Volkslied (literally:
folk song
Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be c ...
) is a genre of popular songs in German which are traditionally sung. While many of them were first passed orally, several collections were published from the late 18th century. Later, some popular songs were also included in this classification.
History
The earliest songs in German appeared in the 12th century.
Art song
An art song is a Western vocal music composition, usually written for one voice with piano accompaniment, and usually in the classical art music tradition. By extension, the term "art song" is used to refer to the collective genre of such songs ...
s were created by
minstrels and
meistersinger while
cantastoria
(; also spelled , or ) comes from Italian for "story-singer" and is known by many other names around the world. It is a theatrical form where a performer tells or sings a story while gesturing to a series of images. These images can be paint ...
(''Bänkelsänger'') sang songs in public that were orally transmitted. Song collections were written from the late 15th century, such as ''
Lochamer-Liederbuch'' and ''
Glogauer Liederbuch''.
Georg Forster's ''
Frische teutsche Liedlein'' was first printed in 1536.
In the period of
Sturm und Drang, poets and authors became interested in that which they saw as simple, close to nature, original, and unspoiled (nach dem ).
Johann Gottfried Herder
Johann Gottfried von Herder ( , ; 25 August 174418 December 1803) was a German philosopher, theologian, poet, and literary critic. He is associated with the Enlightenment, ''Sturm und Drang'', and Weimar Classicism.
Biography
Born in Mohrun ...
coined the term 'Volkslied' in the late 18th century, and published ''Von deutscher Art und Kunst'' (On German ways and artistry) in 1771. In 1778/79, a collection ''Volkslieder'' was published, promoted by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (, ; 22 January 1729 – 15 February 1781) was a philosopher, dramatist, publicist and art critic, and a representative of the Enlightenment era. His plays and theoretical writings substantially influe