Adagio mit sanften Stimmen

Here is a little p[iece of a less known composer.
Benedikt Widmann studied composition and morphology with Franz Xaver Schnyder von Wartensee, whose system of rhythmics he later edited. He was a music teacher and rector for almost 50 years at the "Rosenbergerschule" as well as at the "Schule der Englischen Fräulein" in Frankfurt am Main. He wrote a large number of music-theoretical and music-pedagogical writings, thus contributing, above all, decisively to the spread of the "Leipziger harmonielehre tradition" in the 19th century.

As a composer his focus was on vocal music. Some of his "folk-tone" tunes are still popular today. In particular, he set a variety of children's poems of his Frankfurt colleague Karl Enslin.

Widmann is also occasionally, especially in older school songbooks, as a composer of Karl Enslin texted Christmas Carol Kling, bell, called klingelingeling, but this is not proven. In particular, the frequently found statement that melody was created in 1884, not true, since it is already proven by 1873 at the latest.

Widmann's estate is located in the Frankfurt Institute for Urban History.