WoO 145 Das Geheimnis -: Wo blüht das Blümchen, das nie verblüht?for voice and piano
Inning vorgetragen und nicht schleppend
WoO 145 – Das Geheimnis (“The Secret”): “Wo blüht das Blümchen, das nie verblüht?” for voice and piano, 1815, published in Bonn by Simrock, early 1817, with the added title: Liebe und Wahrheit. GA no. 245 (series 23/32) – Boett. XI/1 – B. 250 – KH. (WoO) 145 – L. IV, p. 347/A – N. p. 184 – T. 203.
There are no further details regarding the original manuscript, which was first offered by Beethoven to Fanny Giannatasio del Rio, and later requested back by him, subsequently being sent to the publisher Simrock for printing. Sketches for the work can be found in the Kock collection, Miller notebook II. The text is by Ignaz H. C. von Weissenberg, Bishop of Constance. It consists of two stanzas, each with the same simple melody, but a syllabic phrasing that is not without originality. The text reads:
Das Geheimnis – (Liebe und Wahrheit)
Ignaz Heinrich Carl von Wessenberg
Wo blüht das Blümchen, das nie verblüht?
Wo strahlt das Sternlein, das ewig glüht?
Dein Mund, o Muse! dein heit’ger Mund
Tu mir das Blümchen und Sternlein kund.
Verkünden kann es dir nicht mein Mund,
Macht es dein Innerstes dir nicht kund.
Im Innersten glühet und blüht es zart
Wohl jedem, der es getreu bewahrt!
[By Biamonti Giovanni – Catalogo cronologico e tematico delle opere di Beethoven comprese quelle inedite e gli abbozzi non utilizzati, Torino, ILTE 1968]
Official title: WoO 145 Das Geheimnis (Liebe und Wahrheit) Lied (G-dur) nach einem Gedicht von Ignaz Heinrich Carl Freiherr von Wessenberg für Singstimme und Klavier Widmung: — NGA XII/1 Nr. 60 AGA 245 = Serie 23/32
Origin and publication: The song was composed in 1815. The first editions appeared in 1816: in February as a musical supplement to the Wiener Moden-Zeitung, and in December through Simrock in Bonn and Cologne. The placement of the sketches for WoO 145 in the notebook known as the “Scheide” suggests a date of composition between late summer and early autumn 1815. Between 1816 and 1820, four of Beethoven’s songs were first issued in the Wiener Moden-Zeitung.
In the spring of 1823, the Vienna publishing house Sauer & Leidesdorf issued these four songs together in pamphlet form under the title „Vier deutsche Gedichte […]“. This occurred with the composer’s approval, as he wrote to Carl Friedrich Peters in Leipzig on 20 December 1822: „Leidesdorfer [!] bath mich nur eine Schenkung von den Liedern der Modenzeitung ihm zu bestätigen, welche ich zwar eigentl. nur für H[aslinger?] machte; allein es ist mir unmögl. in allen Fällen nach per centen zu handeln“ (BGA 1516).
The pamphlet carried the opus number 113, although this number had already been assigned in February 1823 to the overture to „Ruinen von Athen“. Owing to this second, presumably accidental, allocation of “Op. 113”, the song was omitted from Artaria’s Catalogue des Oeuvres (1837, op. 106).
By late September 1816, Peter Joseph, the son of Nikolaus Simrock, had acquired the two songs WoO 140 and 145 together with op. 102. Simrock published them immediately, and they were advertised in the Kölnische Zeitung on 15 December 1816.
A diary entry by Fanny Giannattasio del Rio, dated 29 September 1816, records that she received the autograph manuscript of the song as a gift from Beethoven: „Gestern Abends war […] Beethoven bei uns und brachte einen jungen Menschen seinen Landsmann [Peter loseph Simrock], Wegen seinem Lied, das ich ihm leihen mußte, sagte er auch er müsse es mir wohl bald wieder bringen (da ich ihn darum bat) schon meiner Liebe zur Wahrheit wegen; es war: das Geheimniß, Liebe und Wahrheit, von Winterberg [Wessenberg] “.
Text: Ignaz Heinrich Carl Freiherr von Wessenberg (1774–1860). The poem does not appear in any of the known editions of Wessenberg’s verse. It is possible that Beethoven received the unpublished text from the editor of the Wiener Moden-Zeitung, Johann Schickh, for musical setting.
First performance unknown.
The sketches will be featured in an article specially created for the Beethovenian Music Research Center, www.lvbeethoven.org
