Heinrich Pape (organist)

Heinrich (Hinrich) Pape (born June 27, 1609 in Ratzeburg ; buried April 25, 1663 in Altona ) was a German organist.

Life

Heinrich Pape was the son of an organist of the same name (* around June 24, 1563 in Steinkirchen; † March 10, 1637, probably in Wedel ) and an unknown woman. The father worked as an organist at the town church of Ratzeburg from 1584 and in Wedel from 1613. His grandfather came from Quakenbrück , where he had initially lived as a monk. At the time of the Reformation he left the monastery and moved to Steinkirche as a Protestant pastor.

From 1625 Pape received organ lessons from Jacob Praetorius the Younger at St. Petrikirche in Hamburg . In 1628 he got his first job in Mittelkirchen , to which family relationships could have helped him. In 1630 he moved to Altona and took care of Ottensen as organist , to whose parish Altona belonged at the time. He also taught in schools in both places.

On August 12, 1632, Pape married Geesche (Gesa) Rist, whose father Caspar Rist († 1626) was a pastor of Ottensen. Her brother Johann Rist was a well-known poet and preacher. The couple had at least two sons. One of them was Heinrich (born February 25, 1634 - † July 19, 1675), who worked as an organist in Stockholm in 1662/1963 .

In 1650 Altona got its own church. Pape got a job as organist there and continued to teach at the Ottensen School. A son of his brother-in-law, Caspar Rist, wrote a French letter in the spring of 1663 about his "cousin Henry Pape le jeune", that is Pape's son, and noted in it that he - probably mentally confused - had given up the organizing office in Sweden. Heinrich Pape died out of grief over this. According to this source, Pape would have lived in Altona until the end of his life. Earlier sources, e.g. a person entry in Dansk biografisk leksikon , indicate that Pape himself moved to the Swedish capital.

Works

Pape wrote compositions for organ that no longer exist today. He became known for setting sacred texts to music by his brother-in-law Rist and Jacob Schwieger . One of these songs was probably Daphnis from Cimbrien Galathee from 1642, which was picked up throughout Northern Europe and used in the context of spiritual counterfactures .

Pape also set sacred texts by Caspar Rist, who told his composers to create simple works. Following Rist's instructions, Pape wrote The ... Christ on the Cross in 1648 . The songs were not a great success; only some of the works found their way into applied church music. Rist expanded his collection and published it in 1664 as New Holy Passion Devotions . He replaced Pape's settings with new compositions.

In addition to the compositions, Pape also worked elsewhere for Johann Rist according to an overview he had created himself. From 1653, Rist acted as Imperial Court and Palatine Count and was thus allowed to issue documents, which Pape took over. This included a diploma that allowed Pape and his family to wear their own coat of arms.

Pape also set four texts from Schwieger's collection of songs, Liebesgrillen , published in 1656 . Here people with the initials "HPDA" and "HPD" were named as composers. It is controversial whether these settings come from Pape himself or his son. According to the letter from Rist's son, however, “HPDA” is clearly Heinrich Rist described here. He wrote four songs that are mostly rated better by music experts than the melodies of his son of the same name.

literature

•  Dieter Lohmeier: Pape, Heinrich. In: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck. Volume 8. Wachholtz Verlag, Neumünster 1987, pp. 267-268.
• Nils Schiørring: Pape, Heinrich. In: Dansk biografisk leksikon. Volume 18. Copenhagen 1933-1944, p. 1.