Joseph Mainzer (21 October 1801 – 10 November 1851) was a German music teacher, who spent the last period of his life in the United Kingdom, promoting a vision of choral singing for the masses, as part of the singing-class movement.
He worked subsequently in the Saarbrücken coal mines with the view of becoming an engineer; and after a time was ordained a Catholic priest in 1826, afterwards being made an abbé.
Moving to Paris, he taught popular singing classes and contributed musical articles to journals.
[1] In 1839 Mainzer went to the United Kingdom, and in 1841 he competed unsuccessfully for the music chair at the University of Edinburgh.
The system was the French method of solfège with absolute pitch: Mainzer himself had success with it.