Schacht, Matthias Henriksen

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Schacht, Matthias Henriksen

Schacht, Matthias Henriksen, Danish scholar, writer on music, and composer; b. Visby, Gotland, April 29, 1660; d. Kerteminde, Fyn, Aug. 8, 1700. He studied at the Univ. of Copenhagen and at univs. in Germany. He was a schoolmaster in Visby (1682–83), Kantor of the Odense grammar school (1683–86), and rector at the Kerteminde school (from 1686), where he was also active as a town musician. He wrote widely on scholarly subjects, and also wrote the vol. Musicus danicus eller Danske sagmester, which includes a biographical dictionary of musicians; he completed the MS in 1687, but it was not publ., even though Gerber utilized it for his own Lexikon (1790–92); it was finally ed. and publ, by G. Skjerne in Copenhagen in 1928. His compositions are not extant.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire