Christian Ritter (composer)

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Christian Ritter (* probably between 1645 and 1650; † probably after 1725; exact life dates unknown) was a composer and organist at the North German organ school .

Life

Christian Ritter may have been a student of Christoph Bernhard in Dresden . A note on one of his works names him in 1666 as a chamber organist in Halle . This position is only recorded in the records from 1672; In 1677 he became court organist. From 1680 at the latest he was in Sweden, where he wrote the funeral music for Count Johann Adolf Rehnskiöld in October. From March 1681 he was mentioned in an invoice from the Stockholm court, one year later as vice-music director. In 1683 Ritter returned to Dresden and became vice conductor and chamber organist under Christoph Bernhard. In 1688 he can be traced back to Stockholm as Kapellmeister, where he stayed until 1699. Among the godparents of Andreas Hindrich Roman, a brother of the Swedish composer and musician Johan Helmich Roman , he is mentioned on July 26, 1696 as "Vice Capellmest:". According to the information on a vocal work, Ritter stayed in Hamburg in 1704. In 1717, in a letter to Johann Mattheson , he described himself as “Emeritus, who gave his to Kgl. Chur- and Fürstl. Höfen ... have done in re musica for over the 30th year.

plant

In addition to more than 20 sacred vocal works, a few organ and piano works by Christian Ritter have survived. Among his sacred works, the cantata on O amantissime sponse Jesu ( O most beloved bridegroom of Jesus ) for soprano and five string parts is particularly well known. Most of the surviving works are in the Dübensammlung , a small part can be found in Germany, possibly from his stays in Dresden and Halle.

Several musicologists, including Hans Joachim Moser and Richard Buchmayer , who was the first to conduct major research on knights, attribute an extraordinarily high quality to Ritter's compositions.

literature

  • Richard Buchmayer: Christian Ritter. A forgotten German master of the 17th century. In: Riemann Festschrift. Leipzig 1909, p. 354 ff.
  • Eva Helenius-Öberg : Johan Helmich Roman. Liv och Verk genom samtida ögon. Documents vittnesbörd. (= Kung. Musikaliska akademiens script series 78), Stockholm 1994, p. 25.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Knight, Christian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German composer
DATE OF BIRTH between 1645 and 1650
DATE OF DEATH after 1725