Ave Maria (Schubert)

1879 painting of Ellen's Isle, Loch Katrine

The piece was composed as a setting of a song (verse XXIX from Canto Three) from Walter Scott's popular narrative poem The Lady of the Lake,[2] in a German translation by Adam Storck (1780–1822),[3] and thus forms part of Schubert's Liederzyklus vom Fräulein vom See. In Scott's poem the character Ellen Douglas, the Lady of the Lake (Loch Katrine in the Scottish Highlands), has gone with her exiled father to stay in the Goblin's cave as he has declined to join their previous host, Roderick Dhu, in rebellion against King James. Roderick Dhu, the chieftain of Clan Alpine, sets off up the mountain with his warriors, but lingers and hears the distant sound of the harpist Allan-bane, accompanying Ellen who sings a prayer addressed to the Virgin Mary, calling upon her for help. Roderick Dhu pauses, then goes on to battle.[4]

Schubert's arrangement is said to have first been performed at the castle of Countess Sophie Weissenwolff in the little Austrian town of Steyregg and dedicated to her, which led to her becoming known as "the lady of the lake" herself.[5]

The opening words and refrain of Ellen's song, namely "Ave Maria" (Latin for "Hail Mary"), may have led to the idea of adapting Schubert's melody as a setting for the full text of the traditional Roman Catholic prayer "Ave Maria". The Latin version of the "Ave Maria" is now so frequently used with Schubert's melody that it has led to the misconception that he originally wrote the melody as a setting for the "Ave Maria".

In 1825, Schubert composed a selection of seven songs from Scott's The Lady of the Lake. They were published in 1826 as his Opus 52.

The songs are not intended for a single performer: the three songs of Ellen are piano songs for a woman's voice, while the songs for Norman and the Count of Douglas were intended for the baritone Johann Michael Vogl. The remaining two songs are written one for a male and the other for a female ensemble.

1. "Ellens Gesang I", D. 837, Raste Krieger, Krieg ist aus / "Soldier rest! the warfare o'er"
2. "Ellens Gesang II", D. 838, Jäger, ruhe von der Jagd / "Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done"
3. "Bootgesang", D. 835, Triumph, er naht / "Hail to the chief", for male voice quartet
4. "Coronach" (Deathsong of the women and girls), D. 836, Er ist uns geschieden / "He is gone to the mountain", for female choir
5. "Normans Gesang", D. 846, Die Nacht bricht bald herein ("Night will soon be falling")
6. "Ellens Gesang III" (Hymn to the Virgin), D. 839, Ave Maria! Jungfrau mild! / "Ave Maria! maiden mild!"
7. "Lied des gefangenen Jägers", D. 843, Mein Roß so müd / "My steed is tired"

Schubert composed the songs to the German texts. However, with the exception of No. 5, the songs were clearly intended to be published with the original English texts as well. This meant finding correspondences to Storck's sometimes quite free translations, which entailed significant difficulties.

Walt Disney used Schubert's song in the final part of his 1940 film Fantasia, where he linked it to Modest Mussorgsky's Night on Bald Mountain in one of his most famous pastiches. The end of Mussorgsky's work blends with almost no break into the beginning of Schubert's song, and as Deems Taylor remarked, the bells in Night on Bald Mountain, originally meant to signal the coming of dawn, which cause the demon Chernobog to stop his dark worship and the ghosts to return to the grave, now seem to be church bells signalling the beginning of religious services. A procession of monks is shown walking along. The text for this version is sung in English, and was written by Rachel Field.[7] This version also had three stanzas, like Schubert's original, but only the third stanza made it into the film (one line in the last stanza is partially repeated to show how it is sung in the film):

The version heard in Fantasia was arranged by Leopold Stokowski especially for the film, and unlike the original, which is for a solo voice, is scored for soprano and mixed chorus, accompanied by the string section of the Philadelphia Orchestra. The soloist is Julietta Novis. The Ave Maria sequence was later featured in Very Merry Christmas Songs, which is part of Disney Sing-Along Songs, as a background movie for the song "Silent Night".

Christina Aguilera's rendition of the song has received critical acclaim.[8][9]

In the 1935 film Bride of Frankenstein, a hermit plays the piece on solo violin, which soothes the Creature.

In the 1944 Academy Award-winning film Going My Way, Metropolitan Opera singer Risë Stevens performs the piece with Bing Crosby and the Robert Mitchell Boys Choir.[10]

Yehudi Menuhin performs a version for violin and piano in the 1943 American musical film Stage Door Canteen.

The song was performed by tenor Luigi Vena at the funeral of American president John F. Kennedy.[11]

A rendition of the song was featured in the 2006 video game Hitman: Blood Money, where it was sung by Daniel Perret of the Zurich Boys' Choir.[12]

The 2016 science fiction film 2BR02B: To Be or Naught to Be, based on the story by Kurt Vonnegut, extensively uses the piece as diegetic music. The song's placement in the film is timed so that the line "Dem Kind, das für den Vater fleht" ("And for a father hear a child!") is heard by the character Wehling, before he shoots himself in order to save his children.[13]

The song was covered by Chris Cornell in his 2018 posthumous, self-titled album Chris Cornell.

Idina Menzel covered the song in a medley with "O Holy Night" for her 2019 Christmas album Christmas: A Season of Love.

In February 2020, Christina Aguilera performed "Ave Maria" at Kobe Bryant's memorial service at the Staples Center.[14][15]

• "Ave Maria" by German composer Johann Sebastian Bach and French composer Charles Gounod
• "Ave Maria" by Russian composer Vladimir Vavilov, often misattributed to Italian composer Giulio Caccini
• "Ave Maria" by American R&B artist Beyoncé, a modern re-written rendition featured on her album I Am... Sasha Fierce.[16]

• "Ellens dritter Gesang": Scores at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
• Sheet music, Cantorion.org
• The Lady of the Lake, edition with notes by William J. Rolfe, Boston 1883, with the song on page 58, and notes on alternate words on page 177
• The Lady of the Lake (Gutenberg e-text #3011) The full text of Walter Scott's poem, including "Hymn to the Virgin"