Melchior Teschner (Hymn-Writer, Composer)

Born: April 29, 1584 - Fraustadt [now Wschowa], Silesia
Died: December 1, 1635 - Oberpritschen [now Przyczyna Górna], near Fraustadt

The German composer, Melchior Teschner, studied from 1602 theology, philosophy and music at Frankfurt an der Oder. Bartholomäus Gesius was among those who taught him music.

In 1605 Melchior Teschner became Kantor at Schmiegel (now Smigiel). After further study, at the universities of Helmstedt and Wittenberg, he became Kantor of the Protestant Kirche zum Kripplein Christi at Fraustadt in 1609. From 1614 until his death he was pastor of the church at Oberpritschen. The pastor with whom he worked at Fraustadt from 1609 was Valerius Herberger, who wrote the text of the hymn Valet will ich dir geben in 1613 after surviving a plague. Teschner made two five-part settings of it, which were published at Leipzig in 1614 (Valet will ich dir geben). The second of them (in Winterfeld), which is modelled on the Geneva psalm O Seigneur, que de gens by Louis Bourgeois (1550), is still popular and has been reprinted in hymnals up to the present day, often with different words; with some modification it appears in English hymnbooks as the Palm Sunday hymn All glory, laud and honour. Teschner is otherwise known as a composer only by two wedding songs published respectively at Liegnitz in 1614 and at Leipzig in 1619.

Source: ELHHB Website [Handbook to the Lutheran Hymnal; Dahle, Library of Christian Hymns]; © Oxford University Press 2005 (by Fritz Feldmann/Dorothea Schröder)
Contributed by Aryeh Oron (August 2003), Thomas Braatz (September 2005)

Texts of Bach Cantatas & Other Vocal Works

BWV 415

Chorale Melodies used in Bach’s Vocal Works

Title

Year

EKG

Zahn

Valet will ich dir geben

Links to other Sites

Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary Handbook - Biographies and Sources (ELHHB)

Bibliography