View source for Matthias Weckmann

{{short description|German composer (c. 1616–1674)}}
{{more citations needed|date=February 2017}}
'''Matthias Weckmann''' (''Weckman'') (''c''.1616 {{ndash}} 24 February 1674) was a German musician and composer of the [[Baroque music|Baroque]] period. He was born in [[Niederdorla]] ([[Thuringia]]) and died in [[Hamburg]].

==Life==
His musical training took place in [[Dresden]] (as a chorister at the Saxon Court, under the direction of [[Heinrich Schütz]]), then in Hamburg where he worked with the famous organist [[Jacob Praetorius]] at the [[Saint Peter|Saint Peter's church]] (Petrikirche).

He was introduced to the Italian ''[[stile concertato|concertato]]'', [[Venetian polychoral style|polychoral]] and [[monody|monodic]] styles — because Schütz had journeyed in Italy when a young man and he had met [[Giovanni Gabrieli]] and [[Claudio Monteverdi|Monteverdi]] — as well as the style of [[Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck|Sweelinck's]] pupils, some of whom had settled in Hamburg. Weckmann travelled to [[Denmark]] in 1637 with Schütz, became organist in Dresden at the Electoral Court of Saxony from 1638 to 1642, and returned to Denmark until 1647 (during the [[Thirty Years' War]]).

During a new (and his last) stay in Dresden from 1649 to 1655, he met [[Johann Jakob Froberger]] during a musical competition which had been organized by the Elector. They remained friends and in correspondence with each other. In 1655, after a competition, he was named titular organist at [[St. Jacobi, Hamburg|Saint James church (Jakobkirche)]] in Hamburg, and spent his remaining life there. He founded a renowned orchestral [[musical ensemble|ensemble]], the so-called ''[[Collegium Musicum]]'' in Hamburg. This was the most productive period of his life: his compositions of this time include a collection of 1663, which set sacred texts mentioning the terrible plague which killed his first wife and many of his colleagues in Hamburg that year, including [[Heinrich Scheidemann]].

He died in Hamburg and was buried in a family grave in [[St. James' Church, Hamburg|St. James's Church]] beneath the organ.

==Works==
Weckmann composed [[chorale preludes]] and music for the [[Pipe organ|organ]] and [[harpsichord]] that mixes Italian and French influences, various [[sonata (music)|sonatas]] for three or four instruments, and orchestral and vocal sacred music. Stylistically, he mostly followed the progressive tendencies of Schütz, including the ''[[stile concertato]]'' and the trend to increasing [[chromaticism]] and [[counterpoint|contrapuntal]] and motivic complexity. In this regard, he went against the prevailing trends of the time towards simplification, much of which can be seen in Schütz's later music. Weckmann is a good example of a composer whose works would have been completely lost to history, had it not been for the 19th century interest in researching the predecessors of [[Johann Sebastian Bach|J.S. Bach]].{{Citation needed|date=August 2009}}

==See also==
* [[7587 Weckmann]], an asteroid

==References==
*{{cite NewGrove2001|title=Weckmann, Matthias|last=Silbiger|first=Alexander|volume=xxvii|pages=199–202}}
*[[Manfred Bukofzer]], ''Music in the Baroque Era''.  New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 1947.  ({{ISBN|0-393-09745-5}})

==External links==
*{{IMSLP|id=Weckmann, Matthias}}
*{{ChoralWiki|Matthias Weckmann}}
*{{MutopiaComposer|WeckmannM}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Weckmann, Matthias}}
[[Category:1610s births]]
[[Category:1674 deaths]]
[[Category:17th-century German classical composers]]
[[Category:German Baroque composers]]
[[Category:German male classical composers]]
[[Category:German classical organists]]
[[Category:Organists and composers in the North German tradition]]
[[Category:Pupils of Heinrich Schütz]]
[[Category:17th-century German male musicians]]
[[Category:German male classical organists]]