This work was discovered at the end of a collection of vocal pieces published in 1684 under the main title “Die Bankelsangerlieder.” or “The Song of the Bench Singers”.
This work was discovered at the end of a collection of vocal pieces published in 1684 under the main title “Die Bankelsangerlieder.” or “The Song of the Bench Singers”. The term“bankelsanger” or bench singer referred to an itinerant musician or busker who performed in the local tavern while standing on benches. The Italian translation for a “bankelsanger” is “cantastoria”, which means “story singer”, a singer who tells his story while gesturing to a series of painted or printed images. Baroque in style, some music academics believe that the work may have actually been composed by the German composer Daniel Speer (1636–1709). This lively work is unusual in the quality of its themes and even more so in the antiphonal effects produced by the answering back and forth between various groupings of instruments.
