Michael Praetorius

Michael Praetorius’s (c. 1571–1621) life spanned the transition from the High Renaissance to the early baroque. Born in Kreuzberg, Thuringia, as Michael Schultheiss (Latinized as Praetorius), he was the son of a Lutheran pastor. He spent most of his professional life as an organist, Kantor and Kapellmeister in the Lutheran cities and states of Northern Germany. After studies at Frankfurt an der Oder, at 24 he entered the service of Duke Heinrich Julius of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel as an organist, and in 1604 he also assumed the duties of court Kapellmeister. Upon the death of his patron in 1613, Praetorius entered the service of the Elector Johann Georg of Saxony at the Dresden court, where he would remain until 1616, when he returned to Wolfenbüttel. While in Dresden, he also served as Kapellmeister to the administrator of the Magdeburg bishopric and prior of the monastery at Ringelheim. Praetorius returned to his old position in Wolfenbüttel, but due to regular travel and failing health, was not reappointed in 1620. He died a wealthy man the following year, and directed that the greater portion of his fortune go to organizing a foundation for the poor.

A virtuoso organist, an organ builder, a composer and an assiduous musical scholar, Praetorius is celebrated for writing a remarkable three volume musical treatise, the Syntagma musicum, which allows us rare and fascinating glimpses into the musical sensibilities of his time. Praetorius’s musical style was strongly influenced by the Germans Schütz and Scheidt, and by the latest Italian music, which he came into contact with in Dresden in the 1610s. Most of Praetorius’s sacred music is based on Protestant hymns (chorales). A product of post-Reformation bourgeois society, he was for his time a man of tremendous erudition, a polymath who was well versed in philosophy, theology, and languages (including Greek, Hebrew and Latin) in addition to his formidable theoretical and practical understanding of music. Praetorius was also one of the most prolific composers of his generation in Germany, listing over forty volumes of printed music at the end of the Syntagma musicum, including sacred and secular works of all kinds for voices, choirs, instruments, and organ. His work clearly forms the climax in the history of Protestant church music of alternatim (the practice of alternating the performance of sections of works for different forces).

Vocal works performed by the San Francisco Bach Choir

Allein Gott in der Höh’ sei Ehr
Angelus ad pastores ait
Christ der du bist Tag und Licht
Christ lag in Todesbanden
Christe, du Lamm Gottes
Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott
Ein Kindelein so löbelich
Erstanden ist der heilge Christ
En natus est Emmanuel
Es ist ein’ Ros’ entsprungen
Freut euch ihr lieben Christen
Frohlock, O Tochter Zion, fast
Gelobet seist du, Jesu Christ
Gelobet und gepreiset
Hallelujah, Christ ist Erstanden
Herzlich lieb hab' ich dich, O Herr
Hosianna in der Höhe
In dulci jubilo
Jesaia dem Propheten
Jubilate Domino
Jubilieret fröhlich
Kyrie from Missa a8
Meine Seel erhebt den Herren (German Magnificat)
Magnificat super Angelus ad Pastores
Magnificat super Chorale melos Germanicum
Mit Fried und Freud ich fahr dahin
Nun komm der Heiden Heiland
Nun freut euch lieben Christen g’mein
Omnis mundus jocundetur
Psallite
Puer natus: Ein Kind geborn
Pueri nostri concinite
Quem pastores laudavere
Vom himmel hoch
Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme
Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern
Wir gläuben all an einen Gott