THE GREAT COMPOSERS OF AVE MARIA COMPOSITIONS

Ave Maria is the Latin translation of the Marian prayer, the Hail Mary. Music has been set to that prayer’s text by some of the greatest composers the world has known including: Beethoven, Bizet, Brahms, Bruckner, Czerny, Donizetti, Dvorak, Faure, Franck, Handel, Haydn, Liszt, Mendelsohn, Mozart, Puccini Rachmaninoff, Rossini, Saint-Saens, Stravinsky and Verdi. Probably, today’s most popular versions were composed by Charles Gounod and Franz Schubert.

Gounod’s “Ave Maria” retained the roots of Johann Sebastian Bach’s 1st Prelude in C Major from the Well-Tempered Clavier. It is often referred to as the "Bach-Gounod.

Schubert’s original title was Ellens Gesang III, Op 52 No 4. Today, that piece is referred to as “Ave Maria” but it was never intended by Schubert to be connected with the traditional Hail Mary text. His music was originally set to a poem by Adam D. Storck, with the German translation of Sir Walter Scott’s Lady of the Lake. Later, Schubert’s publishers changed the text to the Hail Mary prayer (in Latin).

Please note (below) that aside from the opening and closing words to Scott’s poem which was originally used in Schubert’s music, there’s no resemblance to the Hail Mary text that is used in his Ave Maria today.