By 1648, Heinrich Schuetz was both a survivor and a relic of his own past glory. The 63-year-old devout Lutheran had survived the religious slaughter of the Thirty Years War, which had killed more than half of the musicians of his German world. Surely the most influential composer of German history, he had also outlasted his own impact on the next generation of German composers, patrons, and audiences, who unjustly regarded his music as outdated. Who knows how he felt about his growing isolation, but it's interesting that he chose to compose one of his grandest and greatest accomplishments - the Geistliche Chormusik 1648, op. 11 - in the antiquated contrapuntal style of Renaissance vocal polyphony, the prima prattica, rather than the operatic Italianate seconda prattica he himself had introduced to German music.