Detlef Altenburg (9 January 1947 – 8 February 2016[1]) was a German musicologist.
[2] Born in Hersfeld, Altenburg studied musicology, Protestant theology, religious studies and philosophy in University of Marburg and University of Cologne, where he received his doctorate in 1973.
From 1983 to 1994 he taught at the University of Paderborn and at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold and the Musikwissenschaftliches Seminar Detmold/Paderborn [de].
From 1994 to 1999 he was Lehrstuhl [de] and director of the Institute for Musicology at the University of Regensburg.
In 1999 he accepted an appointment at the Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt, Weimar and was director of the joint institute for musicology of the HfM Weimar and the Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena from November 1999 until his retirement.