1598–1662 · Germany · Baroque
Johann Crüger (1598–1662) was a German composer and cantor of St Nicholas Church in Berlin. He compiled collections of Lutheran hymns and wrote tunes for chorales; as the twentieth century began, 'Nun danket alle Gott' was still especially popular. The site has his chorale tune for mixed choir.
Johann Crüger was born in April 1598 in the village of Groß Breesen near Guben. His father, Georg Crüger, kept an inn, and his mother, Ulrike, née Kohlheim, was a pastor's daughter.
Until 1613 he studied at the Latin school in Guben. Music and singing were part of the school's curriculum.
On leaving school Crüger travelled on, by way of Sorau and Breslau, and ended up in Regensburg. There he received his first musical training from Paulus Homberger (1560–1634).
In 1615 he arrived in Berlin and studied at the Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster, preparing to study theology. A year later he took a position teaching the children of the von Blumenthal household at home; one of his pupils was Joachim Friedrich von Blumenthal.
From 1620 Crüger studied theology at the University of Wittenberg. He went on learning music on his own.
In 1622 Crüger became cantor of St Nicholas Church in Berlin. At the same time he taught at the Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster.
He held both posts until his death, a span of forty years. He composed, and he wrote a great deal about music education.
Crüger was not only a composer but also the author of teaching works. In 1625 two of his writings appeared in Berlin: 'Praecepta musicae practicae figuralis' and 'Kurtzer und verstendtlicher Unterricht, recht und leichtlich singen zu lernen', a short guide to learning to sing.
These were followed by 'Synopsis musica' (1630, with an enlarged second edition in 1654), 'Quaestiones musicae practicae' (1650) and 'Musicae practicae praecepta brevia et exercitia pro tyronibus varia' (1660), whose title speaks of short rules of practical music and varied exercises for beginners.
In 1628 Crüger married the widow of a city councilman. The family lived through the Thirty Years' War and suffered many privations, including famine.
Crüger himself fell ill with plague and nearly died. In 1636 he lost his wife and five children.
Once he was well again, in 1637 he took a second wife, an innkeeper's daughter aged seventeen. They had fourteen children, most of whom died young.
In 1640 Crüger brought out a hymn collection. In 1643 he got to know Paul Gerhardt, who wrote church songs, and set various songs of his to music, including 'Wie soll ich dich empfangen'.
Crüger's 'Praxis pietatis melica' was the Lutheran hymnal in widest use in the seventeenth century. It kept being reissued: the forty-third edition had appeared by 1733.
In 1649 came 'Geistliche Kirchen-Melodien', with 161 chorales, mostly in four parts. To 108 of them Crüger added two optional upper parts for violins or cornetts. Later he returned to this idea in the double hymnbook 'Psalmodia Sacra', planned for the Reformed court of Brandenburg.
Crüger died in Berlin in 1662. His portrait was painted by the court painter Michael Conrad Hirt.
Later his tunes were published anew. In 1835 an edition of his chorale melodies was published in Berlin, and in 2014 a critical edition of selected works followed.
Crüger is the author of many tunes for Lutheran hymns and of chorale settings of them. His legacy also includes concert works and writings on music education.
His tunes found a place in Bach's music. Two of Bach's Passions, the Matthew and the John, take over Crüger's melody 'Herzliebster Jesu'. The tune for 'Jesu, meine Freude' became the basis of Bach's motet of that name, and a single stanza of Johann Franck's song, 'Komm, o Tod, du Schlafes Bruder', appears in the cantata 'Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen', BWV 56.
He also composed the tune for Rinkart's 'Nun danket alle Gott'; some twenty of his tunes were still well liked as the twentieth century began, above all this one. The current Evangelisches Gesangbuch contains, depending on the regional edition, at least eighteen of his melodies or chorale settings, among them 'Lobet den Herren, alle, die ihn ehren' and 'Schmücke dich, o liebe Seele'.
The site offers one of his publications, the chorale tune 'Jesus, meine Zuversicht' for mixed choir (SATB), at the 'Intermediate' level.