Gottfried Kirchhoff, Wir glauben all’ an einen Gott

Gottfried Kirchhoff (1686 – 1746) was a German organist and composer. He was born in MÜhlbeck and got his musical training from Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow. Along with Händel, Kirchhoff was one of Zachow’s most brilliant students. In 1714 Kirchhoff moved to Halle, where he became organist and director musices at the Liebfrauenkirche. That post was previously declined by Johann Sebastian Bach. Kirchhoff remained at this post, till his death.

Gottfried Kirchhoff wrote mainly vocal music and organ pieces for church use. He was one of the foremost organ composers of the 18th century. Sadly though, not much of his music survives till today. Manuscript Mus Ms 40037, owned by the Staatsbibiothek Berlin, contains 7 choral preludes from Kirchhoff’s hand and a few anonymous pieces, that ,ight well have been composed by Kirchhoff.

The prelude to “Wir glauben all’ an einen Gott” is the first of these choral preludes by Kirchhoff. It is a nice choral trio, with the choral melody in the left hand, accompanied by a livelhy tight hand part. Intruiging is that at the end of the piece, where the choral melody has finished, Kirchhoff writes figured bass. In the score I provide a rudimentary realisation of this basso continuo.

The recording was done on the sample set of the Müller-organ in the Sint Bavokerk in Haarlem by Voxus Organs for Hauptwerk.

Score
Kirchhoff, Wir glauben all

Performance

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