General Biography on Gletle

Feel no shame if you have never heard of Johann Melchior Gletle; before writing these notes I never had, and there is still very little information widely available about him. We know the rough coordinates of his birth (Bremgarten, near Zurich) and death (Augsburg), and it seems clear that this Swiss-born chapel musician spent the vast majority of his life in his homeland. In the early 1650s, just past the age of 25, Gletle took positions, respectively, as organist and Kapellmeister at Augsburg Cathedral and remained in these posts until his death some 30 years later. Over 200 compositions are extant, largely if not entirely sacred in scope, and most of which show a clear debt to the Italian tradition of concertato writing (pioneered by the Venetian Gabrielis and featuring a shared, usually alternating melodic unfolding). Close parallels, stylistically speaking, may be made between Gletle and Pachelbel.

(c) Jason Stell