Chester Lee Alwes writes that the song "became the gold standard of the Lied genre".
[1] There has been doubt whether the melody was in fact written by Heinrich Isaac or copied from earlier tunes.
The melody was later used in a Lutheran chorale, "O Welt, ich muß dich lassen", and still appears in modern English-language hymnals under the name "Innsbruck", to a wide variety of text, of which the most common one is "The duteous day now closeth",[2] a paraphrase of Paul Gerhardt's "Nun ruhen alle Wälder.
The lyrics express sorrow at having to leave a post at court, as the singer is forced to abandon his love and to depart to a foreign country.
Mein Trost ob allen Weiben, dein tu ich ewig bleiben, stet' treu, der Ehren fromm; nun muss dich Gott bewahren, in aller Tugend sparen, bis dass ich wieder komm!