"Ritter Ewald" is a little known German ballad. This is one of two songs given to me by Heidi Schwarz (a member both of Collegium Musicum Bremen and Blue Tuesday) sometime in 1998 who had heard me singing an English ballad and thought it would be a good idea for me to learn some German ones. I don't know from which source she got the songs.
This 13-verse ballad is of a nobleman going off to the wars and coming back to find his true love long departed to the heavenly regions beyond mortal temptations. He turns pacifist, goes to a monastery and dies himself a year later. The object of the exercise being that his grave should be beside his sweetheart's as proof of his fidelity. All splendid stuff, dear surfer.

Lyrics