"Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage" is a short cantata for choir and orchestra composed by Ludwig van Beethoven, based on two poems by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. The two met in 1812; Beethoven admired Goethe, and the work is dedicated to him.
Beethoven began composing at the end of 1814, and finished in the summer of 1815. The premiere took place in Vienna on December 25, 1815, at a benefit concert for the Bürgerspitalfond. Beethoven's oratorio Christus am Ölberge was also performed at this concert.
Beethoven had already used Klopstock's odes as the basis for cantatas in Bonn in 1790 (WoO 87 and WoO 88), at a time when these odes were gaining popularity. His interest in Goethe's poems also dates from this period, as do his initial plans to set Schiller's poem An die Freude, which later became the final movement of the 9th Symphony.
Beethoven's Meeresstille und glückliche Fahrt was not printed until 1822. His letters to Goethe about setting the two poems to music remained unanswered (Goethe was rather particular about his poems being set to music - he often complained that the music obscured the text).
Note that the titles of the poems are not synonymous: in the days before steam, a completely calm sea was cause for alarm (!) - only when the wind finally picks up can the ship continue its journey. The first section depicts a ship that has become becalmed; the second section depicts a ship that has succeeded in resuming its journey.
The quiet, deliberate first movement describes a "deep silence" and the sea "resting without motion. This mood is reversed in the second movement, which becomes more stormy as "the mist breaks" and "the sky is bright" and finally "the distance approaches and the land can be seen. The frenetic 6/8 meter of "Glückliche Fahrt" contrasts sharply with the work's opening, where Beethoven's idiosyncratic scoring and slow-moving, chorale-like harmonies in D major achieve an extraordinary sense of rapture that is matched only in some of the slow movements of the late piano sonatas and quartets.
Mendelssohn's well-known Overture shares the same literary source, as does Schubert's solo setting of 'Meeresstille', D216, composed in June 1815 and published as part of his Opus 3.
Meeresstille.
Tiefe Stille herrscht im Wasser,
Ohne Regung ruht das Meer,
Und bekümmert sieht der Schiffer
Glatte Fläche ringsumher.
Keine Luft von keiner Seite!
Todesstille fürchterlich!
In der ungeheuern Weite
Reget keine Welle sich.
Glückliche Fahrt.
Die Nebel zerreißen,
Der Himmel ist helle,
Und Äolus löset
Das ängstliche Band.
Es säuseln die Winde,
Es rührt sich der Schiffer.
Geschwinde! Geschwinde!
Es teilt sich die Welle,
Es naht sich die Ferne;
Schon seh ich das Land!
Listen to: Radio Filharmonisch Orkest & Groot Omroepkoor conducted by James Gaffigan in a registration by the Dutch television.