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Dieterich Buxtehude, Organist in Lubeck
An enlightening, revised edition of the definitive biography on celebrated organist and composer, Dieterich Buxtehude.
This book is a new edition of the most comprehensive life-and-works study of the great Baroque-era organist and composer Dieterich Buxtehude (ca. 1637-1707), released to celebrate the tercentenary of the composer's death.
Originally published in 1987 and long out of print, Dieterich Organist in Lübeck is considered by most musicologists to be the definitive biography. It also includes close description of Buxtehude's compositional output, from trio sonatas to the famed Buxtehude's yearly oratorio presentations. The young J. S. Bach traveled to Lübeck on foot in 1705 to learn as much as he could from the great master of the organ and of Lutheranchurch music.
The revised edition contains new information on the organs that Buxtehude played in Scandinavia and Lübeck, excerpts from the newly available account books from St. Mary's in Lübeck, a discussion of newly discovered sources, including one written by J. S. Bach, an evaluation of recent scholarship on Buxtehude, and an extensive bibliography. Written for both the casual reader and the serious scholar.
The accompanying music CD (this material is now provided on a companion website) provides examples of all genres discussed in the book -- vocal works, a trio sonata, harpsichord music, and organ music newly recorded on the North German meantone organ in Gothenburg, Sweden, by a noted specialist in this repertoire, Hans Davidsson, who is professor of organ at the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music and the founder of the Göteborg Organ Art Center (GOArt).
Kerala J.Snyder is Professor Emerita of Musicology, Eastman School of Music (University of Rochester).
This book is a new edition of the most comprehensive life-and-works study of the great Baroque-era organist and composer Dieterich Buxtehude (ca. 1637-1707), released to celebrate the tercentenary of the composer's death.
Originally published in 1987 and long out of print, Dieterich Organist in Lübeck is considered by most musicologists to be the definitive biography. It also includes close description of Buxtehude's compositional output, from trio sonatas to the famed Buxtehude's yearly oratorio presentations. The young J. S. Bach traveled to Lübeck on foot in 1705 to learn as much as he could from the great master of the organ and of Lutheranchurch music.
The revised edition contains new information on the organs that Buxtehude played in Scandinavia and Lübeck, excerpts from the newly available account books from St. Mary's in Lübeck, a discussion of newly discovered sources, including one written by J. S. Bach, an evaluation of recent scholarship on Buxtehude, and an extensive bibliography. Written for both the casual reader and the serious scholar.
The accompanying music CD (this material is now provided on a companion website) provides examples of all genres discussed in the book -- vocal works, a trio sonata, harpsichord music, and organ music newly recorded on the North German meantone organ in Gothenburg, Sweden, by a noted specialist in this repertoire, Hans Davidsson, who is professor of organ at the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music and the founder of the Göteborg Organ Art Center (GOArt).
Kerala J.Snyder is Professor Emerita of Musicology, Eastman School of Music (University of Rochester).
584 pages, Hardcover
First published December 31, 1987
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
May 14, 2024
This is one of the greatest informational texts ever written.
I, somewhat reluctantly, picked up a used copy of the revised edition. I knew it would be an academic work, so I was surprised to find myself fully engrossed in the story of Snyder's discoveries and opportunities after WWII just in the preface. I barely perceived time passing as I stayed up most of the night to finish the biographical sections of the book. I had to stop myself from going back and to reread sections just to absorb more detail and experience more of Snyder's passionate descriptions of Buxtehude's life.
Everything she wrote is of the highest quality: exhaustive, but presented in a way that's easy to consume. Her style is academic, but not dry. The appendices themselves are works of art and worth the purchase of the book.
Kerala, if you ever read this review, please accept my thanks for all the work you've done to make this book. You certainly deserve a place amongst the greatest authoritative biographers of our time.
I, somewhat reluctantly, picked up a used copy of the revised edition. I knew it would be an academic work, so I was surprised to find myself fully engrossed in the story of Snyder's discoveries and opportunities after WWII just in the preface. I barely perceived time passing as I stayed up most of the night to finish the biographical sections of the book. I had to stop myself from going back and to reread sections just to absorb more detail and experience more of Snyder's passionate descriptions of Buxtehude's life.
Everything she wrote is of the highest quality: exhaustive, but presented in a way that's easy to consume. Her style is academic, but not dry. The appendices themselves are works of art and worth the purchase of the book.
Kerala, if you ever read this review, please accept my thanks for all the work you've done to make this book. You certainly deserve a place amongst the greatest authoritative biographers of our time.
December 9, 2024
This book about Buxtehude and his music was excellent. Snyder covers both his life and his works with insight and clarity. The material is interesting in itself, but her presentation of it is among the best I've seen in books of this type. The sections on Buxtehude's lie include a lot of context about the places he worked in and people he dealt with, and it is all woven together very elegantly. Snyder eschews the kind of play-by-play narration of pieces that is often so tedious. Instead, she focuses on compositional features and stylistic elements and how they develop across Buxtehude's oeuvre. Her prose is clear and eminently readable. I came away with a much better understanding of Buxtehude's music and the world in which it was created.
November 3, 2018
Extremely thorough and now more accurate with the corrections in the second edition. Rather dry reading though, and more useful as a reference book. The structure that goes through each category of piece (complete with subcategories) and gives BuxWV numbers that fall into these delineations makes it a great resource when studying Buxtehude’s music, and it does not require extensive searching to find the information for which one is looking.
March 14, 2026
Outstanding biography and analysis of Buxtehude's organ music. Very well-researched but still very accessible, without going too deep into the technicalities of his music. Would recommend for organ nerds.
May 31, 2011
I've had little experience with biographies, so I'm not sure quite how to rate them yet, hence the three-out-of-five-star rating. I have a harder time reading them as well, preferring fiction works. But I think it takes practice to learn how to read a biography, and so I'm sure it deserves a better rating, and I will probably come back and give it a higher one in the future. In the meantime, though, this book was a great help in my term paper for Music History I last semester. It is one of the few biographies about the German organist/composer as very little is known about him. It was a great help in analyzing his music and compositional style!
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews