The Birth of Our National Anthem

The year 1864 marks a defining moment in our history as the birth of our national anthem. On 5 June 1864, Ettelbruck hosted the first nationwide music festival of the Allgemeiner Luxemburger Musikverein (ALM), today’s Union Grand-Duc Adolphe, with no fewer than 28 musical societies from across the country taking part.

The highlight of the evening was a grand gala concert, where music societies from Luxembourg, Larochette, Vianden and Wiltz performed under the direction of Jean-Antoine Zinnen. The eleventh item on the programme was Ons Heemecht, a composition for four-part male choir, set to music by Jean-Antoine Zinnen from a poem by Michel Lentz dating back to 1850. On this memorable day, the piece was performed a cappella by 550 singers, conducted by the maestro himself. The audience was captivated, greeting the work with thunderous applause.

This piece, which Zinnen had completed on 25 March 1864, was the first four-part choral composition in the Luxembourgish language, bearing the dedication “Dem Lëtzeburger Sängerbond zouerkannt”. Later, Zinnen arranged his hymn for wind band (harmony and fanfare orchestras), and it was first performed in this form on 25 June 1865 at the ALM festival in Vianden. Drawing on this enticing melody, reminiscent of Mozart’s Ave Verum, he also composed his Heemechtsmarsch.

In the past, Michel Lentz’s stirring De Feierwôn, with its declaration “Mir wëlle bléiwen wat mer sinn”, a statement that was vitally important in 1867 and 1870, served as an unofficial national anthem. In this context, the line from the fourth stanza, “Loosst viru blénken d’Fräiheetsson”, from D’Uelzecht (as the song was once called), resonated strongly with Luxembourgers. The song Ons Heemecht, which since the 1970s had been the “homegrown” national anthem of the Luxembourgish people, definitively replaced the De Feierwôn after the end of the First World War as the national song at official occasions.

The Luxembourgers themselves had effectively anointed Ons Heemecht as their anthem, as the responsible authorities took decades to grant it official recognition. It was not until 47 years after the end of the Second World War that Ons Heemecht was enshrined in law as the national anthem. On 27 July 1993, the following provision was formally adopted:

Loi du 27 juillet 1993 modifiant et complétant la loi du 23 juin 1927 sur les emblèmes nationaux... Art. 6. La première et la dernière strophes du chant “Ons Heemecht” (1859), texte de Michel Lentz, musique de Jean-Antoine Zinnen, tels qu’ils sont publiés en annexe à la présente loi, constituent l’hymne national du Grand-Duché.

Jean-Antoine Zinnen devoted his entire life to music, both as a performer and a composer. His oeuvre, estimated by various biographies at around 130 works, spans orchestral pieces, overtures, polkas, waltzes, dances and marches, as well as operettas, cantatas, choral music and several songs.

His compositions were issued in Luxembourg, Arlon, Liège, Leipzig, Paris and through his own publishing house, Le Diapason. The Parisian manuscripts all bear a stamp with the composer’s Parisian address: 1, rue de la Coutellerie.

The earliest surviving handwritten manuscript by Jean-Antoine Zinnen is held by the Cedom (Centre d’études et de documentation musicales) at the National Library. This autograph collection from 1851 includes the following works: Langsamer Marsch (Zinnen), Galopp (arr. Zinnen), Paulinen Galopp (arr. Zinnen) and 2. Mazurka by Dicks (arr. Zinnen).

This article was originally published in Luxembourgish. The English version was translated using AI and reviewed by the author.