Dietrich Buxtehude: Works for Harpsichord

Review: MusicWebInternational Diderik Buxtehude Suite in A Major 1. Allemande 2. Courante 3. Sarabande 4. Gigue 5. Courent Zimble. 8 Variations Suite d’Amour D minor 6. Allemande d’amour 7. Courante 8. Sarabande d’Amour 9. Sarabande 10. Gigue 11. Aria: Rofilis. 3 Variations Auf meinen lieben Gott 12. Theme 13. Double 14. Sarabande 15. Courante 16. Gigue 17. La Capricciosa. 32 Variations Bonus tracks Bernardo Pasquini 18. Bergamasca Giovanni Battista Martini 19. Gavotte in F Major Johann Sebastian Bach Pastoral in F Major BWV 590 20. Prelude 21. Allemande 22. Aria 23. Gigue Works for Harpsichord © We neither know with certainty the date nor the place of Diderik Buxtehude’s birth, but since a notice published shortly after his death on May 9, 1707, records that “he lived about 70 years”, it is assumed that he was born about 1637. It is known that until 1638 his father was organist and school-teacher in Oldesloe (now Bad Oldesloe) in the Duchy of Holstein, hence this is now regarded as his likely place of birth. The Duchy of Holstein was at that time part of the Kingdom of Denmark, which accords with the information, also contained in the abovementioned notice, that “he recognized Denmark as his native country, whence he came to our region (i.e. Germany)”. From Oldesloe his father went to Helsingborg, Sweden, as organist of St. Mary’s Church but soon after, in 1641 or 1642, he settled permanently on the other side of the sound of Helsingør (Elsinore) as organist of the Church of St. Olaf and it was presumably at the Latin School here that the son received his education. In 1657 or 1658 Diderik was appointed to the post formerly held by his father as organist of the Church of St. Mary in Helsingborg, but in 1660 he too returned to Helsingør to become organist of the church of the German-speaking population there, the Marienkirche. In 1668 he succeeded Franz Tunder as organist of the Marienkirche in Lübeck, where he remained to his death in 1707. In 1703 he was visited by Handel and Mattheson, and in 1705 by J.S. Bach who, tradition tells us, walked all the way from Arnstadt to hear the old master play and stayed “about four times as long” as the four weeks’ leave he had requested. Buxtehude’s works for harpsichord, which consist of dance suites and sets of variations, were found in the 1930s in Nykøbing Falster, Denmark, written down in tablature in an old family register belonging to the Ryge family, whose ancestors include J.Chr. Ryge (1688-1758), cantor of Roskilde School and Cathedral. RELEASE DATE: JANUARY 2020 CATALOGUE NUMBER: DACOCD 852 EAN: 5709499852002 Download BOOKLET (PDF) Related