Friedrich Schiller van Beethoven said that a great poem is more difficult to set to music than a merely good one because the composer must rise higher than the poet – "who can do that in the case of Schiller? In this respect Goethe is much easier," wrote Beethoven. There are relatively few famous musical settings of Schiller's poems. Notable exceptions are Beethoven's setting of "An die Freude" ("Ode to Joy") in the final movement of his Ninth Symphony, Johannes Brahms' choral setting of "Nänie" and "Des Mädchens Klage" by Franz Schubert, who set 44 of Schiller's poems as Lieder, mostly for
A Song of Joy A Song of Joy "A Song of Joy" ("Himno de la alegría") is the title of a popular rock song by the Spanish singer and actor Miguel Ríos. The song is set to the tune the Ninth Symphony by Ludwig van Beethoven, as arranged by Waldo de los Rios, who specialized in arranging classical music to contemporary rhythms. The single was enormously popular in many countries in 1970 (see 1970 in music), reaching number one on music charts in Australia, Canada, Germany, Switzerland, and the Easy Listening chart in the United States. On the U.S. pop chart, the song peaked