Schubert set Goethe's So lasst mich scheinen (So let me seem) twice. The first version has come to be called Mignons Gesang (Mignon's Song, D. 727), and the second has come to be called Lied der Mignon II (Song of Mignon II) (D. 877, No. 3). The poem comes from Goethe's novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre and is second of the four poems recited by the waif Mignon.

This first setting, from April 1821, is less popular than the second setting from five years later. One has the feeling that this is simply a case of the very, very great displacing the merely very great, because Mignons Gesang is a magnificent song from every point of view. Setting Goethe's four verses as two pairs of verses, Schubert alternates between B minor for the first and third verses and B major for the second and fourth verses. Further, the first and third verses are essentially contrapuntal in conception, with the piano's chordal accompaniment moving contrary to the vocal melody, while the second and fourth verses are fundamentally melodic in conception with the piano's doubling the vocal melody at the octave. The melodies themselves are both slow, simple, and reserved but very expressive and very, very moving. One has the feeling that, had there been no second setting of So lasst mich scheinen, this song would be one of the more frequently performed of Schubert's Goethe songs.

One final note: There also exists another Mignon setting by Schubert which is often known as Mignons Gesang. This is a setting of a different Mignon poem, Kennst du das Land (D. 321).

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