"Song to the Evening Star" ("O du, mein holder Abendstern"), also known as "Oh Star Of Eve", is an aria sung by the character Wolfram (

baritone A baritone is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the bass and the tenor voice-types. The term originates from the Greek (), meaning "heavy sounding". Composers typically write music for this voice in the r ...

) in the third act of

Richard Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...

's 1845 opera '' Tannhäuser''. Wolfram greets the Evening Star (the planet Venus) for offering hope in darkness; with an implied contrast to Tannhäuser's lover Venus at the beginning of the opera, in her underground realm Venusberg.

Franz Liszt Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...

wrote in 1849 a paraphrase for piano of this aria, S.

444 Year 444 ( CDXLIV) was a leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Theodosius and Aginatius (or, less frequently, year 1197 ''Ab urbe ...

, arranged with

Bernhard Cossmann Bernhard Cossmann (17 May 1822 – 7 May 1910) was a German cellist. Born in Dessau, he first studied under Theodore Muller. During his life, he worked for the Grand Opera in Paris and became acquainted with Franz Liszt, with whom he went to Weim ...

for cello and piano in 1852 as S. 380. It has been arranged for voice and piano, and for various wind instruments and piano.

References

External links

* A parallel text in German and English. * Compositions by Richard Wagner Opera excerpts 1845 songs Baritone arias Arias in German {{German-opera-stub