The thesis deals with the birth of the Baroque cantata in Northern and Central Germany. It introduces musical forms that led to the creation of cantata and thus significantly influenced its form, which crystalized during the Late Baroque period. The picture of Early Baroque German music is completed with profiles of three principal composers, on a selection of whose works the gradual development of this new musical form - the German Baroque cantata - is demonstrated. The second part is devoted to an analysis of a work representative of this style, Dietrich Buxtehude's Membra Jesu nostri, which is a supreme example of this musical form.