Gottfried Weber

Jacob Gottfried Weber (1 March 1779 – 21 September 1839) was a German writer on music (especially on music theory), composer, and jurist. Biography Weber was born at Freinsheim. From 1824 to 1839, he was the editor of Cäcilia, a musical periodical published in Mainz, which influenced musical thought in Germany during the early Romantic era. His most important work is his Versuch einer geordneten Theorie der Tonsetzkunst (“Theory of Musical Composition”) (Mainz: B. Schott, 1817–21), which introduced several concepts that have since become important in the study of music theory. In this work, Weber develops the idea of “Mehrdeutigkeit” (that is, “multiple meaning”), a term initially introduced by Georg Joseph Vogler. Weber’s “multiple meaning” refers to individual tones and harmonies, based on their context in a piece of music. For example, a C major triad may serve as I in C major, IV in G major, V in F major, etc. “To analyze a chord, a theorist must ask not only ‘What notes are in it?’ but also ‘How is it behaving in the harmonic progression?’” (Thompson); see diatonic function. In the same work, Weber also further develops Vogler’s idea of Roman numeral designations applied to ch