Germany claims some of the most renowned composers, singers, producers and performers of the world. Germany is the largest music market in Europe, and third largest in the world.
German classical music is one of the most performed in the world; German composers include some of the most accomplished and popular in history, among them Johann Sebastian Bach, Georg Friedrich Händel, Ludwig van Beethoven, Felix Mendelssohn, Johannes Brahms, Robert Schumann, Carl Maria von Weber, Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss were among the composers who created the field of German opera. The most popular living German composer is probably film score composer Hans Zimmer.
German popular music of the 20th and 21st century includes the movements of Neue Deutsche Welle (Nena, Hubert Kah, Alphaville), disco (Boney M., Modern Talking, Dschinghis Khan, Milli Vanilli, Bad Boys Blue), metal/rock (Rammstein, Scorpions, Accept, Helloween), punk (Die Ärzte, Böhse Onkelz, Nina Hagen, Die Toten Hosen), pop rock (Sandra, Enigma, Michael Cretu, Herbert Grönemeyer) and indie (Tocotronic). Famous female singers were Marlene Dietrich and Hildegard Knef. German electronic music gained global influence, with Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream being pioneer groups in this genre. The electro and techno scene is internationally popular, namely due to the DJs Paul van Dyk, Scooter and Cascada.
Germany hosts many large rock music festivals. The Rock am Ring and Rock im Park festival is among the largest in the world. Since around 1990, the new-old German capital Berlin has developed a diverse music and entertainment industry.
Minnesingers and Meistersingers (Man and Woman)
The beginning of what is now considered German music could be traced back to the 12th-century compositions of mystic abbess Hildegard of Bingen, who wrote a variety of hymns and other kinds of Christian music.
After Latin-language religious music had dominated for centuries, in the 12th century to the 14th centuries, Minnesinger (love poets), singing in German, spread across Germany. Minnesinger were aristocrats, traveling from court to court, who had become musicians, and their work left behind a vast body of literature, Minnelieder. The following two centuries saw the Minnesinger replaced by middle-class Meistersinger, who were often master craftsmen in their main profession, whose music was much more formalized and rule-based than that of the Minnesinger. Minnesinger and Meistersinger could be considered parallels of French troubadours and trouvère.
Among the Minnesinger, Hermann, a monk from Salzburg, deserves special note. He incorporated folk styles from the Alpine regions in his compositions. He made some primitive forays into polyphony as well. Walther von der Vogelweide and Reinmar von Hagenau are probably the most famous minnesingers from this period.
Classical music of Germany
Germans have played a leading role in the development of classical music. Many of the best classical musicians such as Bach, Händel, Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms, Wagner, Mahler, or Schoenberg (a lineage labeled the "German Stem" by Igor Stravinsky) were German. At the beginning of the 15th century, German classical music was revolutionized by Oswald von Wolkenstein, who travelled across Europe learning about classical traditions, spending time in countries like France and Italy. He brought back some techniques and styles to his homeland, and within a hundred years, Germany had begun producing composers renowned across the continent. Among the first of these composers was the organist Conrad Paumann. The largest summer festival for classical music in Germany is the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival.
Chorale
Beginning in the 16th century, polyphony, or the intertwining of multiple melodies, arrived in Germany. Protestant chorales predominated; in contrast to Catholic music, chorale was vibrant and energetic. Composers included Dieterich Buxtehude, Heinrich Schütz and Martin Luther, leader of the Protestant Reformation. Luther happened to accompany his sung hymns with a lute, later recreated as the waldzither that became a national instrument of Germany in the 20th century.
Opera
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Die Zauberflöte (1791) is usually said to be the beginning of German opera. An earlier starting date for German opera, however, could be Heinrich Schütz's Dafne from 1627. Schütz is said to be the first great German composer before Johann Sebastian Bach, and was a major figure in 17th-century music.