Despite being largely self-taught in the art and practice of music, Michael Praetorius ascended to become one of the best-known, and most prolific, composers of German Protestant church music in the early seventeenth century. His father, a theologian who consorted with Johann Walter (theologian and musical adviser to Martin Luther himself), instilled a love of the reformed faith in Michael at an early age. Michael went on to serve important musical positions in Kassel, Dresden, and Wolfenbüttel; wrote an influential music theory treatise in three volumes; and left over 1,000 compositions for the German reformed church. Some of the best-known—and most charming—pieces are those he wrote for the celebrations of Christmas, often settings of Protestant hymns and carols. One such setting of a popular German carol, printed in 1607 as Quem pastores laudavere, presents many fascinating features.

The very text Praetorius set contains one surprising element: each of the first three verses begins with clauses that are grammatically hanging: each depends on the figure of Christ, who is only mentioned at the outset of the final verse. It is He "whom the shepherds praised" and "to whom the wise men came." Praetorius offers both the original German carol text (from the fourteenth century) and a Latin version. Musically, his setting alternates between solo introductions and choral passages and proceeds in a lively triple meter (common to the carol, which originated as a round dance). The solo introductions may have benefited in Praetorius' own time by a local German practice of singing them In Wechsel: four choirboys with candles sang from the upper galleries of the church, as if their voices were the very angelic chorus. Finally, in the last line of each verse, the text of which echoes another Latin Christmas carol (Resonet in laudibus) the composer adds a bit of intertextuality and quotes the music as well of the second carol.

© Timothy Dickey, All Music Guide