Student song
A student song is a song that has traditionally been and is sung together mainly or exclusively by students at student leisure events - sometimes with instrumental accompaniment.
Details
Although text traces from student songs go back to the Middle Ages , the first German student song collection did not appear in print until 1781. In the 19th century more and more student songbooks were published, which resulted in standardization and canonicalization. Special songbook editions were created, suitable as text templates for singing at the beer table, the so-called Kommers books .
During this time, the student song also became a distinguishing feature of the new student associations that had been emerging since 1800 and built, developed and preserved a song tradition. In the course of the 19th century, this song culture also spread to neighboring countries, especially the Benelux, Eastern Europe and Scandinavia. Around 1900 the development of the firmly established corpus of student songs for the German-speaking area was essentially complete.
Also based from the mid-19th century along the lines of fraternities students compounds took the student songs for themselves and care for them until today.
Traditionally, the student songs mainly deal with topics of interest to young people who have escaped from home, the supervision of parents and other persons of authority, at least for a certain time: partying, drinking, hiking and other leisure activities play the main role, but more serious topics also come up increasingly came into play in the course of the 19th century.
Today these traditional student songs in Germany, Austria and Switzerland are considered a cultural asset almost exclusively of the student associations, to which two to three percent of all students in Germany belong.
History and lore
The origins of European student songs were a number of Latin poems and songs, which were probably written by academically educated people in monasteries or at bishops' courts and which are thematically related to the student songs through the joy of life they express .
In the 18th century, student songs became tangible as such in Germany. Old traces of Latin text from the Middle Ages also became visible again. These early, mostly oral and often improvised songs have simple lyrics and catchy melodies.
1781 was Christian Wilhelm child lives his book Studentenlieder - From the papers left behind an unhappy philosopher, Florido called gesammlet and improved by C. W. K. out. It contains 64 songs, most of which are now forgotten. Kindleben had collected, edited and commented on these songs. In this book he also published the current version of Gaudeamus igitur . This song is now internationally popular and is considered the oldest and most famous student song in the world.
A new phase began in the 19th century. Recognized, but also largely unknown authors wrote songs on student topics, but mostly at an advanced age in a kind of review of their youth. Texts and melodies became more artistic, but also more artificial. The trend was to romanticize student life in the lyrics, to emphasize the positive aspects and thereby to support the selective memory of the former students of the "beautiful youth".
A special type of songbook was developed for practical use as a text template for singing in the pub . The format became small and handy, the book cover firmly bound in leather and studded with so-called beer nails , which should protect the paper from any beer spilled on the table. This format has been preserved to this day.
As early as the first half of the 19th century, songs with a political content were also developing. The open commitment to student mores and customs, which at that time were still considered adolescent bad habits, was considered improper and not very career-enhancing, so that anonymous publications were the rule.
At the beginning of the 19th century, the development of student associations began in the form typical of the German-speaking area. In the context of the general political situation during the Napoleonic period and after the Congress of Vienna , a specific academic culture emerged, which also developed particularly in the area of song. The student connections developed an increasing commitment, also beyond the studies. They adopted customs and symbols of identity ( color , mensur , bar, student coat of arms , etc.) from the 18th century in a very specific selection, standardized them and retained them. Former students carried student culture into civic life and reflected it back again by preparing their sons for university. The student song was part of this culture, was also standardized and thus traditional.
Internationally, this culture radiated mainly to the Dutch area ( Netherlands , Flanders ), Switzerland , Scandinavia and Eastern Europe ( Poland , Baltic States ). Many traces of this radiation are still visible today (as of 2005). The student codex , the Flemish songbook of the Belgian student associations available in several regionally different editions, contains several German student songs in German. In Sweden, a local translation of the German song O old Burschenherrlichkeit is still popular today. Since the end of communist rule in Poland, corporations have been formed here too, seeking contact with German student associations again. There is a Polish project for the creation of a German-Polish Kommersbuch, in which old German-Silesian student songs from Breslau, which are no longer found in today's editions of German Kommers books, are to be revived and published together with Polish student songs. After all, Kindleben's version of Gaudeamus igitur is very widespread in the Anglo-Saxon-speaking area as far as America and is considered the traditional student song there.
In the first half of the 19th century, the Metternichian system of oppression prevented the student song culture from spreading to the German-speaking universities of the Habsburg monarchy. The sometimes centuries-old student cultures of the Mediterranean region ( Italy , Spain ) showed no significant influences from Central Europe.
After the Karlovy Vary resolutions were repealed in 1848, the student associations established themselves as socially recognized non-subject educational institutions at the universities . Recognized poets and composers could now deal with the topic and make a name for themselves by creating student songs, which they did. From 1859 at the latest, the (song) culture of the student associations also flourished at the universities of the Danube Monarchy, for example in Vienna , Innsbruck , Graz , Prague , Brno and Chernivtsi .
The Allgemeine Deutsche Kommersbuch was published for the first time in 1858 and had its 162nd edition in January 2004. With this book a binding and standardized collection of student songs was created in the middle of the 19th century, the definition of which is still valid today.
An entire industry for student and academic memorabilia (souvenirs) emerged in the entire German-speaking area. Graphics, art postcards and novels dealt with the (connecting) student culture, whereby the student song was often used as a keyword. Student songs very often provided the title of pictures and books, and from the 1920s to the 1950s also for movies.
During the Soviet occupation after the Second World War and the beginnings of communist rule in the emerging GDR , the traditional student associations along with their traditional songs were banned from public life and forgotten. They were seen as a cultural characteristic of the bourgeoisie , whose rule was to be overcome by socialism . The connections had to cease operations and moved to the west.
In the 1960s, however, students in the GDR also became interested in traditions, which was first shown in the care for old songs. Kommers books were hard to come by and had to be collected from attics and copied by hand for reproduction. Old student colors were also sought out or recreated in an amateur way. Thus the first attempts were made to imitate the traditions rather than to maintain them. But that too had to be done in secret, because the state authorities did not tolerate recourse to pre-socialist traditions or the formation of organizations that were not controlled by the state. The Catholic and Protestant student congregations formed a retreat here , where pre-socialist songs could be sung undisturbed by government agencies.
At the beginning of the 1980s - without any contacts and at first without any influence from the West - new student associations were formed in the GDR, for which the student couleur and the student song became important identifying features. The power of the communists was already so weakened that from 1987 onwards, the first public appearances in Couleur and the singing of traditional student songs on more or less official occasions became possible. One of the last attempts of the GDR leadership to control the development was to subordinate the activities for the maintenance of student traditions to the organizations of the Free German Youth (FDJ), which was only partially successful, however.
In 1987, on the occasion of the 170th anniversary of the Wartburg Festival , the FDJ tried to build on the tradition of the student song, and on this occasion published a songbook that combined traditional student songs with songs of the FDJ. In the last years of the GDR song books and records with traditional student songs were also published. But compromises like these could not stop the decline of the GDR. Today the newly established student associations form a new student association scene with those who have returned from the west, which also includes the student song.
The Kommers books used today by student associations mainly contain songs that were written in the 19th century or the end of the German Empire, a few of which date from the second half of the 18th century. Songs from the later decades of the 20th century have so far not been included in the traditional canon of Kommersbuch.
Today the traditional student songs are practiced and sung almost exclusively in student associations. Outside of the traditional student associations, however, the traditional texts and melodies are no longer felt to be in keeping with the times. This corresponds to the broken relationship that many people have with traditional German folk songs at the beginning of the 21st century.
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In their lyrics, the songs traditionally deal with topics that move young men who have escaped their parents' home at least for a certain period of time. Typical for this social group are the individual freedom and independence, which was unusual in earlier centuries, as well as a particularly pronounced zest for life. This is reflected in the topics: Celebration (eating, drinking, smoking), love / sexuality - cf. the filia hospitalis - as well as enjoying nature and its seasons.
On certain topics there was a smooth transition between student and folk song . Soldier songs also had an influence on the student song, due to the biographies of many students. The Landsknechtslieder that were created later and are used by students are, however, of historical origin and should be distinguished from them.
Subject-specific training centers such as forest and mining academies also contributed traditional songs, so that hunter and miner's songs, such as the Steigerlied , are still part of the Kommersbuch repertoire today .
At technical universities there has been a certain closeness to the songs of the journeymen to this day. While the relationship between students and craftsmen at the scientific universities was very hostile, the students at the new polytechnic universities of the 19th century were closer to this culture, which also led to an exchange of songs.
From around 1800 the student traditions at German universities were increasingly cultivated and further developed by the student associations in the current sense. As a result, in the second half of the 19th century, the general student culture became the culture of fraternities. From around 1848 these connections lost the nimbus of the forbidden associations of disobedient young people and became established institutions for the non-scientific education of students. Through the formation of old rulers , i.e. the organizations of the no longer studying members, a new type of student song was created, which looked back more from old age to the "beautiful youth" ( O old ladyship ).
Through these increasing contacts with the educated middle class, new topics in the student song developed. A song form that dealt with historical topics in a joking way is particularly typical. The most famous poet of this genre was Joseph Victor von Scheffel .
Since the Wars of Liberation, and especially after the establishment of the Empire in 1871, “patriotic” songs, that is songs about the German nation and its ability to defend itself, have become popular songs for German students. They became an integral part of the program of festive student events.
Musical accompaniment
To accompany the student Kneipp singing, no musical instruments can be seen on early depictions. The piano for vocal accompaniment (also jokingly called the beer organ ) probably only came into use with the construction of the first connecting houses in the decades around 1900.
However, there are depictions from the early 19th century in which string and wind instruments are used to accompany singing on hikes, walks and parades. Such instruments were probably also used in serenades for women.
In the 18th century it was also common for students to get involved as musicians at private feasts (the so-called feasts ) in the house of a fellow student, who then played to dance after eating, drinking and smoking. However, these are probably folk dances and not student songs.
Functions of student songs
Traditionally, student songs in student associations are not only intoned out of pure joy in singing, but are also used to accompany certain traditional rituals or to mark certain phases of a student pub or a Kommerses . The rules followed are very different for different connection types, and even for individual connections of the same type. Here are some examples.
Color stanza / color song
Practically all student associations have a so-called “color song” or at least a “color stanza”, which is sung to the same melody at the end of a certain song. These are musical identity symbols that serve to strengthen and symbolize the community of the vital bond that each connection represents. In the text, individual references are made to the connection and its identifying features. In the case of connections that are historically and nationally oriented, these can be references to the region of origin of the early members or, in the case of connections that are or were oriented towards special faculties ( e.g. student hunting associations ), to the subject.
The so-called color stanza , which is sung after the last stanza of the song So punctually for the second ... , with standardized text, only the connection name and the colors of the couleur ribbon are used individually is very popular with striking connections . Fictional pattern (variable parts in capital letters):
- FRANCONIA, I belong to you
- With heart and also with hand.
- I swear by your colors
- The BLACK-WHITE-GREEN ribbon.
- FRANCONIA should prove it
- Prove by the act
- The Frank's heart and iron
- Has always beaten well.
If the last color of the connection should be red, blue or white, there are special variants for line two: With red I belong until death , with blue you oak on green Au , with know you I love you dearly .
In the Catholic fraternity, however, the content of the color strophe is not standardized. Mostly the melody of the song when we walk through the streets is used.
Color songs and color stanzas are usually sung at the end of the official part of a pub , when new members are accepted or on other festive occasions.
Alternatively, at this point in time , the association song is sung in some associations, often after the national anthem , in the Catholic CV, for example, Let your multicolored-capped crowd .
Country father
A solemn state father is a centuries-old student ritual that is still held today, but with most connections only every five years at the big foundation festival .
For the implementation of the country's father, the song Everything is silent, everyone inclines / serious tones is now sung in his ear , which was composed by August Niemann in 1781 using older models. This song contains the verse country father, protection and counselor , which has been documented since 1650 and gave the custom its name.
The form sung today comes from Friedrich Silcher from the year 1823 and contains various parts of the song with a total of three different melodies for the individual phases of the country father, such as piercing the hats , pause and picking up the hats and the end .
Structure of the pub
Most connections have certain traditions of when which songs are sung in a pub or a Kommers. The general rule is that the more solemn songs are intoned in the official part, the looser ones in the unofficial part. With some connections there are certain songs for the beginning of a pub. It is customary for the corps in the Kösener Seniors Convents Association to begin every pub with the song Dort Saaleck, here the Rudelsburg , as a tribute to the traditional meeting place of Rudelsburg . In Catholic-Austrian connections, Gaudeamus igitur is very often the first, when we walk through the streets the last song.
Student song genres
Vagant songs of the Middle Ages
Vagante poetry refers to medieval secular poetry, which often (but not exclusively) comes from traveling clerics and scholars. The songs of the Codex Buranus , the so-called Carmina Burana , which were made popular by Carl Orff's settings in 1937 , are still generally known .
Components of the song Gaudeamus igitur come from early medieval sources . The version that was recorded in writing by Christian Wilhelm Kindleben in 1781 is internationally widespread.
- Gaudeamus igitur
- |: Gaudeamus igitur, iuvenes dum sumus: |
- Post iucundam iuventutem, post molestam senectutem
- |: Nos habebit humus: |.
- German:
- So let's be happy while we're young.
- After a pleasant youth, after an arduous age
- The earth will take us to itself.
Less well-known, but still recorded in every today's Kommers book, is the song Meum est propositum , which is listed in the Carmina Burana and goes back to a text component of the vagabond confession ( Aestuans interius ira vehementi ), which the medieval poet Archipoeta probably wrote around 1163 in Pavia was written as a confession about his rotten life. The author, presumably a former medical student, worked as a commissioned poet for the Archbishop of Cologne Rainald von Dassel .
- Meum est propositum
- Meum est propositum in taberna mori
- Ubi vina proxima morientis ori.
- Tunc cantabunt laetius angelorum chori:
- Deus sit propitius isti potatori, isti potatori.
- German:
- My resolution is to die in the tavern
- Where the wine is near the mouth of the dying man;
- Then the choirs of angels will sing more joyfully:
- "God have mercy on this drinker, this drinker."
- ( Archipoeta , around 1163)
Student wandering songs created in the 19th century often historically refer to medieval “ traveling students ”.
Round songs
In historical sources, so-called round songs have come down to us for the 18th century , in which each participant in a student feast (today: pub ) had to improvise a stanza. The chorus was then sung by the whole company together.
In the course of time, the most popular stanzas were passed on and the versions became increasingly standardized. Some of these songs found their way into the Kommers books. They can be recognized by the fact that they are mostly dated to the 18th century, have many but short (mostly two-line) stanzas and a long, often repeated refrain, which left time to think for inventing the next stanza. The literary level is mostly low, the language comes from the youthful everyday language of the 18th century.
Examples (only selected stanzas):
- Ça, ça feasted
- Ça, ça feasted, let's not be crazy!
- Those who don't stay at home stay at home.
- Refrain: Edite, bibite collegiales, post multa saecula pocula nulla.
- (freely translated: "Eat and drink, fellow students, in the distant future there will be no more feasts!")
- The professor is not reading a college today,
- So it's better to have a drink.
- refrain
- Drink as you please until you lick your fingers afterwards.
- Then we all really enjoyed it.
- refrain
- Up, brothers! Raise Bacchus to the throne
- And sit down, we're already drinking.
- refrain
- (Text and melody of unknown origin)
- Long live the students
- The students always live into the day,
- If we were rulers of the world, it should always be a festival.
- Refrain: Really, really, that's strange.
- We cheer, sing and drink through the whole night,
- As long as the stars are blinking, no rest is thought of.
- refrain
- But if our pockets are emptied, then we move home.
- You don't live well with empty bottles.
- refrain
- (Melody taken from the French student song Mon père est à Paris , text recorded by Christian Dehn, 1807 to 1852, Corps Vandalia Rostock)
Drinking songs
Mainly in the 19th century, student drinking songs emerged , which stood out from the improvised pub chants of the 18th century with a certain literary claim, were included in the Kommers books and are still sung with pleasure and often today. The most prominent author of one of these songs is Johann Wolfgang von Goethe , who wrote the song Ergo bibamus (German: "So let's drink") in 1810 . This song was set to music by Max Eberwein in 1813.
- Ergo bibamus
- Here we are gathered for laudable deeds,
- So, brother, ergo bibamus!
- The glasses, they ring, conversations, they rest;
- Take heart: ergo bibamus!
- That means another old, a good word
- And happens to the first and so on
- And an echo resounds from the festive place
- |: A wonderful one: ergo bibamus! : |
- (Text: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1810, melody: Max Eberwein 1813)
A memorial was expressly named after the Goethe text. It was erected in Jena in 1986 on the site of the former university brewery in the fountain next to the anatomy tower (Leutragraben) during the GDR era . The monument was created by the Jena artist Freimut Drewello . As the material DDR typical "plastic" (was plastic ) selected.
The idea for this memorial came up in 1983 during the Jena brewery market. The sculpture depicts a beer-drinking student who rides a beer barrel from whose bunghole a devil figure emerges. The official reason for the erection of the monument was the commemoration of the academic brewing and licensing law from 1548, the rose privilege of May 21, 1570 for the bar "Zur Rosen" and the academic brewery that existed from 1594 to 1903. The reference to the Goethe text was also officially mentioned. Unofficially, the burgeoning interest in pre-socialist student traditions in the GDR in the early 1980s may have played a role. Jena was one of the main locations.
In August 2000 the memorial had to be finally stowed away in a university storage room due to material embrittlement. A collection of donations made it possible to cast a bronze at the entrance to Wagnergasse, a place of student nightlife in Jena and not far from the original location.
The song Ergo bibamus was also re-recorded in 2002 by the folk group Liederjan as part of the publication of an album with Goethe texts.
Another example of a student drinking song from the end of the 19th century, with literary, romanticizing language and complex melody in the verse and catchy chorus, which is still popular today and is sung a lot:
- At the Rosenwirt at the Grabentor
- At the Rosenwirt at the Grabentor
- At half past five in the evening
- The landlord swings up the hammer
- And hits the spigot ex!
- That shuffles and growls out of a damp night
- From the bunghole to the can,
- See how everyone's face laughs
- Any carver:
- Refrain: |: Beer, run! Beer, run!
- What use are the cruisers to me
- When i die! : |
- (Text: Julius Rudolf Gspandl 1896, melody: Otto Lob 1896)
Some drinking songs thematically deal not only with drinking and being together, but sometimes also with the intoxication after drinking. This subject is usually closed to poetic treatment. But there are also literarily interesting solutions, as the following example shows:
- Traveling student
- The song is lost
- The wine is gone
- I wander in silence and dream about.
- |: The houses tumble, blown by the storm,
- The waves tumble into the sea. : |
- The clouds they dance
- Many a star falls
- Drinked deep in the clouds;
- |: I stand like a rock, like the hook of the world,
- Like an emperor in freedom and justice. : |
- ...
- (created before 1855)
love songs
Since the Middle Ages, the social situation in the university towns was shaped by the fact that young men from mostly wealthy parents in a provincial town (universities were rarely founded in residential towns) were dependent on buying accommodation and hospitality services from the mostly poor population. In this way, an infrastructure quickly formed in these places that was ideally geared to the needs (and vices) of young people. The prosperity gap caused quite a few undesirable developments, because the services of the local population were not limited to board and lodging, but rather quickly adapted to the sexual needs of the students. Often it was the young daughters of the landlords or other underprivileged families who were used for prostitution.
The student songs written in the 19th century romanticize this situation by portraying the encounter between the young student and the landlady as the first innocent young love. The term Filia hospitalis , i.e. the landlady's daughter, became particularly striking in the much-cited song O wonnevolle Jugendzeit .
- O wonderful youth
- O joyful youth with endless joys,
- With mini-drives far and wide, where the most beautiful could be found.
- I greet you, you young blood, every pretty woman is good,
- And yet nothing is aequalis of the filia hospitalis.
- I came here as a blatant fox and peered in the alleys
- Where there would be a bed and room to hold my long body.
- Didn't find a sofa, nor a boot jack, and yet the booth was fine with me,
- Because none is aequalis of filia hospitalis.
- She is too sweet a child with her blond pigtails,
- The little feet run like the wind in a shoe with tassels and buttons;
- The apron billows on my chest, wherever I look is vain lust,
- And none is aequalis of filia hospitalis.
- ...
The Jäger's love song , published in 1828, is a song in D major with an uninhibited and cheerful gesture and first describes a lyrical self on various hunting adventures, which is haunted again and again by possible love.
- I shoot the deer
I shoot the deer in the dark forest,
In the quiet valley the deer,
The eagle on the cliff eyrie,
The duck on the lake.
No place that can provide protection,
When my shotgun aims,
And yet I, tough man
, have felt love too.
An interpretation is widespread as a popular hunting song with an allusion to a female fine love. The text plays with the possible interpretations of the enjoyment of the figure of light and the sweetheart and the male friend addressed by them.
When she then
looks down at me, When her gaze glows through me,
Then I know what happens to the game
That flees from the pipe.
The origin is a poem by Franz von Schober set to music by Franz Schubert in February 1827 and celebrates their friendship with men.
Funny historical songs
The genre of jokingly historical songs is associated with the name of the poet and fraternity member Joseph Victor von Scheffel , who delighted the educated middle class of the 19th century with his works. The target group was actually not only the student body, but they quickly made many friends among the singing-loving students and were also disseminated in Kommers books. Characteristic for the content of the texts is the fact that a historically known figure or a figure from a historically known environment is confronted with everyday, sometimes all too human problems or their own vices and fails because of it.
One of the most famous songs, which at the same time - here with reference to the motif of the Varus Battle - still caricatures the national spirit of the epoch
- When the Romans got naughty
- When the Romans become naughty ,
- Sim serim sim sim sim sim,
- Did they move to the north of Germany
- Sim serim sim sim sim sim,
- Front with trumpet sound,
- Offender
- The Field Marshal rode,
- Mr. Quinctilius Varus,
- Refrain:
- Woof, woof, woof, woof, woof,
- Mr. Quinctilius Varus,
- |: Schnäde räng: |
- Schnäde räng täng, de räng täng täng
- ...
- O Quinctili, poor general,
- Did you think that was the way the world was?
- He got into a swamp
- Lost two boots and a stocking
- And got stuck miserably.
- refrain
- ...
- (Text: Joseph Victor von Scheffel 1847, melody: Ludwig Teichgräber 1875)
The song is still often sung today:
- Old Assyrian
- In the black whale at Ascalon,
- A man drank three days,
- |: Until he's stiff as a broomstick
- Lied at the marble table. : |
- In the black whale at Ascalon,
- The landlord said: “Stop!
- |: He's drinking my date juice
- More than he can pay. ”: |
- In the black whale at Ascalon,
- The waiter brought a crowd
- |: In cuneiform on six bricks'
- Present the bill to the guest.: |
- ...
- (Text: Joseph Victor von Scheffel 1854, melody: Once upon a time there was a carpenter )
But other authors also wrote songs in this way, including the one that is eagerly sung in the unofficial part of a student pub , angry, wallowing in bed
- One day tosses furiously in bed
- Elector Friedrich of the Palatinate;
- against all etiquette
- he roared at the top of his head:
- |: How did I get into the nest yesterday?
- It seems to have been full again! : |
- Well, loaded a little wrong,
- grinned the Chamberlain,
- even by the grace of Mainz by the bishop
- seemed dazed to me
- |: it was a nice party:
- Everything was full again! : |
- ...
- (Text: August Schuster 1887, melody: Karl Hering 1887)
"Altherren" songs
When, after 1848, with the repeal of the Karlovy Vary resolutions, the student associations and in general the entire traditional student culture were no longer an expression of youthful disobedience and high spirits, but developed into an established institution for the non-subject education of young academics, former students were also able to develop into this culture and to confess their past as "old fellows". These memories - also condensed in student songs - were usually melancholy because the golden age of youth had passed so quickly and the leather Philistine looked too dreary. Sometimes, however, a spark of optimism flashes from the lyrics, because the "old boys" are still alive, at least in the spirit, where "the right mind will always prevail".
The first surviving text of this kind is the famous retrospect of an old lad , first published in 1825, but wisely anonymous at that time. The song is better known under the current title O old lad glory ( see there ). The song Being a student is a summary of student life .
In the second half of the 19th century, several songs on this subject appear in the Kommers books, with old or very old songs also being included in the new poetry. There are also some additional poems, especially for the song Gaudeamus igitur .
- When I was slumbering tonight
- When I lay asleep tonight
- lured sweet dreams,
- shimmering in the youthful splendor,
- me in distant spaces.
- Crass little fox I sat slim
- in the pub again
- and sounded in full chorus
- according to the song of songs:
- |: Gaudeamus igitur,
- juvenes dum sumus; : |
- post jucundam juventutem,
- post molestam senectutem
- |: nos habebit humus! : |
- ...
- (Text: Adolf Katsch 1883, melody: Adolf Schlieben 1885)
Wanderlongs
The hiking tourism that arose in the course of Romanticism was sparked by a new enthusiasm for the beauties of nature and the charm of old, mysterious, preferably medieval monuments. Student songs dealing with this topic were written as early as the first half of the 19th century, but some folksongs that were thematically appropriate were also included in the student song collections. Particularly in the center of interest were the wine-growing areas in the large German river valleys such as those on the Rhine, Main, Neckar and Saale. One example is there Saaleck, here the Rudelsburg , the association song of the Kösener Seniors Convents Association ( KSCV ) that meets at the Rudelsburg .
- There Saaleck , here the Rudelsburg
- And deep down in the valley
- There rushes through between rocks
- The old dear hall;
- And mountains here and mountains there
- To the right and to the left -
- |: The Rudelsburg, that's a place
- To rave about and to drink. : |
- The students know that too
- In Jena and in Halle
- And drink there according to the old custom
- In the courtyard and on the wall.
- Surrounded by mossy rock
- How do the songs sound!
- |: The hall roars so happily
- The mountains echo. : |
- ...
- (Text and melody: Hermann Allmers 1863)
Even as a regional anthem of Franconia is the song of the Franks called. The song is also very popular with students, especially in the south-eastern part of Germany. The song historically refers to the traveling scholars of the Middle Ages through the line "Verfahr'ner pupil push prayer / Means: Lord, give us a drink!":
- The song of the Franks
- Well run, the air is fresh and pure,
- Anyone who sits for a long time must rust.
- The sunniest sunshine
- Let's taste heaven.
- Now I have enough staff and religious dress
- Of the traveling scholars,
- I want good summer time
- Go to the land of Franconia!
- Valleri, vallera, valleri, vallera,
- Go to the land of Franconia!
- ...
- (Text: Joseph Victor von Scheffel 1859, melody: Valentin Eduard Becker 1870/1861)
Political and Patriotic Songs
The songs of political and patriotic content sung by students were based on the political orientation of the academic youth at the time. And it was often oppositional, i.e. contrary to the opinion of the state authorities, but was also extremely adapted in some cases. There were no special student songs on these topics, however, the students orientated themselves on the commonly used songs, which also found their way into the Kommers books and were sung at festive student events and in some cases still are.
The first specifically student songs of political content came up with the end of the wars of liberation and reached their climax in Vormärz . What moved the students was the unity of Germany and the pursuit of democracy. The fraternities in particular , which were the first form of student organization to be explicitly politically active and thus set themselves apart from the older corps , shaped the events that temporarily culminated in the Hambach Festival of 1832 and the Frankfurt Wachensturm of 1833. Later, the students also played a role in the March Revolution of 1848 , which was also accompanied poetically.
The song Flamme up was written on the anniversary of the Battle of the Nations near Leipzig in October 1814 ! which expressed the urge for freedom and unity in Germany. Many students took part in these struggles, who for the first time had the feeling that they were fighting for Germany and not for any princely dynasty or a particularist part of the empire. The song became appropriately popular, but is rarely sung today.
- Flame up!
- |: Flame up! : |
- Rise with blazing bills
- From the mountains on the Rhine
- |: Glowing upwards. : |
- |: See, we're standing: |
- Faithful in the consecrated circle,
- You at the price of the fatherland
- |: To see burning! : |
- ...
- |: Shining glow! : |
- See, we singing couples
- Swear by the flame altars
- |: To be German! : |
- |: Hear the word! : |
- Father to life and death,
- Help us acquire freedom!
- |: Be our hoard! : |
- (Text: Joh. H. Christian Nonne 1814, melody: Enemies all around by OL Tr. Glasses, 1791)
The song The Free Republic recalls the imprisonment and flight of students who were incarcerated after the Frankfurt Wachensturm in 1833 :
- The free republic
- Sitting in the dungeon
- To Frankfurt on the Main
- For many years
- six students one
- |: Who fought for freedom
- And for citizen happiness
- And for human rights
- The free republic. : |
- ...
- (Text and melody anonymous, after January 10, 1837)
The fraternity member August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben wrote the song of the Germans on Heligoland in 1841 , which was publicly performed in Hamburg in front of Streit's hotel on Jungfernstieg that same year . The following year the author was relieved of his state office in Prussia and expelled from the country another year later. His work, which due to its great success with academic youth can still be found today in the Allgemeine Deutsche Kommersbuch , became the German national anthem in 1922 .
- Song of the Germans
- Germany Germany above all,
- than anything in the world,
- when it is always for protection and defense
- holds together brotherly.
- From the Meuse to the Memel,
- From the Adige to the Belt,
- |: Germany, Germany above all,
- than anything in the world! : |
- ...
- (Text: August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben 1841)
Since 1991 only the third stanza of the song of the Germans has formed the text of the German national anthem:
- Unity and justice and freedom
- For the German fatherland!
- That is what let us all strive for
- Brotherly with heart and hand!
- Unity and justice and freedom
- Are the pledge of happiness;
- |: Bloom in the splendor of this happiness ,
- Blossom, German fatherland! : |
After the repeal of the Karlovy Vary resolutions in 1848, the students and their organizations increasingly established themselves and became a supporter of the state in the course of the establishment of the Empire in 1871. The political opponent was no longer the aristocracy , which denied the bourgeoisie its rights. In the meantime, since the 1860s, a new danger had arisen in the labor movement that denied privileges to the bourgeoisie, which provided the majority of the students.
From 1880 at the latest, most of the German students were enthusiastic about the “national cause”. Communists, socialists and social democrats were seen as enemies of the fatherland (" patriotic journeymen "). But the rampant, international capitalism, which disappointed many people after the bursting of the speculative bubble of the founding period in the 1870s , was also criticized . “International Judaism” was identified as the beneficiary of capitalism, which stimulated anti-Semitism especially among the academic youth. This trend essentially persisted into the 1930s.
In the decades before and after the First World War, the typical student in Germany - as in most other European countries - was “nationally minded” and stood up for the “national cause”. “International” was a dirty word.
In these decades the students orientated themselves to the generally valid national songs. The song Die Wacht am Rhein (see there) was particularly popular and sung on festive national occasions .
Midnight scream
The so-called midnight scream, not a song, but a poem, is particularly common in student associations and technical universities with a mining background. It was probably created in Leipzig at the beginning of the 20th century and further developed in Göttingen. In the 1960s it was expanded in Clausthal to the form listed below. At the Clausthal-Zellerfeld Robert Koch School , the midnight scream followed by a Steiger song is still celebrated at every Abitur graduation ceremony.
Traditionally the poem is performed at midnight sharp in a deep, dramatic voice. For this, after a loud cry, Silentium! Lumen ex! extinguished the light in the room; only the auditor receives a light, ideally a miner's lamp . After the poem, everyone traditionally sings the Steigerlied . For example, during the Weinheim Conference of the Weinheim Senior Citizens' Convention, the midnight scream is sung every evening at 12 on the market square and is an integral part of the tradition.
- According to ancient customs and lads' custom,
- at midnight the boy screams!
- We are descended from the heroic fathers,
- We always enjoyed sedentarism,
- Despisers of the dwarf race,
- only with a bad stomach
- Juice and soda can be tolerated.
- But we want to swing the methorn,
- Bardensong shall penetrate heavenly;
- that in the days of a grandchild and great-grandson
- all the charcoal burners in the forest say:
- Weather too! They could do it nicely!
- Clausthal variant
- Friends of the late hour,
- hear my admonishing scream.
- Cheered in a happy group
- Another festival passed by.
- Cheered, smoked and drunk,
- as it should be
- now heaven is open to us
- because the cycle is cleared again.
- Now rushes through our veins again,
- fiery blood, contrary to the police,
- and with the crescendo of songs
- our courage increases with the help of hormones.
- At midnight
- the eternal miracle repeats itself;
- Gambrinus aged round
- becomes youthful again.
- So friends let us remember the old
- who once invented that cult
- and in all Clausthal taverns
- confessed to the midnight scream.
- According to ancient, ancient customs
- sounds at midnight
-
the Clausthal midnight scream.
- Everyone: Hui!
- We have descended from the forefathers,
- defensive, true Wallhall comrades,
- Outlaws of the pitiful dwarf race,
- that in his pimped stomachs
-
at most milk or rare water can be tolerated.
- Everyone: Ugh!
-
But that's nothing for us
- All: No, nothing at all!
- Therefore, brothers, let's swing the methorns,
- and reach heaven with cheers,
- like bearskin roar,
- so that the charcoal burners in many thousands of years
- say in the deepest Harzewinkel:
- "Weather up, they were nice!"
- The new morning shouldn't see us sober.
Student song today
Since the second half of the 20th century, student songs have only been created to a limited extent, sometimes well-known folk or protest songs are underlaid with a current text for a demonstration, sometimes new songs are created in a student cabaret. However, these songs often disappear with their respective occasion.
Otherwise, the repertoire of today's singing students (if they don't sing in groups) consists mainly of German and international folk and pop songs, as they are also common among today's non-academic youth.
See also
- Singers
- See German student movement in the 1960s
- See the youth movement around 1900: Wandervogel
- See collection of songs Die Mundorgel
literature
Theoretical about the student song
- Wolfram Dürbeck : From Vagant Song to Kneipp Song. The German student song through the ages. In: then and now. Yearbook of the Association for Corporate Student History Research . 47 (2002), pp. 33-49.
- Helmut Henne : student song in the 19th century. Report on a research project. In: Dieter Cherubim, Klaus Mattheier (ed.): Requirements and basics of contemporary language. Walter de Gruyter, 1989, ISBN 3-11-011349-X . Pp. 297-302.
- Theodor Hölcke : From the German student song . In: Historia Academica. Series of publications by the Student History Association of the Coburg Convent. Issue 29/30, 1990/1991.
- Salcia Landmann: O old lad glory ! Farewell to the student song . In: Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte XXIX, 1977, no. 1, pp. 53–60.
- Raimund Lang : Intonas I. Of student texts and ways. Publishing house of the Austrian Association for Student History, Vienna 1992.
- Raimund Lang: Intonas II. Of student texts and ways. Publishing house of the Austrian Association for Student History, Vienna 1998.
- Raimund Lang: Intonas III. Of student texts and ways. Publishing house of the Austrian Association for Student History, Vienna 2017.
- Raimund Lang: The woman in the student song. In: Documenta et Commentarii. Series of publications by the Swiss Association for Student History. No. 20, 1998.
- Raimund Lang: Ergo cantemus. Texts and materials for the student song. GDS archive for university history and student history, supplement 13, SH-Verlag, Cologne 2001, ISBN 3-89498-112-1 .
- Heinz Linnerz : The drinking song in German poetry from Johann Hermann Schein to Viktor von Scheffel. Diss. [Mach.] Cologne 1952.
- Harald Lönnecker : "To spread dissatisfaction with the existing governments among the people". Political songs of the fraternities from the period between 1820 and 1850. In: Deutsches Volksliedarchiv (Hrsg.): Lied und popular Kultur, 48. Waxmann, 2003, pp. 85-131.
- Harald Lönnecker: “You will never come back, golden days, so happy and free!” Student songs of remembrance in the 19th and 20th centuries. In: Lied und popular Kultur, 59. Waxmann, Münster 2015, ISBN 978-3-8309-3184-3 , pp. 39–73.
- Paul Nettl : Prague in a student song . Robert Lerche Publishing House, Munich 1964.
- Georg Objartel : Student song and art song in the late 18th century: The song manuscript of Friedrich August Koehler (1791). In: Jahrbuch für Volksliedforschung, 33 (1988). Pp. 19-45.
- Kurt Stephenson : On the sociology of the student song. In: Erich Schenk (Ed.): Report on the international musicological congress Vienna, Mozart year 1956, June 3rd to 9th. Graz / Cologne 1958, pp. 608–611.
- Friedrich Schiller University Jena (Ed.): "We had built a stately house ..." - Contributions to the history of the German fraternity 1815–1848 / 49. Jena 1989 (Appendix).
Early or major song collections
- Johann Christian Günther : love poems and student songs in chronological order. In: J. Ch. Günther's Complete Works . Historical-critical complete edition. 6 volumes. Edited by Wilhelm Krämer. Vol. 1. Darmstadt: WBG, 1964.
- Christian Wilhelm Kindleben: student songs . Collected from the papers left behind by an unfortunate philosopher, called Florido, and improved by C. W. K. , Halle an der Saale 1781 (collection of 64 songs digitized by the Munich Digitization Center of the Bavarian State Library ).
- Selection of good drinking songs, or tones of joy and wine, to be played at a friendly meal. Collected from the best poets. [Ed .: Johann Christian Christoph Rüdiger.] 2nd, greatly increased edition. Hendel, Halle 1795.
- Leipzig Commers book by Doering. [Author: CH]. [O. O.] 1815.
- New German general commers and song book. Second increased edition. Germania 1816 [1. Ed. Tübingen 1815].
- German boys' songs with four-part melodies. First collection. Jena 1817.
- General commers and song book with melodies, containing older and new boyish songs, drinking songs, patriotic songs, war and gymnastics songs. Edited by Albert Methfessel . Rudolstadt 1818.
- Kiel Commers and song book . Printed by CF Mohr, Kiel 1821.
- Life at universities or presentation of all the manners and customs of the students, their connections and comments in duels, etc. together with all boyish expressions and a selection of the most popular boyish songs. Sondershausen 1822.
- Aug [ust] de Marle (Ed.): Germany's song and Commers book. Coesfeld 1838.
- Songbook of the Tübingen University , Tübingen 1842.
- Gustav Braun (ed.): Songbook for students. With melodies , Berlin 1843.
- Old and new student songs. With pictures and ways of singing. Edited by L. Richter and AE Marschner. Leipzig 1844. Reprint 3rd edition. Dortmund 1985 ( The bibliophile paperbacks; 13).
- General German song lexicon or complete collection of all known German songs and folk chants in alphabetical order. Published by Wilhelm Bernhardi. I: A-E. Hildesheim 1968 (reprint of the Leipzig 1844 edition).
- General German song lexicon or complete collection of all known German songs and folk chants in alphabetical order. Published by Wilhelm Bernhardi. II: F-M. Hildesheim 1968 (reprint of the Leipzig 1844 edition).
- General German song lexicon or complete collection of all known German songs and folk chants in alphabetical order. Published by Wilhelm Bernhardi. III: N-V. Hildesheim 1968 (reprint of the Leipzig 1846 edition).
- General German song lexicon or complete collection of all known German songs and folk chants in alphabetical order. Published by Wilhelm Bernhardi. IV: W-Z. Hildesheim 1968 (reprint of the Leipzig 1846 edition).
- Ludwig August Clericus : Songbook of the Albertina. Koenigsberg 1850; newly edited by Eduard Loch, by Graefe and Unzer, 1934.
- Georg Scherer (Ed.): Student songs. Leipzig around 1853. (With illustrations for all 129 songs and the title page by Ludwig Richter and Franz Pocci .)
- Hermann Schauenburg, Moritz Schauenburg (Hrsg.): General German Kommersbuch. Edition D., Morstadt Druck + Verlag, 162nd edition, January 2004 (first edition 1858), ISBN 3-88571-249-0 .
- Robert Keil, Richard Keil: German student songs of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Lahr 1861.
- “Ubi sunt, qui ante nos In mundo fuere?” Selected Latin student, drinking, love and other songs from the fourteenth to eighteenth centuries from various sources, with new German translations, historical introduction, explanations, additions and an illustration. A study of the history of literature, at the same time a song book by Adolf Pernwerth von Bärnstein . Wuerzburg 1881.
- Franz Magnus Böhme: Popular songs of the Germans in the 18th and 19th centuries. Leipzig 1895 [student songs p. 409-426].
- Songbook for female students. JH Ed. Heitz (Heitz & Mündel), Strasbourg 1910.
- Gaudeamus igitur. Let's be happy. Historical student songs. Compiled, edited and commented by Günter Steiger and Hans-Joachim Ludwig, 1st edition Leipzig 1986, 3rd edition, Leipzig 1989 [1] .
- FDJ student songbook. Published by the Central Council of Free German Youth through the Junge Welt publishing house. Berlin (GDR) 1987.
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