Why does the Midwest love orchestras so much? - The Washington Post washingtonpost.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from washingtonpost.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Ken Myers
If none of the music of Dieterich Buxtehude had survived, the German organist and composer would still be known as a footnote in the career of his fellow Lutheran Johann Sebastian Bach. In the autumn of 1705, the 20-year-old Bach was granted a four-week leave of absence from his post as organist at the Neuekirche in Arnstadt. From there, he reportedly walked north 260 miles to the town of Lübeck. Since 1668, the Marienkirche in Lübeck had been blessed by the musical presence of Buxtehude, the man Bach considered the greatest living musical practitioner. Buxtehude was getting on in years; he had been scouting for . . .