Heulen und schmerzlichs Weinen
Staff Notation • Secular, Madrigals
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Heulen und schmerzlichs Weinen by Johann Hermann Schein — Lyrics
About Heulen und schmerzlichs Weinen
Johann Hermann Schein’s Heulen und schmerzlichs Weinen is a motet for SSATB voices. The composer’s sensitive setting of this German text demonstrates his mastery of word painting. The music opens with dissonant cries of sorrow, reflecting the text’s opening lines of 'howling and painful weeping'. Yet, this gloom is short-lived as the music transforms, mirroring the text’s hopeful turn towards the sun breaking through the clouds and the return of joy. The second verse jubilantly expresses the singer’s renewed happiness as love returns, leading to the final verse’s enthusiastic casting off of all sadness and raising a glass to good health and the beloved.