Friday, November 6, 2026

It is the 6th of November 2026. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

Historians of hymnody and music rightly connect the flowering of German music and Reformation theology with the life and work of Johann Sebastian Bach.

But Bach wasn’t born until 1685, well over a century after the Reformation. So what, or who, can serve as the connection between the movement and the later musical tradition? We can locate it in a man, Heinrich Schutz, who not only helped develop Lutheran and Reformation hymnody but linked both the Italian traditions and a theology which could succor him in his own tragedies but also in the devastating Thirty Years War.

Heinrich Schutz was born, the oldest son of Christoph and Euphrosine (yoo-FROZ-ih-nee), in 1585. The family owned an inn, the Golden Ring. By chance, the landgrave Moritz of Hesse-Kassel stayed at the inn in 1599 and was taken by young Heinrich’s musical abilities. He was taken under the wing of the Landgrave, was educated, and sent to Marburg. He intended to study law but the Landgrave convinced him otherwise. In 1609 he was sent to Venice as an apprentice to the composer and organist Giovanni Gabrieli.

Heinrich would publish his Italian Madrigals in 1611. Heinrich would introduce into German music what Bach would, perhaps, perfect. This included the use of separate groups of singers and instruments that would respond to one another. He used the contrast of quiet individual solos and resounding chorales and played with the dramatic possibilities in linking music and lyrics.

In 1615 he was hired by the electoral court under Johann Georg I of Saxony. Johann Georg would be one of the most significant characters with the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War in 1618. During the first year of the war, Schutz became Choir Master of the court, was married to Magdalena Wildeck, and published his Psalms of David- a Venetian-inspired German setting of the Psalms.

The Thirty Years' War was not just in the background of his life and work as a composer but deeply affected him and the work he was able to produce. During the war, he would lose his wife, leaving him a widow with two daughters. One daughter would die during the war, and the second just after. His parents and siblings also died. The disruption of the war also meant it was hard to produce large pieces- his two collections- the Kleine geistliche Konzerte or “Little Sacred Concertos” would go on to be useful for smaller choirs still wanting the dramatic effect of the Baroque.

He would also produce the first German Opera- the Dafne, based on Ovid’s story and the earliest Italian opera.

We can see his most mature work, and that which brings together the various threads of his life, with the Musikalische Exequien- or Musical Funeral Rites of 1636. It was written for the funeral of the Count of Reuss-Gera. The count had himself planned his funeral with the composer and decorated his own copper coffin with scripture. Schutz used the composition and the coffin itself as part of the funeral rite. It is a work in 3 parts for six voices, a mixed choir. The centerpiece of the work is two four-part choirs that sing a German translation of Psalm 73- “Lord, if I Only Have You,” contrasting the death of the body with the sufficiency of God’s provision. It was also the text used for the funeral sermon.

It can be considered the first German Lutheran Requiem. We know that Johannes Brahms knew the piece and borrowed from it for his very famous German Requiem.

Schutz would also publish his Geistliche Chormusik, or Sacred Choral Music, in 1648, and it would be the text for teaching counterpoint in hymnody before Bach.

He never remarried and, besides two visits to the Danish court, lived and composed at the Dresden court. Heinrich Schutz, born in 1585, died on this, the 6th of November in 1672- the greatest German composer before Bach and the link in German hymnody to him- was 87 years old.

The Last word for today comes from the daily lectionary; let's skip the Revelation reading and hear from the 8th chapter of Joshua:

30 Then Joshua built on Mount Ebal an altar to the Lord, the God of Israel, 31 as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded the Israelites. He built it according to what is written in the Book of the Law of Moses—an altar of uncut stones, on which no iron tool had been used. On it they offered to the Lord burnt offerings and sacrificed fellowship offerings. 32 There, in the presence of the Israelites, Joshua wrote on stones a copy of the law of Moses. 33 All the Israelites, with their elders, officials and judges, were standing on both sides of the ark of the covenant of the Lord, facing the Levitical priests who carried it. Both the foreigners living among them and the native-born were there. Half of the people stood in front of Mount Gerizim and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the Lord had formerly commanded when he gave instructions to bless the people of Israel.

34 Afterward, Joshua read all the words of the law—the blessings and the curses—just as it is written in the Book of the Law. 35 There was not a word of all that Moses had commanded that Joshua did not read to the whole assembly of Israel, including the women and children, and the foreigners who lived among them.

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 6th of November 2026 brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man surely wondering what kind of name “Euphrosine” yoo-FROZ-ih-nee is- he is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man with an answer- it’s Greek for mirth… like being named “Joy”- I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.