Gottfried Scheidt

Gottfried Scheidt (September 20, 1593 - June 3, 1661) was a German composer and organist.

Born in Halle (Saxony-Anhalt), he moved to Amsterdam in 1611 to study with Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, returning home in 1615 to study with his older brother, Samuel Scheidt, among others. He was appointed organist of the court of Altenburg in 1617, and held the post until his retirement on May 5, 1658. He was successful and respected, and besides playing the organ, he led the newly founded Hofkapelle, despite the restrictions of the War of the Thirty Years. His compositions are a set of variations on Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr realized in collaboration in 1614 by Sweelinck and others; this work belongs to the tradition of the school in northern Germany. Modern editions are found by HJ Moser (Kassel, 1953), and G. Gerdes, 46 Chorale für Orgel und von JP Sweelinck deutschen seinen Schülern (Mainz, 1957). His other compositions are occasional vocal works: Pia et vota hortulanae devotionis Amicor, a wedding of Aria (1646); Selig sind die Toten, funeral of the music of Sophie Elisabeth, Duchess of Brunswick-Lüneburg (Leipzig, 1650), another funeral work (1620), in S. Scheidt: Gesamtausgabe IV, ed. G. Harms (Klecken, 1933), and two works in the sacred Cantionale III (Gotha, 1648), in Schatz des-und Chor liturgischen Gemeindegesangs III, ed. L. Schoeberlein (Göttingen, 1872).

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