German Folk Tales — Part 1 (The Frog-Prince · The Queen Bee · The Elves and the Shoemaker)
Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices.
Part one — the premiere of a new shelf. Three tales from the Brothers Grimm's Kinder- und Hausmärchen, in Margaret Hunt's English translation (1884), heard here in a fresh telling from the printed text. In The Frog-Prince, a princess loses her golden ball in the deep spring and promises the frog who fetches it that he may eat from her golden plate and sleep on her bed — and her father the king holds her to her word, three nights, until the charm breaks and faithful Heinrich rides behind the coach. In The Queen Bee, the youngest brother stays his elders' hands from the ant-hill, the ducks, and the bees, and the grateful creatures answer in kind: the ants find the thousand pearls, the ducks dive up the key, and the queen bee settles on the lips that tasted honey. In The Elves and the Shoemaker, an honest shoemaker down to his last piece of leather finds his work finished stitch-perfect each morning, and repays his midnight helpers with little clothes of their own. The episode opens and closes with its theme, Feline Grace — Concert Hall Miniatures, heard also briefly between the stories.
Chapters
0:55 The Frog-Prince
7:34 The Queen Bee
12:31 The Elves and the Shoemaker
Two further tales were read in full for this pack and are not read here, set aside by name: The Golden Goose (its elder brothers' refusals are answered by narrated axe wounds) and Mother Holle (benched at screen — the blood-on-the-spindle device and the heroine's jump into the well). The Juniper-Tree class is excluded by standing register. No claim of completeness for the book is made.
From Kinder- und Hausmärchen by Jacob Grimm (1785–1863) and Wilhelm Grimm (1786–1859), final edition 1857, in Margaret Hunt's translation (1884), public domain — Project Gutenberg #2591; the three tales complete and in the Hunt volume's order, in a fresh telling. Narrated by Benedetto. Theme: Feline Grace — Concert Hall Miniatures.
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