Johann Mattheson (28 September 1681 – 17 April 1764) was a German composer, critic, lexicographer and music theorist. His writings on the late Baroque and early Classical period were highly influential, specifically, "his biographical and theoretical works were widely disseminated and served as the source for all subsequent lexicographers and historians".

Early life and career

Johann Mattheson was born on 28 September 1681 in Hamburg. The son of a prosperous tax collector, Mattheson received a broad liberal education and, aside from general musical training, took lessons in keyboard instruments, violin, composition and singing.

Death

After his death in 1764, Johann Mattheson was buried in the vault of Hamburg's St. Michaelis Church where his grave can be visited.

Literary and musical legacy

thumb|Der vollkommene Capellmeister, Hamburg, 1739

Mattheson is mainly famous as a music theorist. He was the most prolific writer on performance practice, theatrical style, and harmony of the German Baroque. He is particularly important for his work on the relationship between the disciplines of rhetoric and music, for example in Das neu-eröffnete Orchestre, Hamburg 1713, and ', Hamburg 1739. However, his books draw attention also because Mattheson was a brilliant polemicist and his theories on music are often full of pedantry and pseudo-erudition.

The bulk of his compositional output was vocal, including eight operas, and numerous oratorios and cantatas. He also wrote a few sonatas and some keyboard music, including pieces meant for keyboard instruction. All of his music, except for one opera, one oratorio, and a few collections of instrumental music, went missing after World War II, but was given back to Hamburg from Yerevan, Armenia, in 1998. This includes four operas and most of the oratorios. The manuscripts are now located at the .

Selected works

Operas

  • Die unglückselige Kleopatra, Königin von Ägypten (1704)
  • Boris Goudenow (1710)

Oratorios

  • Die heilsame Geburt (1715), Christmas oratorium
  • ' (1720), Christmas oratorium
  • Der gegen seine Brüder barmherzige Joseph (1727), oratorium
  • Der liebreiche und geduldige David

See also

  • Doctrine of the affections
  • Letters and writings of George Frideric Handel
  • – music as rhetorical-poetic composition

References

Further reading

  • Stubbs, Stephen. "Johann Mattheson—the Russian Connection: The Rediscovery of Boris Goudenow and His Other Lost Operas". Early Music 33, no. 2 (May 2005): 283–92.