Pastor Iver Brink's Sacred and Secular Music: A Private Collection of Music from Copenhagen at the Beginning of the Eighteenth Century

Abstract

Iver Brink (1665–1728) is familiar to students of Danish religious literature, but a published auction catalogue of his books (1729) shows him also to have been a discerning collector of music. Born in Norway, Brink settled in Copenhagen in 1686. After ordination, he became, in 1691, the first official pastor to the Danish community in London. Returning in 1701, he worked as pastor at two Copenhagen churches. In 1708–9 he accompanied King Frederik IV to Italy as chaplain. Brink's musical collection reflects his religious vocation, his travels to England, Italy and Germany, and especially his fondness for solo song of any description. He penned the texts of several devotional songs, and the ensemble music in his possession hints at his participation in social music-making. The breadth and connoisseurship displayed by his collection reinforces a growing perception that Danish musical culture in the early eighteenth century was less provincial than previously believed.