Kaern-Biederstedt, Franz (*1973) is a composer and music theorist. He studied music education in Trossingen and Frankfurt/Main, composition with Ulrich Leyendecker in Mannheim and music theory at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater (HMT) "Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy" in Leipzig. He has a doctor's degree in music theory/musicology from the HMT Leipzig. His doctor's thesis "Die Harmonia Cantionum Ecclesiasticarum des Thomaskantors Sethus Calvisius - Entstehung, Quellen, Stilistik" puts Calvisius' collection of choral settings (Kantionalsätze), which was pubished in Leipzig in 5 editions (1597, 1598, 1605, 1612 and - posthum - 1622) and is considered one of the most influential and important cantional collections besides the ones of Johann Hermann Schein and Hanns Leo Hassler, into a historical perspective and discusses its compositional style and foundations in Calvisius' own writings in music theory. A critical edition of the collection is also a part of Kaern-Biederstedt's doctor's thesis, which was published 2015 as Vol. 63A and B in the series Quellenkataloge zur Musikgeschichte by Florian Noetzel-Verlag/Heinrichshofen Bücher Wilhelmshaven.
Franz Kaern-Biederstedt is a freelance composer and an assistant professor (künstlerisch-wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter) for music theory and ear training at the HMT in Leipzig. For further information see here.
