Benedict Anton Aufschnaiter

Biography

Benedict Anton Aufschnaiter (baptised 21 February 1665, Kitzbühel, County of Tyrol – buried 24 January 1742, Passau) was an Austrian Baroque composer.

Life and career

Aufschnaiter received much of his musical education in Vienna, where he lived for several years. Later he got a post at the band near to the emperor's court. On 16 January 1705, he was appointed Kapellmeister at the Passau court by Bishop-Cardinal Johann Philipp von Lamberg as a successor to Georg Muffat. Aufschnaiter died there in January 1742.
He was married twice and from the second marriage, he had a son.
Most of Aufschnaiter's 300 surviving works are sacred. In his Regulæ Fundamentales Musurgiæ, he named Giacomo Carissimi, Orlande de Lassus, Johann Kaspar Kerll and Adam Gumpelzhaimer as his idols.

Theoretical works

Regulæ Fundamentales Musurgiæ (Fundamental rules on composing good music)

Compositions

Concors discordia op. 2 (Nürnberg 1695) – six serenades for orchestra
Dulcis Fidium Harmoniæ op. 4 (Augsburg 1703) – eight string sonatas
Memnon sacer ab oriente op. 5 (Augsburg 1709) – Vesper psalms
Alaudæ V op. 6 (1711) – five masses
Aquila clangens op. 7 (Passau 1719) – twelve offertories
Cymbalum Davidis op. 8 (Passau 1728) – four Vesper psalms
Miserere pro tempore quadragesimae op. 9 (unpublished, 1724)
Concerto o parthia della cortesia
Kommt, beschaut die Weisoheit – Pastorella-Trio sonata
Litaniae Lauretanae
Requiem in C major (1738)
Serenada della pace in C major
Sonata gloriosa