Joseph Eybler: Iste Confessor, Hymnus de Communi Confessorum, HV 124

This hymn in D minor was composed in 1835 as a late work of the Viennese Hofkapellmeister Joseph Edler von Eybler (since 1833 severely affected by a stroke, knighted in 1835). As a commodity piece for the Hofkapelle - intended for the feast of the state patron saint Leopold on November 15, as the autograph suggests - it makes no claim to artistic subtlety and depth. Although the title ("Hymnus de Communi Confessorum") points to the intent for confessor feasts, at that time the term "Confessor" was no longer limited to persecuted Christians, but generally describe a holy life. The Saint Leopold (margrave Leopold III. of Ostarrichi, 1073-1136, canonized in 1485, from 1663 patron saint of Austria and three federal states) has to be regarded as a confessor only in this sense.

The work is for four-part a cappella choir (explicitly noted "Senz' organo" in the organ part, i.e. without any instrumental accompaniment). However, in the Hofkapelle the organ played the work once as an interlude between the two stanzas.

The alternative text "[...] meruit supremos laudis honores" ("[...] earned the highest honors of Praise") at the end of the first stanza, written in the scores of the Hofkapelle in red ink, was probably written to be able to to perform the hymn on days other than on feasts of a confessor.