German composition was the prominent model for study around the turn of the 20th century, and Ives songs with German texts show his mastery of that form. "Widmung" (Dedication) was written for one of Horatio Parker's classes and later published as "There Is A Lane". The song begins in a Brahms-ian mode with lovely descending piano chords, and the peaceful, loving vocal line lyrically scale-wise - " Do not thank me for these songs. It seems to me that I should be thankful to you.You gave them to me and I am returning was is now and was once and will ever be thine. " (trans. by this writer). The line very gradually builds in intensity, like great emotion that is being held back in order not to overwhelm the loved one. Ives uses two unusual chords within the verse, a whole tone chord and a complex diminished one, that bend the ear a bit but they are both resolved within the standard Romantic harmonies, and thus acceptable to his Yale composition teachers. The other setting of Wolfgang Müller's poem was by composer Robert Franz but is in a quite different spirit than that of Ives approach.

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