Schubert seemed much possessed by death in early November 1816: in the first few days of that month he composed this Bei dem Grabe meines Vaters (By the Grave of my Father, D. 496), Wiegenlied (Cradle Song, D. 498), and Am Grabe Anselmos (At the Grave of Anselmo, D. 504). The latter two seem to have been inspired by the death of Schubert's infant brother Theodor, but the former had no such immediate inspiration: Schubert's father was still among the living in 1816. And, oddly, Schubert's strophic setting of Matthias Claudius' two-verse poem Bei dem Grabe meines Vaters is not at all emotional: where the other two songs are heartrending in their restrained but deep emotions, Bei dem Grabe meines Vatesr is not so much restrained as it is emotionally void. Am Grabe Anselmos is written in dark E flat minor; Bei dem Grabe meines Vaters is written in clear E flat major. Both the Kindertotenlieder (songs on the deaths of children) have anguished vocal melodies; Bei dem Grabe meines Vaters sounds more like Schubert in a elevated and objective mood. One gets the sense that Schubert was not especially moved by the sentiments of Claudius' poem. One would like to speculate on why Schubert would compose a funeral song for his still living father and on why he would compose such an emotionally affectless setting of such an emotional topic.

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