Johann Joseph Fux

1660-1741. Musical composer. Although chiefly remembered today for his Gradus ad Parnassum, the most influential eighteenth-century treatise on counterpoint, he was also perhaps the greatest Catholic composer of church music in the Germanic cultural sphere of his day. He strove to keep alive the tradition of church style stemming from Palestrina and the Counter-Reformation. He was active at court in Vienna, and for a time at St. Stephen's Cathedral. His influence continued to be felt by composers down into the nineteenth century.