Dietrich Buxtehude is probably most familiar to modern classical music audiences as the man who inspired the young Johann Sebastian Bach to make a lengthy pilgrimage to Lubeck, Buxtehude's place of employment and residence for most of his life, just to hear Buxtehude play the organ. But Buxtehude was a major figure among German Baroque composers in his own right. Though we do not have copies of much of the work that most impressed his contemporaries, Buxtehude nonetheless left behind a body of vocal and instrumental music which is distinguished by its contrapuntal skill, devotional atmosphere, and raw intensity. He helped develop the form of the church cantata, later perfected by Bach, and he was just as famous a virtuoso on the organ.

He is thought to have been born with the name Diderich Buxtehude. His parents were Johannes (Hans Jensen) Buxtehude and Helle Jespersdatter. His father originated from Oldesloe in the Duchy of Holstein, which at that time was a part of the Danish realms in Northern Germany. Scholars dispute both the year and country of Dieterich's birth, although most now accept that he was born in 1637 in Helsingborg, Skåne at the time part of Denmark (but now part of Sweden). His obituary stated that "he recognized Denmark as his native country, whence he came to our region; he lived about 70 years". Others, however, claim that he was born at Oldesloe. Later in his life he Germanized his name and began signing documents Dieterich Buxtehude.

His musical career, and his autonomy was a model for the careers of later Baroque masters such as George Frideric Handel, Johann Mattheson, Georg Philipp Telemann and Johann Sebastian Bach. In 1673 he reorganized a series of evening musical performances, initiated by Tunder, known as Abendmusik, which attracted musicians from diverse places and remained a feature of the church until 1810. In 1703, Handel and Mattheson both traveled to meet Buxtehude, who was by then elderly and ready to retire. He offered his position in Lübeck to Handel and Mattheson but stipulated that the organist who ascended to it must marry his eldest daughter, Anna Margareta. Both Handel and Mattheson turned the offer down and left the day after their arrival. In 1705, J.S. Bach, then a young man of twenty, walked from Arnstadt to Lübeck, a distance of more than 400 kilometres (250 mi), and stayed nearly three months to hear the Abendmusik, meet the pre-eminent Lübeck organist, hear him play, and, as Bach explained, "to comprehend one thing and another about his art". In addition to his musical duties, Buxtehude, like his predecessor Tunder, served as church treasurer.

The Sonata in G Major (BuxWV 271), for two violins and gamba is symmetrically constructed and can almost be regarded as one long concerto movement. It is in fact characteristic of Buxtehude’s unpublished sonatas that they contain more solo passages than the printed collections. Three tutti sections, all marked Allegro, enclose parallel solo passages for first and second violins. The first tutti section is a short, concentrated fugal construction where the three strings present three expositions of the theme without episodes and with varied ground bass accompaniment in the continuo. Towards the end Buxtehude makes room, as is his custom, for freer treatment of the material. Soloistically motivated contrasts are a feature of the two uniformly structured passages for solo violin: these are the second section of the sonata (Adagio – Allegro – Adagio – 12/16 – Adagio a 3) for first violin and the fourth section (Adagio – Allegro) for the second. The contrasts are between major and minor tonality, between improvisatory, rhythmically free passages and tightly controlled figurations, and between slow and fast tempi. The tutti section in the middle of the work (Allegro) is a set of variations over an ostinato strophe of two times four measures. a gracious melody that dissolves into figurations when repeated is played by the first violin and then by the second. At the last two statements of the ostinato strophe (now without repetition of the second half) the gamba joins the two high strings and eventually takes over their figurations, so that the section ends as a dialogue between three equal voices. The concluding tutti evolves as a three-part fugal and concerted treatment of a theme derived from the opening and concluding note repetitions of the solo passages. After the theme has been assigned thrice to each of the three strings, the section proceeds as a concertato game played with fragments of the theme and the recurrent cadential motif. Here, too, Buxtehude succeeds with never-failing inventiveness and musical enthusiasm in bringing a piece to its culmination in an effective final cadenza.

Source: Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dieterich_Buxtehude).

Although originally composed for 2 Violins, Bass Viola & Continuo, I created this Interpretation of the Sonata in G Major (BuxWV 271) for Winds (Flute, Oboe & Bassoon) and Strings (2 Violins, Viola & Cello).