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Bach

  • Writer: Carlos Alencar
    Carlos Alencar
  • May 1
  • 10 min read

Updated: May 17

Introduction:

For the first article of this encyclopedia, I could not begin with any other composer than Johann Sebastian Bach, "the father of music". His biography is truly fascinating, and his work stands out as one of the greatest ever written, with a legacy that, in an absolutely literal sense, extends to infinity. As long as there is music, there will be Bach. This entry does not intend to carry out a holistic analysis of his life and work, but simply to highlight significant episodes in his career and point out the key works of Bach's repertoire that every young pianist should know.

Childhood and Education:

JS Bach was born in 1685 in Eisenach, a small town in the Thuringian region of Germany. Very little is known about his musical education as a child, but since he came from a traditionally musical family, it is extremely likely that he was taught the art of sound from an early age. The 17th century was marked by terrible living conditions: infant mortality was devastating and life expectancy rarely exceeded thirty. In this context, the young Bach lost his mother, Elisabeth, at the age of nine, and his father, Johann Ambrosius, at the age of ten. Orphaned, he was taken in by his older brother, Johann Christoph, an organist in Ohrdruf.


The beginning of Bach's musical life can be traced back to Ohrdruf. Under the tutelage of his brother, Bach learned to play the organ and the harpsichord. At this time, the very young Bach performed as a soprano in a student choir and composed his first piece that we know of, the Capriccio in E Major BWV 993, dedicated to his older brother. In his late teens, as a student at the St. Michael's College in Lüneburg, he studied with Georg Böhm. During this period he made visits to Hamburg to study with Johann Reincken, a great organist and composer of the time, from whom he learned the northern German organ tradition.

Artistic Consolidation and Professional Trajectory:

There is no evidence that Bach was a child prodigy like Mozart and Mendelssohn later became. However, it is quite possible that by the age of twenty he was already the greatest organist of his time, and could also sing, play the harpsichord, violin, viola, viola da gamba and compose, all at a professional level. In 1703, at the age of eighteen, Bach wrote the famous Toccata and Fugue in D Minor BWV 565, probably the most famous organ work of all time.


Throughout his life Bach worked in a wide variety of positions. Beginning as a violinist in a private orchestra in Weimar, he also served briefly as organist in Arnstadt and Mühlhausen, where he married his second cousin Maria Barbara Bach, both at the age of twenty-two. His first lasting position was at the court of Dukes Wilhelm Ernst and Ernst August in Weimar, where he remained from 1707 to 1717. Working for the dukes, Bach was a prolific composer, writing numerous pieces for harpsichord and organ, 30 cantatas and 24 transcriptions of Vivaldi concertos, and fathering the first four of his 20 children, Catharina Dorothea, Wilhelm Friedemann, Carl Philipp Emanuel (CPE) and Johann Gottfried Bernhard. His efforts in this position and the progressive rise of his name in the musical world earned him several raises and an eventual promotion to the position of concertmaster.


In his later years of employment in Weimar, the political instability at court began to affect his art, and he secretly sought employment elsewhere. In 1717 he signed a contract to become Kapellmeister at the court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Köthen. The position of Kapellmeister was the pinnacle of any musician's career at the time, and varied in grandeur depending on which court he worked for. Upon learning of Bach's return to court, one of the dukes ordered his arrest, a sentence that lasted a month and was followed by his summary dismissal.


Not long after he began working for Prince Leopold's court, Maria Barbara died. A few months later, in December 1721, he married Anna Magdalena Wilcke, a fellow employee who sang at the court. Three years after arriving at the prince's court, he was offered a position at the church of St. Thomas in Leipzig, which, with the prince's permission, he accepted. The position he was offered at the church required his presence, but the prince allowed him to go as long as he continued to compose for his court.


In 1729, Bach took over as director of the Collegium Musicum. In Bach's time, music was propagated mainly by three types of institutions: churches, courts, and musical societies. The Collegium Musicum was one of the largest of these societies, and presiding over it was a very advantageous position. There, Bach had the opportunity to promote his music with frequent public and private performances. In the next seven years, two more of his sons were born: Christoph Friedrich and Johann Christian, in 1732 and 1735, respectively.


A year after Johann Christian's birth, Bach was accepted as the Royal Saxon-Polish Electoral Court Composer, a position that gave him a certain political clout and increased the extent of his powers over the Collegium Musicum and the musical scene around it. His renown continued to grow, and so did his work.

Meeting with Frederick II and Final Years:

Around ten years later, at the age of sixty-two, JS Bach starred in one of the most memorable moments in the history of music. Through his son, CPE, a meeting was arranged between Johann and Frederick the Great. The meeting took place at the royal residence in the city of Potsdam and had as its backdrop a recently invented keyboard instrument that Frederick wanted to introduce to the elder Bach. This instrument, very similar in appearance to the harpsichord, was called the Fortepiano and would cause quite a sensation in the centuries to come under its more elaborate version, the piano. It is worth remembering that we are in the Baroque period and that the piano as it is known today did not exist during Bach's lifetime, having only become popular in the middle to the end of the Classical period and only becoming definitively consolidated in the transition to the Romantic period.


Upon arriving in Potsdam, old Bach, still tired from his journey, was summoned to the royal residence where Frederick asked him to play and improvise for some guests and for the musicians of his court. For the improvisation part, the king proposed to the tired Bach a task deemed impossible: to improvise a Three Voice Fugue based on a theme supposedly composed by the king himself. The Fugue form, due to its polyphonic and contrapuntal nature, is complex and demands great skill during its composition. Improvising a Fugue requires complete mastery of the instrument and musical theory.


It is theorized that this request made by Frederick was intended to humiliate the old Bach. To the delight of every pianist, the effect was precisely the opposite, and served as one of the foundations for the immortalization of the myth of Bach as the greatest of all masters. Contrary to expectations, Johann accepted the challenge and masterfully improvised a Fugue for Three Voices based on the theme that the world would come to know as Thema Regium. Astonished, admired and irritated by Bach's triumph, the king challenged him again, this time asking him to improvise a Fugue for Six Voices, which the great master did, this time over a theme of his own. The rumors about this encounter echoed and Bach's transcendence was immortalized in the pages of history.


Shortly after, his health deteriorated, causing him motor and visual difficulties, significantly hindering his compositional process. In 1750, he underwent surgery at the hands of a famous “ophthalmologist” of the time, Sir John Taylor. The surgery momentarily restored his vision, but complications led to a fatal stroke a few months later. The great master died on June 28, in accordance with his belief: leaving behind the world of men, heading for the land where true music comes from.

Essential Works:

The Little Notebook of Anna Magdalena Bach:

First published in 1722, the Notebook is an essential work in the library of the young classical pianist. Generally considered the gateway to the study of J.S. Bach, the 1722 edition contains exclusively compositions by the master, while the 1725 version also incorporates works by other composers, such as Christian Petzold, François Couperin, Gottfried Stölzel and C.P.E. Bach. The most widely distributed edition is that of 1725, which includes a variety of minuets, polonaises, chorales, the famous Musette in D major, marches, arias and sketches of works that Bach would later develop, such as the first two French Suites and two of the Partitas.


Inventions and Sinfonias (BWV 772-801):

After exploring Anna Magdalena’s Notebook, the Inventions for Two and Three Voices appear as the next natural step in Bach’s study, representing the first serious immersion in the vast universe of counterpoint. These 30 short pieces were originally written as an exercise for his son Wilhelm Friedemann, and were later published as studying material for his students.


When you hear the term Invention, the image that should come to mind is that of a short, contrapuntal piece containing two voices, heavily based on motives, whereas by Sinfonia one should envision an Invention with three voices instead of two. Johann wrote 15 of each of these gems and arranged them in ascending tonal order, eight in major keys and seven in minor keys. The most famous of these are Inventions No.8 and No.14.


The Well-Tempered Clavier (WTC): BWV 846-893

The third stage of Bach's repertoire is possibly the most referenced work in the study of music, the Wohltemperierte Klavier. Dubbed by Hans von Bülow as the “Old Testament of Music”, the Well-Tempered Clavier stands out as the most revolutionary work of its period, however, it only received its recognition belatedly.


It is composed of 2 volumes, each containing 24 Preludes and 24 Fugues, a total of 96 pieces! Its revolutions are many, but the main factors are that it was the first musical collection to include pieces in all keys, both major and minor, an achievement made possible by advances in the tuning system of the time. Thus, Book I (BWV 846-869) begins with a Prelude and a Fugue in C Major, followed by a Prelude and Fugue in C Minor, followed by the same pair in C sharp Major and Minor, and so on. Book II (BWV 870-893) follows the same pattern.


The first book is widely regarded as the rite of passage from being an intermediate to pianist to becoming an advanced one. Throughout history, playing both books has been a challenge for many professional pianists, and is a true test of pianism and passion for music. Not only for performers but also for musicologists and music historians, the WTC is a true landmark and a vibrant source of knowledge and learning opportunities. Its most famous piece is the Prelude in C Major, from Book I, which was used by Charles Gounod a century later to compose his famous Ave Maria; curiously, it is precisely the easiest piece in the book, and by a substantial margin.


The Musical Offering (BWV 1079):

After the famous meeting arranged between Bach and Frederick II, the father of music offered yet another proof of his genius in the form of the Musikalisches Opfer. Using the theme that the king had provided him, Bach wrote a series of pieces and offered them as a tribute to the monarch. Among the pieces offered were a Ricercar for 3 Voices, a Ricercar for 6 Voices, 9 Canons, a Canonical Fugue and a Sonata for Trio.


Not only a test of mastery for those who can play it, the Offering is a true adventure for those who decide to unravel it. IIn this work, Bach made the most out of his skill to create music that goes beyond itself. There are a number of articles where you can learn more about this work, some of which will be cited at the end of this entry. It is also worth noting that, except for the Sonata for Trio, none of the pieces indicate in which key they should be played and a good number of them come in the form of a puzzle to be solved.


The Art of Fugue (BWV 1080):

Written between 1742 and 1749, Die Kunst der Fuge is a true testament to transcendence. Composed by Bach in his later years, the collection comprises a series of progressively extraordinary fugues. The Art of Fugue is considered by many scholars to be one of the pinnacles of the Western musical tradition and is undoubtedly one of the few examples that pushes both creative ability and musical technique to their respective limits.


The collection comprises approximately 20 pieces, depending on the edition. These include: 14 Fugues (Contrapunctus), 4 Canons and inversions of some of the Contrapunctus. As in the Musical Offering, there is no indication of the correct instrumentation; current performances tend to use the piano, harpsichord, organ or strings. A popular curiosity about this work is that, in Contrapunctus XIV, considered unfinished by some scholars, Bach uses his own name to write a short theme, followed by an abrupt interruption of the music.


Goldberg Variations (BWV 988):

The Goldberg Variations were written around 1741 on the theme of an aria found in the Notebook of Anna Magdalena Bach. Recent studies have questioned the veracity of the story, however, the popular version of the origin of this set claims that Bach wrote them for a musician named Johann Gottlieb Goldberg, who was an instrumentalist for a certain Count Keyserling. This count had trouble sleeping and supposedly asked Bach to compose something to help him cope with his sleepless nights.


The collection consists of a theme followed by 30 variations. Its popularity is due mainly to its intrinsic beauty, a sublime work that overflows with love for life. Not simply beautiful, these variations made their name by representing an essential milestone in the history of the Theme and Variations form. Furthermore, they contain within themselves prophecies of what would become part of the Romantic style around a century later, the clearest example of which is in Variation No.25.


Other Works

The Bachian repertoire, as previously mentioned, is one of the most extensive on the musical scene and commenting on each piece individually would be a herculean task. However, it is essential to at least mention some keyboard pieces that ended up being left out of the detailed description.


  • English Suites (BWV 806-811): Pearls written during the Weimar period. A challenge for intermediate pianists, pieces worthy of the concert hall.


  • French Suites (BWV 812-817): Similar in form to their sister suites, they were written by a more experienced Bach, already in Köthen. In general, they are considered a little easier than the splendid English suites.


  • Toccatas (BWV 910-916): Traditionally Baroque pieces, full of virtuosity and improvisational character. Incredible for the student looking for a Bach different from the usual.


  • Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue (BWV 903): One of Bach's prophecies about Romanticism. It is characterized as a complex piece even for professionals. One of Bach's high points in terms of harmony.


Further Reading and References:



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