Life
Heinrich Schütz was a German composer and organist born 18 October 1585 in Köstritz and died 6 November 1672 in Dresden. Discovered as a child singer by the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel, he later studied music in Venice under Giovanni Gabrieli before becoming court composer to the Elector of Saxony in Dresden in 1615, a post he held for the rest of his career despite the disruptions of the Thirty Years’ War. Heinrich Schütz is generally regarded as the most important German composer before Johann Sebastian Bach, credited with bringing the Italian polychoral and concertato styles north. His surviving output of over 500 works includes the Psalmen Davids, Musikalische Exequien, and three settings of the Passion.
Impact
Schütz was the crucial conduit through which Italian Baroque innovations — polychoral writing, the concertato style, and expressive text-setting — entered German musical life, laying the groundwork for the great German Lutheran choral tradition. His Musikalische Exequien is considered the first German Requiem, and his synthesis of Italian and German styles directly shaped the North German organ and choral schools that culminated in the work of Bach.
Repertoire
Psalmen Davids, Op. 2, 1619
A landmark collection of large-scale polychoral psalm settings that introduced the grand Venetian concertato style to German sacred music.
Schütz: Psalmen Davids | Hans-Christoph Rademann & Dresdner Barockorchester & Kammerchor — Performed by Hans-Christoph Rademann / Dresdner Kammerchor · Concert performance
Musikalische Exequien, 1636
A funeral composition written for the burial of Schütz’s patron Heinrich Posthumus of Reuss, often considered the first German Requiem.
Schütz: Musikalische Exequien I – Herreweghe — Performed by Philippe Herreweghe / La Chapelle Royale · Studio recording, part I