By the mid-seventeenth century the Dutch Golden Age was at its height and Amsterdam was considered the trading centre of the world. The many churches of the city fulfilled an important social and religious function and city organists were held in high esteem. Anthoni van Noordt was one such organist. Little is known of his life before 1652 when he was appointed organist of the New Church in Amsterdam.

Van Noordt’s Tabulatuur-boeck van psalmen en fantasyen was published in 1659 and contains all his known works. From what is known of the specifications of the city’s organs at that time, the collection seems to have been designed to show off the range of the organ in Amsterdam’s Old Church, the most sophisticated organ of its day.