Ole Andreas Lindeman – organist at the Church of Our Lady

From 1802, Ole Andreas Lindeman was employed at the Church of Our Lady (he had been standing in for the incumbent organist since 1799), which at that time was the most important church in the city. For a long time, Lindeman worked on the preparation of a choral songbook, but that work was only completed on the request of the Ministry of Faiths. The songbook was published in 1838 and was recommended for use in all the churches of the country. It was the first such collection prepared for the Church of Norway, which until that time had used various Danish-only canticles, while organists used also their own, individual versions of songs. In his attempt to adjust the rhythm of the lyrics to the melody and return to the more authentic forms of psalms and good harmonisation, Lindeman contributed in his songbook to the unification of church singing. He also translated numerous eighteenth-century treatises on music by renowned European musicians.

The Church of Our Lady is one of the oldest buildings in Trondheim. In the Middle Ages, it was dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The tower and the western part were erected in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, while the eastern part is identical to the mediaeval church of the Holy Virgin Mary from the end of the twelfth century. The church was frequently destroyed by fires, but it was rebuilt every time. From the once rich Baroque interior, the pulpit and the 1744 altar by Heinrich Kühnemann have survived to this day.