Drese, Adam

Composer

b Thuringia, Germany 1620, d Arnstadt, Germany 1701. He played the viol, and by 1648 he had become a court musician to Duke Wilhelm IV of Weimar, who sent him to study at Warsaw before making him his Kapellmeister. On the duke’s death in 1662, his son Bernhard employed Drese as his secretary in Jena until his own death 17 years later. Drese had meanwhile become Town Mayor in 1672, and remained there until moving to Arnstadt as Kapellmeister by 1683. By this time his home had become a regular meeting-point for the Pietists (led by Philipp J Spener, 1635–1705), who were the first to sing the hymns he had written but whose presence was not universally popular. He stayed at Arnstadt until his death. Most of his musical works have been lost. No.943.