Notker the Stammerer (familiarly known as Notker Balbulus, or Notker of St. Gall; c.840 - c.912) was a musician, poet and Benedictine monk at the Abbey of St. Gall at St. Gallen in Switzerland during the ninth century. He is known for his invention of the sequence, a mnemonic poem for recording the series of pitches sung during an extended syllable in plainchant.
He was described as "frail in body, though not in mind, a stammerer in voice but not in spirit; lofty in divine thoughts, patient in adversity, gentle in everything, strict in enforcing the discipline of our convent, yet somewhat timid in sudden and unexpected alarms, except in the assaults of demons, whom he always withstood manfully. He was most assiduous in illuminating, reading, and composing; and (that I may embrace all his gifts of holiness within a brief compass) he was a vessel of the Holy Ghost, as full as any other of his own time." (from Ekkehard, History of the Vicissitudes of St. Gallen)
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