Notker

840-912

 

Distinguished from others of same name by title of Balbulus the Stammerer. He was a St. Gallen monk and to him are musicians indebted for a nobler and grander expression of the Sequences, of which he wrote thirty-five. They had great influence over French and Italian song. His Media Vita in Morte Sumus, a chant which was adopted by Christian warriors as a battle song is still in use as well as other of his music which is sung at Pentecost, Easter and Christmas. A number of his chants are still preserved at St. Gall. Notker is often confused with a younger monk known as Notker Labeo, who was celebrated as the writer of the first German manuscript on the theory of music, though this treatise is sometimes accredited to Notker the elder. He gained his renown as poet and vocalist. Notker died at St. Gall, Switzerland.