Georg Forster (composer)

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Georg Forster (* around 1510 in Amberg , Upper Palatinate ; † November 12, 1568 in Nuremberg ) was a German composer , doctor and music editor of the Renaissance .

Live and act

Georg Forster came from a long-established Amberg bourgeois family; his father was the black dyer Hans Forster. In his youth he came to the Heidelberg choir of Elector Ludwig X. in 1521 , which was under the direction of the conductor and composer Lorenz Lemlin . There he received a thorough musical education; his classmates included Caspar Othmayr , Jobst von Brandt and Stefan Zirler , which led to a lifelong friendship with these composers. Forster stayed in Heidelberg until 1531, still studied ancient languages ​​at the university and acquired the degree of baccalaureus artium here in the summer of 1528 . The relationships in Heidelberg were of great importance for his musical development: This is where he laid the foundation for his large collection of fresh teutsche Liedlein , and the composers with whom he studied in Heidelberg are particularly well represented in this collection.

From 1531 Forster went to Ingolstadt to study medicine; one of his teachers here was the outstanding botanist Leonhart Fuchs . Perhaps religious reasons were the reason why Forster left Ingolstadt after three years. There is a speculation by music historians that the composer felt drawn to Protestantism and that he did not feel permanently at home in Ingolstadt, which is clearly Catholic, although the university of this city was only taken over by the Jesuit order in the late 1540s . Forster could have the desire cherished over Luther to inform teachings first hand, so he moved the location of medical school from 1534 as a scholarship to Wittenberg , where he attended also the lectures of Philipp Melanchthon and M. Garbicius, and was after some Time also a guest in Luther's table community. His compositional skills aroused Luther's interest as a music lover, and the reformer asked Forster to set Bible passages to music. In the supplementary part (1818) of Christian Conrad Nopitch's Nuremberg scholarly lexicon by Georg Andreas Will , it says : "Luther mainly enjoyed his music and also had psalms and various scriptures composed by him". Duke Ernst of Saxony was also impressed by Forster's musical abilities and often invited him to performances at his court.

After graduating in 1539 Forster worked temporarily in Würzburg and then became the personal physician of Count Palatine Wolfgang , Duke of Zweibrücken in Heidelberg . In 1542/43 he accompanied him on the arduous campaign against the Duke of Jülich-Kleve and the French king. He then continued his training in Tübingen , presumably because Fuchs and Garbicius were now teaching here. Here Forster received his doctorate in medicine on September 27, 1544. After that he first worked as the "common town Doctor" from the beginning of 1545 to Easter 1547 in his hometown of Amberg; During this time he married Sabine Portner from Theuern near Amberg. Finally he went to Nuremberg, where he was appointed personal physician to Abbot Friedrich zu Hailsbronn. He stayed in this city for 20 years until his death. In Nuremberg he was accepted into the jury of Nuremberg doctors and made numerous sick visits to places in the near and far from here. During his lifetime he was better known as a doctor and language scholar than as a composer. A wealth of knowledge in various fields was available to him, as can be seen from his library of around 100 volumes. In addition to medical works, it also contained theological , philosophical and music-theoretical writings, including the treatises by Sebald Heyden and Adrianus Petit Coclico . The variants and different forewords to his large collection of songs, Fresh Teutsche Liedlein, prove that Forster himself editorially supervised the new editions of the collection until at least 1561. He also had the plan to publish a collection of sacred works by Brandt, Othmayr and others, which he was no longer able to achieve. Georg Forster may have died in the autumn of 1568 as a result of an epidemic that raged in Nuremberg in the spring.

meaning

Georg Forster's compositions and publications were significantly influenced by the religious movements of his time. His psalm settings, Magnificat - antiphons and German hymns correspond to the repertoire of the Lutheran-Protestant church service in the mid-16th century. Overall, in contrast to his contemporaries such as Othmayr, the composer stuck to the cantus firmus style from the first quarter of the 16th century in a conservative way , which is also shown in the first volume of his Fresh Teutschen Liedlein , which also contains representative works of the previous generation, such as Heinrich Isaac and Heinrich Finck , are included. Only in his later period, in the 1540s, and then only occasionally, did he make use of a stronger imitation linkage of the voices based on the Dutch model, for example in the perhaps self-composed song “On Gottes Gnad war in den tod Ludwig Pfaltzgraff surrender “on the death of Count Palatine Ludwig V in the third part of the Fresh German song . A particularly masterful piece for Forster is his five-part arrangement of the song “Vom Himmel hoch”, in which the newer melody sounds in the tenor and the older one in the soprano . It was published by Georg Rhau in 1544.

In contrast to his compositional work, Forster made a much larger contribution to music history as a song collector and music editor. His five-part collection Fresh Teutsche Liedlein , which contains 321 four-part and 52 five-part tenor songs by around 50 composers, has an outstanding position in the tradition of the German song. Like no other collective print of its time, it offers a comprehensive cross-section of the entire German songwriting of the 1st half of the 16th century with a variety of types from folk songs to court songs, from drinking songs to sacred songs. Compared to other contemporary publications, such as the songbook by Erhard Öglin from 1521 and the songbooks by Hans Ott from 1534 and 1543, Forster's collection shows a larger scope, a representative completeness and a complete reproduction of the associated texts. After all parts of the collection contain the words "teutscher Liedlein" in the title, the music researcher M. Elizabeth Marriage gave her the overall name "Freshness teutsche Liedlein" in the incomplete edition, begun in 1903, by which it is still known today.

The most strongly represented composer is Jobst von Brand with 51 pieces, followed by Forster himself with 38 works; this is followed by Ludwig Senfl , Caspar Othmayr, Stefan Zirler and Lorenz Lemlin, with which the members of the “Heidelberger Kreis” are represented in large numbers. It also contains compositions by Heinrich Isaac, Heinrich Finck, Arnold von Bruck and Sixt Dietrich , while more than half of the second volume consists of anonymous works. The first volume, published in 1539, became very popular and saw five new editions, which probably led the composer to continue the series. The fourth and fifth volumes, both published in 1556, illustrate, in comparison with volumes one to three, the stylistic upheaval in lieder creation in the 16th century with the late works by Brandt and Othmayr. In all five parts Forster shows that the songs can also be performed without instrumental accompaniment only with singing voices. If the original of a song was only texted in tenor, he tried to add text to the other parts, and he corrected and changed the text underlay. At the appropriate places, this led to notes being split or drawn together, or parts of text to be omitted or inserted. This has often brought him the accusation of a certain negligence in the editing work, for example by Elizabeth Marriage and Robert Eitner , but this was due to a conscious artistic intention.

After the melodies were not included in most of the printed folk songs of the 16th century, but only referred to the associated melody with the note “Im Thon”, Forster's collection of “thon” and word brought together hundreds of folk songs of earlier modern times saved from oblivion. In addition, up to the middle of the 17th century, a virtually unmistakable number of composers repeatedly used Forster's collection. "It was his lasting merit to have created a document of bourgeois musical culture with the Frischen teutschen Liedlein , with which the city of Nuremberg, as the city of collectors, publishers and printers, dignified the tradition of the Lochamer songbook and the songbook by Hartmann Schedel " ( Kurt Gudewill in the source MGG, 1st edition from 1989).

Works

  • Sacred compositions and other works with Latin text
    • Motet “Conclusit Deus omnia” with four voices, Wittenberg 1538
    • Motet “Domine clamavi” with four parts, Wittenberg 1538
    • Motet “Esurientes” for two voices, Nuremberg 1549
    • Magnificat quinti toni to three voices, Wittenberg 1542
    • Motet “Non potest homo quicquam” with four voices
    • Motet “Quid queritis” with four parts, Wittenberg 1539
    • Motet "Timete Dominum" for two parts, Wittenberg 1545
    • Seven Magnificat antiphons for four voices, Wittenberg 1540
  • Sacred compositions with German text
    • “Out of deep need I scream to you” to three votes, Nuremberg 1541
    • “Oh, woe to the time that I was too early” to two votes
    • “Comfort me, oh Lord, in my need” to four votes, Wittenberg 1544
    • "From heaven high, there I come" to five votes, Wittenberg 1544
    • "Whoever keeps searching in God" to three votes
  • Latin secular works
    • "Es locus Elysium" for four voices (?), Nuremberg 1554
  • German secular works
    • "Oh Maidlein, think about it" to four votes, Nuremberg 1549
    • "Oh maid little one would like it to be good" to four votes
    • "The holy Mr. Sant Matheis" to four votes, Nuremberg 1540
    • "The brick-maker sat on the huts" with four votes, Nuremberg 1540
    • "Dieweil umbsunst now all art" to four votes, Nuremberg 1539
    • “A friendly, beautiful and lovely” to four votes, Nuremberg 1539
    • “It awakened my heart to you” to four votes, Nuremberg 1539
    • “Glück Wiederstel, was Ungesäll” to four votes, Nuremberg 1539
    • “Good Gsellen and also cool wine” to four votes, 1549
    • “Dearest Man” to four votes, 1549
    • "Dearest wine, not soft from me" to four votes, 1549
    • "Hoho dear Hans" to four votes, 1540
    • “I poor boy am shabab” to four votes, 1549
    • "I am called a white tanner" to four votes, 1549
    • “I dared, dearest maiden” to four votes, 1539
    • “I young man, what have I g'tan” to four votes, 1549
    • “In German Land was a little shame” to four votes, 1549
    • “No joy on earth” to four votes, 1539
    • "One says of gselschaft mechtig vil" to four votes, Nuremberg 1556
    • "Mein kinds B" to four votes, 1549
    • "We are happy to enter the house" with five votes, Nuremberg 1556
    • “I would have chosen myself if I wanted” to four votes, 1549
    • "Without honor and favor the Glehrt lives" to four votes, 1539
    • “Cause does a lot” to four votes, 1549
    • "Past is with happiness and good fortune" to four votes, 1539
    • “Lost service, that's a lot” to four votes, 1549
    • “By God's grace there was in death”, chant for the death of Prince Ludwig V of the Palatinate to four voices, 1549
    • “Past times what I love and value” to four votes, 1549
    • “Was Entelein, Was Gänselein” to four votes, 1540
    • “What is it that guides me?” To four votes, 1549
    • "If you struggle, you eat" to four votes, 1549
    • "How does it matter that I'm so sad?" To four votes, 1540
    • “Although the orders are much harder” to four votes, 1549
    • “Willing and faithful without all regrets” to four votes, 1539
    • “Where I cannot come with my body” to four votes, 1549
    • "Two brothers moved out of the country of witchcraft" to four votes, 1540
  • Spiritual editions: collections edited by Forster, published in Nuremberg
    • “Selectissimarum mutetarum partim quinque partim quatuor vocum tomus primus”, 1540, with 27 motets of four to five voices
    • "Tomus tertius psalmorum selectorum quatuor et quinque, et quidam pluricum vocum", 1542, with 40 psalm motets with four or more voices
  • Secular editions: collections edited by Forster, published in Nuremberg
    • “An excerpt from good old and newer Teutscher Liedlein, a real German way of using instruments on all sorts of things, besides reading”, 1539, with 130 songs of four voices; 2nd edition 1543, 3rd edition 1549, fourth edition 1552, fifth edition 1560
    • “The other part, short two-part good fresh German little song, vastly fun to sing”, 1540, with 71 songs with four voices; 2nd edition with a different title and seven additional songs 1549, 3rd edition 1553, fourth edition 1565
    • “The third Teyl, beautiful, lovely, old and newer Teutscher Liedlein”, 1549, with 80 songs with four voices; 2nd edition with changed title and preface 1552, 3rd edition 1563
    • "Der vierdt Theyl beautiful frölicher fresh old and newer Teutscher Liedlein", 1556, with 40 songs with four voices
    • “The fifth part of beautiful, happy old and newer Teutscher Liedlein”, 1556, with 52 songs of five voices

Literature (selection)

  • GA Will: Nürnbergisches Schehrten-Lexikon. Nürnberg / Altdorf (1755–1806), supplement published by C. Nopitsch, Nürnberg / Schönberg 1818.
  • Moriz Fürstenau:  Forster, Georg . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 7, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1877, p. 164 f.
  • M. Elizabeth Marriage: Georg Forster's fresh little German songs in five parts (= reprints of German literary works of the 16th and 17th centuries). Halle an der Saale 1903, pp. 203–206.
  • Hans Kallenbach : Georg Forster's fresh teutsche Liedlein (= Giessen contributions to philology, No. 29). Giessen 1931, reprint Amsterdam 1968.
  • Kurt Gudewill :  Forster, Georg. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 5, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1961, ISBN 3-428-00186-9 , p. 303 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • W. Dupont: Editions of works by Nuremberg composers in the past and present . Nuremberg 1971.
  • E. Kraus: The secular printed music song books from Erhard Öglin (1512) to Georg Forster's fifth song book . Frankfurt am Main 1980.
  • W. Seidel: Review by Georg Forster: Fresh Teutsche Liedlein. Second part (1540) and the same third part (1549). In: The music research. No. 33, 1980, p. 120 ff.
  • Erika Bosl: Forster, Georg. In: Karl Bosl (ed.): Bosls Bavarian biography. Pustet, Regensburg 1983, ISBN 3-7917-0792-2 , p. 212 ( digitized version ).
  • Georg Forster (1514–1568) , short biography and poems. In: Wilhelm Theopold : Doctor and Poet to: Poet doctors from five centuries. Kirchheim and Mainz 1986, ISBN 3-87409-024-8 , pp. 32-35.
  • M. Garland (Ed.): The Oxford Companion to German Literature . Oxford 1997.

Web links

Commons : Georg Forsters Fresh Teutsche Liedlein  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Georg Forster  - Sources and full texts

swell

  1. ^ Rebecca Wagner Oettinger:  Forster, Georg. In: Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present . Second edition, personal section, volume 6 (Eames - Franco). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 2001, ISBN 3-7618-1116-0 , Sp. 1501–1505 ( online edition , subscription required for full access)
  2. ↑ Marc Honegger, Günther Massenkeil (ed.): The great lexicon of music. Volume 3: Elsbeth - Haitink. Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau a. a. 1980, ISBN 3-451-18053-7 .
personal data
SURNAME Forster, Georg
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Vorster, Georg
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German composer, doctor and music editor of the Renaissance
DATE OF BIRTH around 1510
PLACE OF BIRTH On the mountain
DATE OF DEATH November 12, 1568
Place of death Nuremberg