Gottfried August Homilius

Gottfried August Homilius 1782, engraved by Christian Ludwig Seehas

Memorial plaque on the house where G. A. Homilius was born in Rosenthal

Memorial plaque for G. A. Homilius

Gottfried August Homilius (born February 2, 1714 in Rosenthal , † June 2, 1785 in Dresden ) was a German composer , cantor and organist .

Life

After attending the Annenschule in Dresden, Homilius studied law in Leipzig . There he was already musically active and at times represented the organist of the Nikolaikirche Johann Schneider . He was probably one of Johann Sebastian Bach's immediate pupils . From 1742 Homilius was organist at the Dresden Frauenkirche and from 1755 in the succession of Theodor Christlieb Reinhold until his death, Kreuzkantor and music director at the three main churches of Dresden; Homilius' main place of activity was the Dresden Frauenkirche, after the Kreuzkirche was destroyed by Prussian troops in 1760 and its new building was not consecrated until 1792. Homilius died in Dresden in 1785 and was buried in the Johanniskirchhof . His grave has not been preserved.

Work and meaning

Homilius composed mainly church music: more than 10 passions (one printed in 1775 by Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig with the title "A little lamb goes and bears the guilt"), an oratorio each for Christmas (1777) and for Easter, over 60 motets , 180 cantatas , 4 magnificat , chorales , preludes and chorale preludes. In addition, a number of “Chants for Masons ” and a figured bass school have come down to us from him. In 1776 Homilius was described as "probably the best church composer now identified". After his death, Ernst Ludwig Gerber even came to the opinion that Homilius was "our greatest church composer without objection".

Homilius' vocal compositions enjoyed great popularity well into the 19th century. A large number of copies that have survived to this day testify to the distribution of his works. In the course of the Homilius renaissance in recent years, many of the rediscovered works by the presumed Bach student and Kreuzkantor were released on CD as first recordings.

literature

• Friedrich Wilhelm Bautz :  Homilius, Gottfried August. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 2, Bautz, Hamm 1990, ISBN 3-88309-032-8 , Sp. 1017-1018.
• Lothar Hoffmann inheritance law:  Homilius, Gottfried August. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 9, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1972, ISBN 3-428-00190-7 , p. 590 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Philipp Spitta :  Homilius, Gottfried August . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 13, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1881, pp. 53-57.
• "Homilius, Gottfried August". In: Don Michael Randel (Ed.): The Harvard Biographical Dictionary of Music . Harvard University Press, Cambridge 1996, p. 392. ( Online in Google book search)
• Hans John : The Dresden Kreuzkantor and Bach student Gottfried August Homilius. A contribution to the music history of Dresden in the 18th century. Schneider, Tutzing 1980, ISBN 3-7952-0292-2 .
• Uwe Wolf : Gottfried August Homilius. Studies of life and work. With catalog raisonné (small edition). Stuttgart, Carus 2009. ISBN 3-8994-8090-2
• Uwe Wolf: Gottfried August Homilius. Thematic directory of musical works (HoWV). Stuttgart, Carus 2014. ISBN 978-3-89948-186-0
• Gottfried August Homilius: (38) chorale preludes for organ, Christoph Albrecht, éd., Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, 1988

Web links

• Works by and about Gottfried August Homilius in the catalog of the German National Library
• Sheet music and audio files by Gottfried August Homilius in the International Music Score Library Project
• Sheet music in the public domain by Gottfried August Homilius in the Choral Public Domain Library - ChoralWiki (English)
• Motets (cantory archive)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Other information is June 1st or 5th
2. ↑ Six arias from various cantatas appeared in print in 1786.
3. ↑ Quoted from ADB, p. 54.