12 Facts About Johann Mattheson

Johann Mattheson was a German composer, critic, lexicographer and music theorist.

The son of a prosperous tax collector, Mattheson received a broad liberal education and, aside from general musical training, took lessons in keyboard instruments, violin, composition and singing.

Johann Mattheson made his solo debut with the Hamburg opera in 1696 in female roles and, after his voice changed, sang tenor at the opera, conducted rehearsals and composed operas himself.

Johann Mattheson was cantor at St Mary's Cathedral, Hamburg from 1718 until increasing deafness led to his retirement from that post in 1728.

Johann Mattheson had studied English in school and spoke it fluently.

Johann Mattheson became tutor to the son of the English ambassador Sir John Wich and then secretary to the ambassador.

Johann Mattheson went on diplomatic missions abroad representing the ambassador.

Johann Mattheson was a close friend of George Frideric Handel, although he nearly killed Handel in a sudden quarrel during a performance of Johann Mattheson's opera Die ungluckselige Kleopatra, Konigin von Agypten in 1704.

Johann Mattheson was the most abundant writer on performance practice, theatrical style, and harmony of the German Baroque.

Johann Mattheson is particularly important for his work on the relationship of the disciplines of rhetoric and music, for example in Das neu-eroffnete Orchestre, Hamburg 1713, and Der vollkommene Capellmeister, Hamburg 1739.

However his books raise more and more attention and suspicion because Johann Mattheson was a brilliant polemicist and his theories on music are often full of pedantry and pseudo-erudition.

Johann Mattheson wrote a few sonatas and some keyboard music, including pieces meant for keyboard instruction.