Praetorius, Michael

(1571-1621)

German composer, theorist, and music publisher, who helped establish the style of early 17th-century German music.

Born Michael Schultheiss in Kreuzberg, he studied organ in Frankfurt, served Heinrich Julius, Duke of Brunswick, after 1604, and became music director at Wolfenbüttel in 1612.

His abundance of sacred choral compositions includes the Musae Sioniae (1605-1610), a veritable encyclopedia of 1244 chorale arrangements.

His major work is the three-volume Syntagma musicum (1614-1620), a historical and descriptive treatise in Latin that is an invaluable source of information on early Baroque music and musical instruments of the time.