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Johann Wilhelm Hertel
October 9, 1727 - June 14, 1789
born in Eisenach, composed during the Baroque period
Biography
Hertel was a composer, violinist, and keyboard player who spent most of his life employed by the court of Schwerin in Germany. He was also an erudite writer who left behind theoretical treatises on music and translations of contemporary French and Italian essays on aesthetics and opera. He wrote an autobiographical account of his career valuable for the insight it provides into the musical and cultural life of northern Germany in the second half of the eighteenth century.

Born in Eisenach in 1727, Hertel represented the third generation of a family of musicians; his father, Johann Christian Hertel, was a viola da gamba virtuoso and composer who frequently traveled throughout Germany and Holland as a performer. After studying with Johann Heinrich Heil, who was one of Johann Sebastian Bach's pupils, Hertel, then 12 years old, joined his father on concert tours as a harpsichord player. In 1742-1743, Hertel took lessons on the violin with Zerbst court konzertmeister Carl Höckh. At his father's behest, Hertel was to pursue a legal career in Leipzig upon completion of his studies with Höckh. However, during a visit to Berlin, Hertel met Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, whose music produced such an effect on the young composer that he resolved to pursue a career in music.