Matthias Weckmann

While Matthias Weckmann's music is much admired by those familiar with his works, compared to that of other seventeenth-century masters it has received relatively little attention. This paper suggest a possible explanation, within the context of the great tradition Weckmann inherited and from Monteverdi and from Schütz, his teacher. Note: This article was scanned for me by the Duke Library from the Symposium volume. The poor quality of the scan is due to the fact that the publication is tightly bound, with narrow margins. Nevertheless, it is quite readable throughout, and I do not possess the article in any other form.

Hugo Leichsenring (3. November 1896 – 3. November 1946) was organist and choir director in Hamburg after serving in WWI and following his studies at the Friedrich-Wilhelm University in Berlin from 1919-1922.  He graduated in 1922 with a PhD in musicology that focused on the music history of Hamburg in the period before, during, and after the Reformation.  His dissertation holds special importance, due to the near total destruction of Hamburg during World War II.  An untold number of printed and handwritten resources that he investigated and reported on— from the archives of the major churches in Hamburg, to the city’s historical documents and those of the State & University Library—no longer exist and are therefore resources we would have no knowledge of were it not for his tireless search for primary sources.
    It is for this reason I decided to edit and publish the Leichsenring dissertation, which exists in two typewritten exemplars—the original in Berlin and an onion-skin copy, complete with erasures and illegible passages, in Hamburg (see sample pages at the end of the book).  A photocopy of his handwritten dissertation was graciously provided to me by his wife, Ella Leichsenring, and it was there that I discovered many passages that were not included in the typewritten originals, including half of the many music examples.  In comparing the handwritten exemplar with the typewritten copy, I decided to use the former as the primary basis for this publication.  No attempt was made to bring the work up to date.  Major errors were tacitly corrected, and the Table of Contents, Bibliography, and Index were added by the editor.
    Of particular interest is Leichsenring’s research into the functions and responsibilities of Hamburg’s church musicians—organists, cantors, choir directors, and instrumentalists—and his discussion of the structure of the liturgy.  His in-depth dive into Hamburg’s history provided the names and dates of musicians from the earliest times to the seventeenth century.  Of further importance are his detailed comparisons of Hamburg’s hymnbooks, not only among themselves, but with printed and handwritten hymnbooks throughout the country. 
    Due to his highlighting of the work of Hieronymus Praetorius, we learn for the first time that Praetorius was not only a composer of choral works, but also of compositions for organ. He stumbled across this when viewing an organ tablature that was on display at the 9th German Bach exhibit in Hamburg in June 1921.  The manuscript was the Visby (Petri) organ tablature which is located in Visby (Gotland) Sweden.  Leichsenring is the first to examine the Praetorius organ Magnificats, which he describes as full of “colorist” embellishments, and he is the first to transcribe a few sections from them into modern notation, eg., "Magnificat Septime toni," verses 1-4) and the "Alio modo Fuga" from the "Magnificat quarti toni."  (See attachments [Anhäge] II and III taken from my edition of The Visby (Petri) Organ Tablature for the sake of legibility.)  In addition to works by Hieronymus Praetorius, he noted the existence of works by Jacob Praetorius, Hieronymus’s son, and two works by Johann Bahr, the German organist who emigrated in 1630 to Sweden with this tablature in hand.
    It is hoped that previously unknown bits of information will be of use to scholars of the twentieth century and beyond.