Abendmusik(Ger.).The name given to a particular type of concert
held in the Marienkirche, Lbeck, during the 17th and 18th
centuries. The exact origins of the Abendmusiken were already
obscure in the mid-18th century, but they began as organ recitals,
probably during Franz Tunders tenure as organist (164167), perhaps
even earlier. The original purpose may have been to entertain
businessmen who assembled in the Marienkirche to await the opening
of the stock exchange at noon on Thursdays. However, Tunder already
referred to them as Abendspiele in 1646. It is also possible that
the Lbeck businessmen who financed them were imitating the
municipally sponsored organ recitals in the Netherlands, where
Reformed Church doctrine prohibited the use of the organ during
church services.Tunders musical offerings later included vocal and
instrumental soloists, but Buxtehude, who succeeded him, added
orchestra and chorus, necessitating the building of four extra
balconies in 1669 to accommodate 40 performers. He also changed the
time from a weekday to 4 p.m. on the last two Sundays of Trinity
and the second, third and fourth Sundays of Advent, a schedule that
was maintained throughout the 18th century. Although as late as
1700 Buxtehude presented programmes of assorted choral and solo
vocal music, he had much earlier introduced oratorios at these
concerts. A libretto for his 1678 oratorioDie Hochzeit des
Lammssurvives (published in Pirro); it is in two parts, presumably
performed on two successive Sundays. Two Buxtehude oratorios
advertised for publication in 1684,Himmlische Seelenlust auf
ErdenandDas Allerschrcklichste und Allererfreulichstewere each in
five parts. Under Buxtehudes successors, Johann Christian
Schiefferdecker (16791732), Johann Paul Kunzen (16961757), his son
Adolf Carl Kunzen (172081) and Johann Wilhelm Cornelius von Knigslw
(17451833), it became standard practice for the organist to compose
and present each year a new oratorio in five parts, extending over
all five Sundays. The subjects were mainly taken from the Old
Testament (seeOratorio, 7).Only two oratorios survive that are
known to have been performed at the Lbeck Abendmusiken: Adolf
KunzensMoses in seinem Eifer gegen die Abgtterey in den
Wsten(inD-Bsb) andAbsalon(inD-Lh).Wacht! Euch zum Streit, published
by Willi Maxton, under the titleDas jngste Gericht, as a work of
Buxtehude (Kassel, 1939), is anonymous in the manuscript source,
and its authenticity as a work of Buxtehude has been the subject of
controversy (see Ruhle;see alsoBuxtehude, dieterich, 2(viii)).
Before World War II manuscripts of numerous other oratorios by
Adolf Kunzen and von Knigslw were still extant at Lbeck; they are
discussed by Stahl but were lost during the war. They contained
chorale settings in addition to the more usual components:
recitative, arias and choruses, both dramatic and contemplative.The
Abendmusik concerts were financed mainly by the business community;
individual donors were rewarded with a printed libretto and a good
seat, but admission to the church was free, and disorderly conduct
during the performances was often a problem. In 1752 Johann Kunzen
instituted the practice of charging admission to the dress
rehearsals that were held on Fridays in the spacious stock-exchange
hall, and in time these performances became the more important
ones. The free Sunday performances in the Marienkirche were
abolished in 1800, and ten years later the Lbeck Abendmusiken
ceased entirely as a result of the Napoleonic Wars. The term has
since come into general use for concerts in churches
anywhere.BIBLIOGRAPHYSmitherHOA.Pirro:Dietrich
Buxtehude(Paris,1913)W.Stahl:Die Lbecker Abendmusiken im 17. und
18. Jahrhundert(Lbeck,1937)O.Shngen:Die Lbecker Abendmusiken als
kirchengeschichtliches und theologisches Problem,Musik und Kirche,
xxvii (1957), 18191M.Geck:Die Authentizitt des Vokalwerks Dietrich
Buxtehudes in quellenkritischer Sicht,Mf, xiv (1961), 393415; xvi
(1963), 17581G.Karstdt:Die extraordinairen Abendmusiken Dietrich
Buxtehudes: Untersuchungen zur Auffhrungspraxis in der Marienkirche
zu Lbeck; mit den Textbchern des Castrum Doloris und Templum
Honoris in Faksimile-Neudruck(Lbeck,1962)G.Karstdt:Die Instrumente
in den Kantaten und Abendmusiken Dietrich Buxtehudes,Beitrge zur
Musikgeschichte Nordeuropas: Kurt Gudewill zum 65. Geburtstag, ed.
U. Haensel (Wolfenbttel,1978), 11121G.Karstdt:Richtiges und
Zweifelhaftes in Leben und Werk Dietrich Buxtehudes,Musik und
Kirche, xlix (1979), 16370G.Karstdt:Buxtehude und die Neuordnung
der Abendmusiken,Festschrift fr Bruno Grusnick, ed. R. Satzwedel
and K.-D. Koch (Neuhausen-Stuttgart,1981),
11927K.J.Snyder:Buxtehude and Das jngste Gerichts: a New Look at an
Old Problem, ibid., 12841S.C.Ruhle:An Anonymous Seventeenth-Century
German Oratorio in the Dben Collection (Uppsala University Library
vok.mus.ihskr.71)(diss., U. of North Carolina,1982)K.J.Snyder:Lbeck
Abendmusiken,800 Jahre Musik in Lbeck, ii, ed. A. Edler, W.
Neugebauer and H.W. Schwab (Lbeck,1983), 6371K.J.Snyder:Dietrich
Buxtehude: Organist in Lbeck(New York,1987)G.Flaherty:Literary
Perspectives on the Texts of Buxtehude's Abendmusiken,Church Stage
and Studio: Music and its Contexts in Seventeenth-Century Germany,
ed. P. Walker (Ann Arbor,1990), 193203K.J.Snyder:Buxtehude, the
Lbeck Abendmusiken, and Wacht! Euch zum Streit gefasset macht,
ibid., 20528K.J.Snyder:Partners in Music Making: Organist and
Cantor in Seventeenth-Century Lbeck,The Organist as Scholar: Essays
in Memory of Russell Saunders, ed. K.J. Snyder (Stuyvesant,
NY,1994), 23355G.Webber:North German Church Music in the Age of
Buxtehude(Oxford, 1996)K.J.Snyder:Franz Tunder's Stock-Exchange
Concerts: Prelude to the Lbeck Abendmusiken,GOArt Research Reports,
ii (2000)KERALA J. SNYDER
