Vom Himmel hoch da komm ich her

The choral prelude I post today is a sort of left over from Christmas diner. The plan was to publish it before Christmas, but obviously I did not succeed. I could wait till next Christmas, but decided not to. The author of this piece is uncertain. Walther indicates only initials in his manuscript: F.C.S.M. It is sometimes ascribed to one Carl F. Scheidemantel. And that is, as far as I could find, only a name. No year or place of birth of death, no information about where he worked, lived, married or not, nothing. Yet this prelude is a brilliant piece of trio writing. It’s everything one could wish for in such a piece. It has drive, clever ornamentation of the choral melody, perhaps simple but very effective counterpoint, and overal harmonic layout that follows the structure of the choral melody brilliantly. Whoever the author was, he deserves a statue for this piece alone.

One drawback: it’s difficult to register. In the end I choose this particular registration, primarily because of the nice punch in the last low C of the pedal.

Registration
Man.: Prestant 8′, Octaaf 4′, Quint 3′, Octaaf 2′, Trompet 8′ bas+discant (LH)
RW: Prestant 4′, Kromhoorn 8′ (RH)
Ped: Subbas 16′, Octaaf 8, Octaaf 4′
RW+Man, Ped+RW

Score available here: http://partitura.org/index.php/carl-f-scheidemantel-vom-himmel-hoch-da-komm-ich/