Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 3.djvu/634

622 the Palatinate, cannot have been favourable to it. But no political or social troubles could affect its existence so deeply as an invasion upon its own ground by the Kunstlied. As long as the artistic song dwelt apart, among learned musicians, the Volkslied had little to fear. But when once it had become simple and melodious enough to be easily caught by the people, the Volkslied was supplanted: its raison d'étre was gone. In churches and schools, at concerts and theatres, the public grew habituated to the artistic song, and the old Volkslieder faded from memory. The few that retained any popularity were in the modern tonal system. The volksthümliches Lied is, in short, a combination of the Volkslied and the Kunstlied, and its area of capacity is a very wide one. In the hands of a true master it rises to a high level of poetic beauty, and in the hands of a bad workman it can descend to any depths of stupidity or vulgarity, without ceasing to be volksthümlich. Songs there were, undoubtedly, before the time of J. A. Hiller, to which this epithet could properly be applied; but he was the first to secure for them a thoroughly popular recognition. He belonged to the second half of the 18th century, and was really an operatic composer. It was the songs in his 'Singspiele ' which took so strong a hold of the public. [See .] A favourite tune from his Singspiel 'Die Jagd' will serve as a specimen of his style:—

Another, 'Ohne Lieb und ohne Wein,' taken from his Singspiel 'Der Teufel ist los,' and still sung in Germany with much zest, was one of the first of the Kunstlieder to be received into the ranks of the Volkslieder. J. Andre, the author of the 'Rheinweinlied,' was a contemporary of Hiller's; and so was J. A. P. Schulz, who did much for the volksthumliches Lied. He was careful above others of his time to select poetic words for his music; and the composer was now provided with a store of fresh and natural poems of the Volkslied type by Burger, Claudius, Hölty, the Stolbergs, Voss, and other poets of the Göttingen school. So long as Schulz kept to a simple form, he was always successful, and many of his songs are still the delight of German school children. In his more ambitious but less happy efforts, when he tried to give full expression to the words by the music, he abandoned the volksthümlich form, as his song 'Die Spinnerin' will show:—

Starting from Hiller and Schulz the volksthumliches Lied pursued two different roads. Its composers in the Hiller school, such as Ferdinand Kauer, Wenzel Müller, and Himmel, were shallow and imperfectly cultivated musicians. Their sentimental melodies had a certain superficial elegance which gave them for a time an undeserved repute. A few of Himmel's songs—for example, 'Vater ich rufe Dich' and 'An Alexis send' ich Dich'—are still in vogue among some classes of the German population, but, measured by any good standard, their value is inconsiderable. The dramatic composers, Winter and Jos. Weigl, may be reckoned to