Gustaf Düben
Swedish composer (1628–1690)

Gustaf Düben (Swedish pronunciation: [ˈɡɵ̂sːtav dy:ʹbən]; 1624/1628 – December 19, 1690) was a Swedish organist and composer. Düben is best known for his contributions to the Düben collection, a collection of baroque music manuscripts.
Early life
Gustaf Düben was born in Stockholm, Sweden, in the 1620s, into the Düben family. He was the son of the German-born organist Andreas Düben and Anna Maria Gabrielen (1609–1690). His mother served as a lady's maid to Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg and was the daughter of Peter Gabriel, a court musician at the Berlin royal court.
Career
In 1647 Gustav became part of the Swedish royal court orchestra, the Kungliga Hovkapellet, where he would succeed as Hofkapellmeister. He succeeded to the role in 1663, following his father's death the previous year. Both of his sons would follow in their father's footsteps, Gustaf holding the office from 1690 to 1698 and Anders von Düben the Younger from 1698 to 1726.
In addition to his court duties, he was organist at the German Church in Stockholm, and he also taught Hedwig Eleonora how to play instruments.
Düben composed a few works in the North German style prevalent in his time, including both vocal and instrumental music.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Gustaf Düben” is swedish composer (1628–1690). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Gustaf, Düben and Swedish, not as a finished interpretation.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q326817. VIAF identifies the subject as 305407960. The Library of Congress control number is n88682545. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1624, 1628, 1690 and 1609.
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This entry incorporates text from “Gustaf Düben” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.