[1][2] Tannenberg attended schools in the Moravian communities of Ronneburg, Marienborn and eventually Herrnhaag.

[3] While in Zeist, Tannenberg began making arrangements to travel with a group of Moravians to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

[7] In 1778, Tannenberg and twenty-one other members of his congregation took an Oath of Allegiance to the newly formed government of the United States.

[1] According to music historian Thomas McGeary, "Tannenberg was the most important eighteenth-century American organ-builder.

"[8] In late 1757 or early 1758, Tannenberg began learning the craft of organ building from Johann Gottlob Klemm.

However, organs were also constructed in Albany, New York, Frederick, Maryland, and Salem, North Carolina.

[10] At the time of its opening on October 10, 1790, the organ Tannenberg constructed at the Zion Church in Philadelphia was the largest in the United States and considered the best of its kind.

[13] Tannenberg later wrote to a friend that, "On the main manual seven stops are now in place, and the pedal are complete, with the exception of five pipes in the Trombone Bass.

The church paid Tannenberg a sum of eleven shillings and sixpence in November 1797 for tuning of the organ they had commissioned from Peter Kurtz during the interim.

[15] Tannenberg's organs at that time were praised for the tones in the diapasons and in the upper registries, including the 12th, 15th, and sesquialtera.

[16] Tannenberg was tuning an organ he had constructed at the Lutheran Church in York, PA when he suffered an episode of apoplexy.