Search - Georg Friedrich Kauffmann, Maurizio Croci :: G. F. Kauffmann: Harmonische Seelenlust

Poor Georg Friedrich Kauffmann! He might be a famous composer today were it not for one fateful incident in his life. In 1722, when Johann Kuhnau (Cantor of Leipzig?s St. Thomas Church) died, the city council held a competition for his successor to this very prestigious position. Although Kauffmann was among the finalists, the council decided instead on Johann Sebastian Bach! Indeed Kauffmann?s organ works are of the highest order and hardly inferior to those of Bach, yet today his name is known only to specialists. The collection published as Harmonische Seelenlust contains 98 chorale preludes altogether, some of them specifying use of an oboe "placed in order to give the impression that it is an organ?s stop." Born in 1970, organist Maurizio Croci holds diplomas in organ, composition and harpsichord from various schools, and a degree in musicology form Fribourg University in Switzerland. He has concertized throughout Europe and in Japan, performed J.S. Bach?s complete organ works in Berne to mark the 250th anniversary of the composer?s death, and recorded CDs for radio and television. On this CD he plays the Treutmann organ (1737) of St. Georg Church, Grauhof.