later (this edition was sent to Beethoven on 6 December 1811, BGA 532). Beethoven’s title An die Hoffnung derives from Tiedge’s table of contents, where these stanzas are called “Lied an die Hoffnung”. Beethoven had already set the same text in Op. 32. For the dedication, see Op. 75.
First private performance: perhaps on 9 April 1816 in Vienna at the home of Gaetano Giannattasio del Rio, by the daughters Maria Anna (Nanni) and Franziska (Fanny). The latter noted in her diary: “Seine neue Composition, ,Die Hoffnung‘ aus Tiedges Urania mit dem Rezitativ ist göttlich. Ich war so entzückt als Nanni, als wir es spielten und sangen, es hob uns himmelan!” (TDR IV, p. 528; Nohl/Stille Liebe, pp. 78f). Another performance in Vienna took place “in der Wohnung eines Kunstfreundes” on 25 May 1816, sung by the tenor Franz Wild, presumably with Beethoven at the piano. Report: AmZ 18 (1816), 26 June 1816, col. 444.
The sketches will be featured in an article specially created for the Beethovenian Music Research Center, www.lvbeethoven.org
Ob ein Gott sei? Ob er einst erfülle,
Was die Sehnsucht weinend sich verspricht?
Ob, vor irgendeinem Weltgericht,
Sich dies rätselhafte Sein enthülle?
Hoffen soll der Mensch! Er frage nicht!
Die du so gern in heil’gen Nächten feierst
Und sanft und weich den Gram verschleierst,
Der eine zarte Seele quält,
O Hoffnung! Laß, durch dich empor gehoben,
Den Dulder ahnen, daß dort oben
Ein Engel seine Tränen zählt!
Wenn, längst verhallt, geliebte Stimmen schweigen;
Wenn unter ausgestorb’nen Zweigen
Verödet die Erinn’rung sitzt:
Dann nahe dich, wo dein Verlaßner trauert
Und, von der Mitternacht umschauert,
Sich auf versunk’ne Urnen stützt.
Und blickt er auf, das Schicksal anzuklagen,
Wenn scheidend über seinen Tagen
Die letzten Strahlen untergehn:
Dann laß’ ihn um den Rand des Erdentraumes
Das Leuchten eines Wolkensaumes
