THOMAS STOLTZER  

Among the most important German composers of his time, Thomas Stoltzer was born in the Silesian city of Schweidnitz and was probably a pupil of Heinrich Finck. He served as a priest in Breslau and in 1522 became magister capellae to the Hungarian court at Ofen, but seems to have had some sympathy with the changes initiated by Martin Luther. Although he set some Lutheran German texts, including a group of four Psalms, the greater part of his work was for the traditional Latin Catholic liturgy, with a number of Latin hymns, 39 of which were included in Rhau's Lutheran Sacrorum hymnorum liber primus of 1542.