Grove's dictionary of music and musicians

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252 SCHEIDEMANN SCHEIDEMANTEL
and more important member of the family,
David Scheidemann, probably an uncle of Heinrich.
The date of David Sohoidemann's birth is
not ascertained, but in 1585 he was organist of
St. Michael's Church, Hamburg. He is chiefly
noteworthy as associated with three other Hamburg
organists of repute, ^acob and Hieronymus
Praetorius, and Joachim Decker, in the compilation
of what we should now call a Choralbuoh,
though this name was not in general use then,'
a book of the usual hymn-tunes or chorales of
the Lutheran Church, simply harmonised in
four parts for congregational singing. This
book appeared in 1604. Its origin^ title is
'Melodeyen-Gesangbuoh, darein Dr. Luthers
und auder Christen gebriiuchlichate Gesiinge,
Ihren gewohnlichen Melodien naoh ... in
vier stimmen ubergesetzt. ' The example first
set by Lucas Osiander in 1586, of uniformly
giving the melody to the soprano part, and not
to the tenor, as the older practice was, is here
followed, and in the preface attention is called
to the greater convenience of this for congi-egational
singing. Of the eighty -eight tunes in
the book, David Scheidemann harmonised
thirteen or fourteen ; among them there appears
for the first time harmonised 'Wie schou
leuchtet der Morgenstern. ' Gerber, confusing
David with Heinrich, attributes both the melody
and the setting of this Chorale to Heinrich.
But Winterfeld shows (Ev. Kirch, i. p. 90) that
the melody belongs to neither, but seems to
be taken from an old secular song, beginning
with similar words ('Wie sohon leuchten die
Aeugelein '), to the metre of which Philip
Nioolai in 1599 wrote the words of his hymn,
'
Wie schon leuchtet der Morgenstern. ' It should
be mentioned, however, that Waekernagel (^Das
Deutsche Kirchenlied, Bd. I. pp. 618-19), after
giving the words of the secular song in ftfll,
adduces reasons for believing that in this case
the secular song is a later parody of Nicolai's
hymn, not vice versa. Winterfeld praises
Scheidemann's settings of the chorales for their
fresh animated character, and for the happy
way in which the rhythmical peculiarities of
the old melodies are brought out. Chorales were
not then sung as now, all in slow uniform
rhythm, but many of the older melodies had
curious changes of rhythm, as from common
to triple time, in successive lines. See the
1 It is worth while noting that the word Choral (in English usually
HpeltChorale), as now restricted to the melodies of German metrical
hymns, reaUy originated in a misunderstanding of what Walther
meant when he spolce of Luther as having called the ' deutecher
Choralgesang' into life. What hoth Luther and Walther meant
hy 'Choralgesang' was the old Cantus Choralis or Plain-song of the
lAtin Church, which Luther himself wished to retain ; and his merit
consisted in the adaptation of the chief parts of the Latin Choral to
German words, his work in this respect corresponding to Marbeck'a
'Book of Common Prayer Noted' with us in Kngland. All the
older Lutheran Church -musicians, such as Lucas Lossius and
Michael Praetorius, used the words Choral and Choralgesknge in
this sense of the old Plain-song melodies to the graduals,
sequences, and antiphons, whether sung to lAtin or adapted to
German words. It was only when Oerman metrical hymns gradually
superseded in common use the other choral parts of the
service, that the name Choral in course of time hecame restricted
to the melodies of these hymoB. See Winterfeld, Ev. Kirdh. i. pp.
151, 162.
specimens of Scheidemann in Winterfeld, Part I.
Nos. 70, 71.
Hbinbich Scheidemann, mentioned above,
was the son of Hans Scheidemann, organist of
St. Catherine's Church, Hamburg. In 1616 he
and Jacob Praetorius, the younger, were sent
at the public expense to Amsterdam, to be
initiated into a higher style of organ-playing,
under the tuition of the then most famous
organ-player of Europe, Peter Sweelinck. In
1625 Heinrich succeeded his father as organist
of St. Catherine's. Mattheson says of Scheidemann
that his organ-playing and compositions
were like himself, popular and agreeable, easy
and cheerful, with no pretence or desire for
mere show. Some of his organ pieces have
been discovered in MS. tablature at Liineburg,
for an estimate of which see Seiffert's Geschichte
der KlaviermusHe, vol. i. i)p.
117-19. Heinrich
Scheidemann was again associated with Jacob
Praetorius in contributing melodies to Kist's
'
Himmlisohe Lieder, ' which were published in
1641-42. Praetorius composed ten to the 4th
part of Rist's Book, Scheidemann ten to .the
5th part, entitled 'Hbllenlieder.' One of
Scheidemann's melodies in this collection,
'Friseh auf und lasst uns singen,' continued
for a whUe in church use, as it appears again
in Vopelius's ' Leipziger Gesangbuch ' of 1682.
Among Scheidemann's pupils were Werner Fabricius,
Matthias Weckmann, and Joh. Adam
Reinken, the last of whom became his successor
as organist of St. Catherine's, Hamburg, in
1654. Max Seiffert, in the Sammelbdnde of
the Int. Mils. Ges. ii. p. 117, gives the date of
Scheidemann's death as 1663, but Eitner, in
the Quellen-Lexikon, gives reasons for adhering
to the previously accepted date, 1654, as there
is no doubt that Reinken succeeded him in
that year. j. K. M.
SCHEIDEMANTEL, Carl, born Jan. 21,
1859, at Weimar, was taught singing by Bodo
Borchers, and on Sept. 15, 1878, made his
debut there as Wolfram. He remained there
until 1886, having in the meantime received
further instruction from Stockhausen at Frankfort.
In 1884, on leave from Weimar, he
sang in German at Covent Garden, June 4, as
Kothner, as the Minister (' Fidelio '), Herald
('Lohengrin'), Kurwenal, Wolfram, and, July
9, Rucellb, on the production of Stanford's
' Savonarola.' He made a very favourable impression,
both on account of his fine baritone
voice and his excellent singing and acting. In
1886 he sang at Bayreuth as Klingsor, Amfortas,
a remarkable performance, and Kurwenal
after which he mjtde his debuts at Dresden as
the Dutchman, and the Templar and Hans
Heiling of Marschner, as a permanent member
of the company there, as successor to Degele,
the result of a successful
'
gaatspiel ' the previous
year. Here he has remained ever since
(1907), and has gained great popularity in a