Some time before Beethoven composed his last symphony, Shubert had set
stanzas from Schiller's "Ode to Joy" to music in his own Lied.  I heard it
just now on a Hyperion CD (CDJ33016) of Thomas Allen singing Schubert songs
to texts by Schiller accompanied by Graham Johnson, which I had bought last
week in a sale at Tower Records.  I thought it a wonderful setting.  The CD
also contains, among other Lieder, Schubert's setting of "Die Buergschaft"
("The Pledge", the Damon and Pythias story), almost a mini-opera with one
voice singing the various parts and that of the narrator, lasting 16 and a
half minutes.  I have Fischer-Dieskau singing it on a DG lp but have never
found it recorded on a separate CD before (I've not bought the complete
FiDi Schubert set) and its inclusion on this CD has contributed further
to making it a valuable addition to my collection.

Walter Meyer