Stöckl, Bonifaz 11/27/1745 - 09/27/1784

Stoeckl, Bonifaz OSB, real name Johann Evangelist Stoeckl

* Nov. 27, 1745 in Pilling (Lower Bavaria), † Sept. 27, 1784 in Amberg (Upper Palatinate), clergyman and composer. Stoeckl came from a farming family and received his first music lessons in Geiselhöring. In Freising, where Placidus von Camerloher worked, he graduated with honors in humanities and philosophy from the Benedictine grammar school. Various compositions were already written here; according to Lipowsky (1811), Stoeckl is said to have been a composition pupil of Leopold Mozart in Salzburg. On Oct. 27, 1771, he took his religious vows in the Benedictine Abbey of Mallersdorf. He was ordained a priest on July 18, 1773 and became the monastery's prefect of music the following year. Stoeckl played the organ and violin himself. In the fall of 1781, he was appointed professor of the arts humaniora at the electoral grammar school in Amberg, where he composed several school plays. He taught there until his death. Musicologists give the following description of his works, which have hardly been published: “He was a marvelous composer of music”. Manuscripts of his masses and other works from Weyarn Abbey are now in the Bavarian State Archives branch on Freising Cathedral Hill.