The song Auf der Lüneburger Heide ("On the Lüneburg Heath") was composed in 1912 by Ludwig Rahlfs based on a

poem Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings in ...

from the collection ''Der kleine Rosengarten'' ("The Little Rose Garden") by

Hermann Löns Hermann Löns (29 August 1866 – 26 September 1914) was a German journalist and writer. He is most famous as "The Poet of the Heath" for his novels and poems celebrating the people and landscape of the North German moors, particularly the L ...

. It is often played at

folk festival A folk festival celebrates traditional folk crafts and folk music. This list includes folk festivals worldwide, except those with only a partial focus on folk music or arts. Folk festivals may also feature folk dance or ethnic foods. Handicra ...

s in this region of north Germany and is also frequently part of the repertoire of local choral societies. It gained fame outside the Lüneburg Heath as a result of the 1951 film ''Grün ist die Heide'' ("Green is the Heath") with Kurt Reimann as the singer and the 1972 film of the same name in which Roy Black sings the heathland song. Various musicians have publicised their own interpretations of the song, for example the

tenor A tenor is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. The tenor's vocal range extends up to C5. The low extreme for tenors is wide ...

Rudolf Schock Rudolf Johann Schock (4 September 1915 – 13 November 1986) was a German tenor. Rudolf Schock was born in Duisburg, in the Prussian Rhine Province. He sang a wide repertoire from operetta to ''Lohengrin'', recording among others opera and lieder, ...

on his CD ''Stimme für Millionen'' ("Voice for Millions"). The

Slovenia Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...

n industrial band

Laibach Laibach () is a Slovenian avant-garde music group associated with the industrial, martial, and neo-classical genres. Formed in the mining town of Trbovlje (at the time in Yugoslavia) in 1980, Laibach represents the musical wing of the Neue ...

used the song in 1988 on their cover version of the Beatles album Let It be, where under the title ''Maggie Mae'', instead of the folk song used by the Beatles an unfamiliar version of ''Auf der Lüneburger Heide'' (first and third verses) may be heard.

Text and English translation

External links

Link with text and melodyAuf der Lüneburger Heide
by Paul Biste.
Information about the poet Hermann LönsAuf der Lüneburger Heide
on YouTube by

Heino Heinz Georg Kramm (born 13 December 1938), known professionally as Heino, is a German singer of Schlager music, Schlager and traditional Volksmusik. Having sold a total of over 50 million records, he is one of the most successful German musici ...

. {{DEFAULTSORT:Auf der Luneburger Heide Regional songs Volkslied Lüneburg Heath