À propos de Joseph Ahrens

Joseph Ahrens, born in Sommersell in 1904 and died in Berlin in 1997, is one of the important German organ and church music composers of the 20^th century.
After studying church music in Münster (with Werner Göhr and Fritz Volbach), he moved to Berlin in 1925 where he undertook further studies with Alfred Sittard and Max Seiffert at the Academy of Church and School Music and attended Wilhelm Middelschulte's organ master classes. In addition, he studied Gregorian chant at the Benedictine abbeys of Gerleve and Beuron. From 1928 he worked as a lecturer at the Berlin Academy of School and Church Music where he was appointed professor in 1936. From 1945 to 1969 he was professor of church music at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik and, in addition, assistant director from 1954 to 1958.
For nine years (1931-1940) he had been organist of the Berlin Philharmonic and from 1934 organist at the St. Hedwig's Cathedral in Berlin until the latter was destroyed in 1943. Two years later he began to work as a choir director and organist at the St. Salvator Church in Berlin-Wilmersdorf. In 1955 Ahrens received the Berlin Arts Award and in 1963 was elected member of the Berlin Academy of the Arts.
Among his major works are:

   
• Conationes Gregorianae pro organo (3 Bände ED 4787-4789) and

   
•  Triptychon über B-a-c-h für Orgel (ED 4194).