(He is not to be confused with the German composer Johann Gabriel Meder, born in 1729 near Erfurt, and active in Amsterdam until 1800; nor is there evidence that the two men were related.)
Unable to secure a position there at the university, he resorted to taking a post as a professional singer in the Hofkapelle of Duke Ernst der Fromme (d.
[2] He was employed as court singer at Gotha in 1671, Bremen in 1672–1673, Hamburg in 1673 and Copenhagen and Lübeck, where in 1674 he met Buxtehude, whose work influenced Meder's own sacred compositions.
According to his younger contemporary Johann Mattheson's encyclopedic Grundlage einer Ehren-Pforte, Meder was an outstanding organist and singer, as well as being a composer of repute.
Mattheson argued that Meder would have become the music director for the Swedish Court in Stockholm had it not been for the Great Northern War, which involved Sweden, Russia, Denmark, and Saxony-Poland-Lithuania.