On special occasions
This hymn is sung at very speciaal occasions e.g. on the birthday of our queens reign, when some people are decorated by the mayer. Once a year, in july, there is a great fair in the Beemster. Then the Beemsterlied is always sung at the end of a special noon for the pensioners of the Beemster.
 
The Beemsterlied was also performed when Beemster was proclaimed World Inheritance in 1999. (picture on the right) But in case of funerals there are many requests to have the sung played too.
 Binne Sytstra
De text of the Beemsterlied was written by Binne Sytstra in 1937 when Beemster celebrated its 325th years existance. A competition was organized for writing a poem, a song of praise. The winning poems were used in a musical and The Beemsterlied was the one that won. The writer of the poem was Binne Sytstra. He was a teacher at the secondary school in the period 1932-1939. He was married with an German girl, Frieda Augusta Bendix.
 O.J.Weisskopf, the composer
For a long time the name of the composer was unknown, until an old choir partition revealed his identity: O.J.Weiszkopf.
There is nothing more known about this composer. He could be an Austrian. Possibly his beautiful melody was kept in the memory of Sytstra's German friend, Frieda.
Sytstra used it for his ode to the Beemster.
Attempts to discover more about the composer did not lead tot more facts, except for the statement of the of the Archiv des Österreichischen Volksliedwerkes that he also wrote the song "Gruß an die Heimat". This folksong was recorded by the Geschwister Buchberger.
O.J.Weiszkopf seems to be totally "sunk down in the morass of oblivian", but in the Beemsterlied, he lives forth.
T he text of the Beemsterhymn
From the high dike,
You have a look over the land.
An unlimited wide distance
stretches out to every side.
The sky is so light and clear,
the wind so fresh and free.
There is space around
and you feel free.
The crossing straight ways
are overshadowed by rows of trees, between which, in a dark frame,
the green pastures.
When spring is there,
every tree becomes a pink
jewel and thousands of flowers are colouring
the world of the polder yellow.
The mirror of the beltcanal
is lying so quiet in the reed.
The plumes are rocking in the wind,
soft whispering their song.
And on the evening a blue dew
makes the fields a sea
and cows are dreaming at the ditch
and everything breathes peace.
Refrain
You are beautiful,
I love love you, my greenest polderland.
You will be my dearest place on earth,
my green and fine Beemsterland
This is an arrangement of the Beemsterlied. The name of the real composer is wiped off and the adapter put his own name on it: Paul Geugjes.
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