700 years ago on this day William Tell reportedly, shot an apple off his son's head. After refusing to pay homage to a Hapsburg liege, he was forced to submit to the test of marksmanship. Later, he killed the tyrant and went on to many daring exploits.
legends and folk tales around William Tell are known to date back to the late fifteenth century and you don't need to dig too deep to discover many more myths of marksmanship throughout the world. Friedrich Schiller's highly politicized play canonized the apple tale and buoyed by Switzerland's post-Napoleonic patriotism, made the archer iconic. Schiller had never visited Switzerland; he got the idea from his friend Goethe, who returned from a trip bearing local folk tales. In 1804, the tale premiered at Weimer under Goethe's direction. The popular Rossini opera and the resulting Lone Ranger theme was based on the play.
The play became part of the German dramatic canon and initially was favourite of the Nazi's but later dropped out of favour with Hitler following an assassination attempt by a Swiss born activist. reportedly Hitler lamented "of all people Schiller had to glorify this Swiss sniper"
“Against stupidity the very gods themselves contend in vain.”
- Friedrich Schiller
and here's my attempt at the William Tell Overture. I have a side project revisiting some classical favourites with unusual instrumentation. This one is the first out of the blocks. Ravel's Bolero played on the Mellotron anybody?
legends and folk tales around William Tell are known to date back to the late fifteenth century and you don't need to dig too deep to discover many more myths of marksmanship throughout the world. Friedrich Schiller's highly politicized play canonized the apple tale and buoyed by Switzerland's post-Napoleonic patriotism, made the archer iconic. Schiller had never visited Switzerland; he got the idea from his friend Goethe, who returned from a trip bearing local folk tales. In 1804, the tale premiered at Weimer under Goethe's direction. The popular Rossini opera and the resulting Lone Ranger theme was based on the play.
The play became part of the German dramatic canon and initially was favourite of the Nazi's but later dropped out of favour with Hitler following an assassination attempt by a Swiss born activist. reportedly Hitler lamented "of all people Schiller had to glorify this Swiss sniper"
“Against stupidity the very gods themselves contend in vain.”
- Friedrich Schiller
and here's my attempt at the William Tell Overture. I have a side project revisiting some classical favourites with unusual instrumentation. This one is the first out of the blocks. Ravel's Bolero played on the Mellotron anybody?
RSS Feed