The title of organ works. Bach biography

Toccata and Fugue in D minor (BWV 565) is Johann Sebastian Bach's trademark, one of the most powerful organ works ever produced.

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) is an outstanding German composer, virtuoso organist, who created over 1000 works in his life.

All significant genres of that time are represented in the work of Bach, except for opera. Bach is a famous master of polyphony, a follower of ancient traditions, in whose work polyphony reaches its peak.

Today, each of the famous works has been assigned a BWV number (abbreviated from Bach Werke Verzeichnis - catalog of works by Johann Sebastian Bach). Bach wrote music for various instruments, both spiritual and secular. Some of Bach's works are adaptations of works by other composers, and some are reworked versions of his own.

Church organist

In January 1703, after completing his studies, he received the position of court musician from the Weimar Duke Johann Ernst. For seven months of service in Weimar, Bach spread fame as a magnificent performer. Bach was invited to the post of organ superintendent at the Church of St. Boniface in Arnstadt, located 180 km from Weimar.

In August 1703, Bach took over as organist of the church. He had to work three days a week and his salary was relatively high. In addition, the instrument was well maintained and tuned to a new system that expanded the capabilities of the composer and performer. During this period, Bach created many organ works.

In 1706, Bach decides to change his job. He was offered a more lucrative and high position as organist at St. Blasius Church in Mühlhausen, a large city in the north of the country. In 1707, Bach accepted this offer, taking the place of organist Johann Georg Ale. His salary was increased in comparison with the previous one, and the level of singers was better.

Toccata and Fugue in D minor (BWV 565)

Toccata and Fugue in D minor (BWV 565) is a work for organ by Johann Sebastian Bach, one of his most popular compositions.

The work is believed to have been written by Bach during his stay in Arnstadt between 1703 and 1707.

A feature of this small polyphonic cycle is the continuity of the development of the musical material (without a break between toccata and fugue). The form consists of three parts: toccata, fugue and coda. The latter, echoing with the toccata, forms a thematic arch.

Toccata

The toccata begins with a prominent mordent, which is repeated an octave below. Toccata consists of episodes of contrasting tempo and texture, ending in cadences.

Beginning with allegro, the toccata ends at the adagio tempo in the third degree of D minor (F), which adds incompleteness and makes it clear that this is not the final yet.

Fugue

The fugue theme is written in the technique of latent polyphony. Further imitative development of the work is based on melodic figurations. The interlude and middle section deviate into a parallel key in F major. The reprise returning the fugue to D minor begins with a stretch.

The coda consists of several "improvisational" contrasting episodes (the development technique is borrowed from toccata). The entire composition ends with a plagal cadence.

Arrangements

There are many transcriptions of toccata and fugue. In particular, for piano, guitar, electric guitar, button accordion, string, jazz orchestra and other performing groups. A cappella arrangements are also known.

Born: March 21, 1685
Place of birth: Eisenach
Country: Germany
Died: July 28, 1750

Johann Sebastian Bach (German Johann Sebastian Bach) - German composer and organist, representative of the Baroque era. One of the greatest composers in the history of music.

During his life, Bach wrote over 1000 works. All significant genres of that time are represented in his work, except for opera; he summarized the achievements of the musical art of the Baroque period. Bach is a master of polyphony. After the death of Bach, his music was not popular, but in the 19th century it was rediscovered. His work had a strong influence on the music of subsequent composers, including in the 20th century. Bach's pedagogical works are still used for their intended purpose.

Johann Sebastian Bach was the sixth child in the family of musician Johann Ambrosius Bach and Elisabeth Lemmerhirt. The Bach family is known for its musicality since the beginning of the 16th century: many of Johann Sebastian's ancestors were professional musicians. Bach's father lived and worked in Eisenach. Johann Ambrosius's work included organizing secular concerts and performing church music.

When Johann Sebastian was 9 years old, his mother died, and a year later his father. The boy was taken by his elder brother Johann Christoph, who served as organist in neighboring Ohrdruf. Johann Sebastian entered the gymnasium, his brother taught him to play the organ and the clavier. Johann Sebastian was very fond of music and did not miss an opportunity to study it or study new works.

While studying at Ohrdruf under the guidance of his brother, Bach got acquainted with the work of contemporary South German composers - Pachelbel, Froberger and others. It is also possible that he became acquainted with the works of composers from Northern Germany and France. Johann Sebastian observed the maintenance of the organ, and may have taken part in it himself.

At the age of 15, Bach moved to Luneburg, where in 1700-1703. studied at the singing school of St. Michael. During his studies, he visited Hamburg, the largest city in Germany, as well as Celle (where French music was held in high esteem) and Lubeck, where he had the opportunity to get acquainted with the work of famous musicians of his time. The first works of Bach for organ and clavier also belong to the same years.

In January 1703, after completing his studies, he received the position of court musician from the Weimar Duke Johann Ernst. During his seven months of service in Weimar, the fame of him as a performer spread. Bach was invited to the post of organ superintendent in the church of St. Boniface in Arnstadt, located 180 km from Weimar. The Bach family had long-standing ties with this oldest German city. In August, Bach took over as organist of the church. He only had to work 3 days a week and his salary was relatively high. In addition, the instrument was well maintained and tuned to a new system that expanded the capabilities of the composer and performer. During this period, Bach created many organ works, including the famous Toccata in D minor.

In 1706 Bach decided to change his job. He was offered a more profitable and high position as organist in the church of St. Blasius in Mühlhausen, a large city in the north of the country. On October 17, 1707, Johann Sebastian married his cousin Maria Barbara from Arnstadt. In this marriage, seven children were born, three of whom died in childhood. Two of the survivors - Wilhelm Friedemann and Karl Philipp Emanuel - became famous composers.

The city and church authorities of Mühlhausen were pleased with the new employee. They without hesitation approved his plan for the restoration of the church organ, which required large expenses, and for the publication of the festive cantata "The Lord is my Tsar" (this was the only cantata printed during Bach's lifetime), written for the inauguration of the new consul, he was given a large reward.

After working in Mühlhausen for about a year, Bach changed jobs again, this time getting a job as court organist and concert organizer in Weimar. Probably the factors that forced him to change jobs were his high salary and a well-chosen cast of professional musicians.

In Weimar began a long period of composing clavier and orchestral works, in which Bach's talent flourished. During this period, Bach absorbs musical influences from other countries. The works of the Italians Vivaldi and Corelli taught Bach to write dramatic introductions, from which Bach learned the art of using dynamic rhythms and decisive harmonic schemes. Bach studied the works of Italian composers well, creating transcriptions of Vivaldi's concertos for organ or harpsichord.

In Weimar, Bach had the opportunity to play and compose organ works, as well as use the services of the ducal orchestra. In Weimar, Bach wrote most of his fugues (the largest and most famous collection of Bach's fugues is The Well-Tempered Clavier). While serving in Weimar, Bach began work on the "Organ Notebook", a collection of pieces for the teaching of Wilhelm Friedemann. This collection consists of adaptations of Lutheran chorales.

By the end of his service in Weimar, Bach was already a well-known organist and master of the harpsichord. After a while, Bach again went in search of a more suitable job. The Duke of Anhalt-Köthensky hired Bach as Kapellmeister. The Duke, being a musician himself, appreciated Bach's talent, paid him well and gave him a lot of freedom of action. However, the duke was a Calvinist and did not welcome the use of sophisticated music in worship, so most of Bach's Köthen works were secular. Among others, at Köthen, Bach composed orchestral suites, six solo cello suites, English and French clavier suites, as well as three sonatas and three partitas for solo violin. During the same period, the famous Brandenburg Concerts were written.

On July 7, 1720, while Bach was abroad with the Duke, tragedy struck - his wife Maria Barbara suddenly died, leaving four young children. The following year, Bach met Anna Magdalena Wilke, a gifted young singer (soprano) who sang at the ducal court. They were married on December 3, 1721. Despite the age difference (she was 17 years younger than Johann Sebastian), their marriage, apparently, was happy. They had 13 children.

In 1723, the performance of his "Passion according to John" took place in the church of St. Thomas in Leipzig, and on June 1, Bach was appointed cantor of this church, while simultaneously serving as a school teacher at the church, replacing Johann Kuhnau in this post. Bach's duties included teaching singing and giving weekly concerts in Leipzig's two main churches, St. Thomas and St. Nicholas.

The first six years of his life in Leipzig turned out to be very productive: Bach composed up to 5 annual cycles of cantatas. Most of these works are written in the Gospel texts, which were read in the Lutheran church every Sunday and on holidays throughout the year; many (such as "Wachet auf! Ruft uns die Stimme" and "Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland") are based on traditional church chants.

Writing cantatas for most of the 1720s, Bach amassed an extensive repertoire for performances in the main churches of Leipzig. Over time, he wanted to compose and perform more secular music. In March 1729, Johann Sebastian became the head of the Collegium Musicum, a secular ensemble that had existed since 1701, when it was founded by Bach's old friend Georg Philipp Telemann. At that time, in many large German cities, gifted and active university students created similar ensembles. Such associations played an increasing role in public musical life, they were often headed by well-known professional musicians. For most of the year, the Collegium of Music held two-hour concerts twice a week at Zimmermann's coffee shop, located near the market square. The owner of the coffee house provided the musicians with a large hall and purchased several instruments. Many of Bach's secular works, dating from the 1730s, 40s and 50s, were composed specifically to be performed at Zimmermann's coffee shop. Such works include, for example, "Coffee Cantata" and a collection of claviers, as well as many concerts for cello and harpsichord.

In the same period, Bach wrote the Kyrie and Gloria parts of the famous Mass in B minor, later adding the rest of the parts, the melodies of which were almost entirely borrowed from the composer's best cantatas. Although the entire mass was never performed during the composer's lifetime, today it is considered by many to be one of the finest choral works of all time.

In 1747 Bach visited the court of the Prussian king Frederick II, where the king offered him a musical theme and asked him to compose something on it. Bach was a master of improvisation and immediately performed a three-part fugue. Later, Johann Sebastian composed a whole cycle of variations on this theme and sent it as a gift to the king. The cycle consisted of richercars, canons and trios based on a theme dictated by Frederick. This cycle was called "The Musical Offering".

Another major cycle, The Art of the Fugue, was not completed by Bach. During his lifetime, he was never published. The cycle consists of 18 complex fugues and canons based on one simple theme. In this cycle, Bach used all the instruments and techniques for writing polyphonic pieces.

Bach's last work was a choral prelude for organ, which he dictated to his son-in-law, practically on his deathbed. The title of the prelude is "Vor deinen Thron tret ich hiermit" ("Here I appear before Your throne"), this piece often ends the performance of the unfinished Art of the Fugue.

Over time, Bach's eyesight became worse and worse. Nevertheless, he continued to compose music, dictating it to his son-in-law Altnikkol. In 1750 Bach underwent two operations, but both were unsuccessful. Bach remained blind. On July 18, he unexpectedly briefly regained his sight, but in the evening he had a blow. Bach died on July 28, possibly due to complications after surgery.

The composer was buried near the church of St. Thomas, where he served for 27 years. However, soon the grave was lost, and only in 1894 the remains of Bach were accidentally found during construction work, and then the reburial took place.

Bach has written over 1000 pieces of music. Today, each of the famous works has been assigned a BWV number (short for Bach Werke Verzeichnis - catalog of Bach's works). Bach wrote music for various instruments, both spiritual and secular.
During his lifetime, Bach was best known as a first-class organist, teacher and composer of organ music. He worked both in the traditional "free" genres of that time, such as prelude, fantasy, toccata, and in more strict forms - chorale prelude and fugue. In his works for organ, Bach skillfully combined features of various musical styles with which he became acquainted during his life. The composer was influenced by both the music of North German composers (Georg Boehm, Dietrich Buxtehude) and the music of southern composers. Bach rewrote for himself the works of many French and Italian composers in order to understand their musical language, and later he even transposed several Vivaldi violin concertos for organ. During the most fruitful period for organ music (1708-1714), Johann Sebastian not only wrote many pairs of preludes and fugues and toccatas and fugues, but also composed the unfinished Book of Organ, a collection of 46 short choral preludes, in which various techniques and approaches to composing works on choral themes. After leaving Weimar, Bach began to write less for organ, however, after Weimar many famous works were written (6 trio sonatas, 18 Leipzig chorales). Throughout his life, Bach not only composed music for the organ, but also consulted on the construction of instruments, testing and tuning new organs.

Bach also wrote a number of works for the harpsichord. Many of these creations are encyclopedic collections that demonstrate various techniques and methods of composing polyphonic works. Most of Bach's clavier works, published during his lifetime, were contained in collections entitled "Clavier Exercises".
The Well-Tempered Clavier in two volumes, written in 1722 and 1744, is a collection, each volume of which contains 24 preludes and fugues, one for each common key. This cycle was very important in connection with the transition to the systems of tuning instruments, which make it equally easy to perform music in any key - first of all, to the modern equal temperament scale.
15 two-part and 15 three-part inventions are small works arranged in ascending order of the number of characters in the key. They were intended (and are used to this day) for learning to play keyboards.
Three collections of suites: "English Suites", "French Suites" and "Partitas for Clavier."
"Goldberg Variations" is a melody with 30 variations. The cycle has a rather complex and unusual structure. Variations are based on the tonal plan of the theme rather than the melody itself.
Various pieces like "French Style Overture", "Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue", "Italian Concerto".

Bach wrote music for both individual instruments and ensembles. His works for solo instruments - 6 sonatas and partitas for solo violin, 6 suites for cello, partita for solo flute - are considered by many to be among the composer's most profound creations. In addition, Bach composed several pieces for solo lute. He also wrote trio sonatas, sonatas for solo flute and viola da gamba, accompanied only by the bass general, as well as a large number of canons and richercars, mostly without specifying the instruments for performance. The most significant examples of such works are the cycles "The Art of the Fugue" and "The Musical Offering".

The most famous works of Bach for orchestra are "Brandenburg Concertos". Six concerts are written in the genre of concert grosso. Other extant works of Bach for orchestra include two violin concertos, a concerto for 2 violins in D minor, concertos for one, two, three and even four harpsichords.

For a long period of his life, every Sunday Bach in the church of St. Thomas directed the performance of the cantata, the theme of which was chosen according to the Lutheran church calendar. Although Bach performed cantatas by other composers, in Leipzig he composed at least three complete annual cycles of cantatas, one for every Sunday of the year and every church holiday. In addition, he composed a number of cantatas in Weimar and Mühlhausen. In total, Bach wrote more than 300 cantatas on spiritual themes, of which only about 195 have survived to this day. Bach's cantatas vary greatly in form and instrumentation. Some of them are written for one voice, some for choir; some require a large orchestra to play, and some require only a few instruments. The most famous of Bach's spiritual cantatas are Christ lag in Todesbanden, Ein feste Burg, Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme and Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben. In addition, Bach also composed a number of secular cantatas, usually timed to coincide with some events, for example, for a wedding. Among the most famous secular cantatas of Bach are two "Wedding Cantatas" and a comic "Coffee Cantata".

Passion for John (1724) and Passion for Matthew (c. 1727) - works for choir and orchestra on the gospel theme of the suffering of Christ, intended to be performed at Vespers on Good Friday in the churches of St. Thomas and St. Nicholas. Passions are one of the most ambitious vocal works of Bach. It is known that Bach wrote 4 or 5 passions, but only these two have fully survived to this day.

The most famous is the "Christmas Oratorio" (1734) - a cycle of 6 cantatas to be performed during the Christmas period of the liturgical year. The Easter Oratorio (1734–1736) and the Magnificat are rather extensive and elaborate cantatas and are smaller in scope than the Christmas Oratorio or Passions. The Magnificat exists in two versions: the original (E-flat major, 1723) and the later and famous (D major, 1730).

The most famous and significant Mass of Bach is the Mass in B minor (completed in 1749), which is a complete cycle of the Ordinary. This Mass, like many other works by the composer, includes revised early works. The Mass was never performed in its entirety during Bach's lifetime - for the first time this happened only in the 19th century. In addition, this music was not performed as intended due to the duration of the sound (about 2 hours). In addition to the Mass in B minor, we have survived 4 short two-part masses by Bach, as well as separate parts like "Sanctus" and "Kyrie".

The rest of Bach's vocal works include several motets, about 180 chorales, songs and arias.

Bach's music is one of the best creations of mankind recorded on Voyager's golden disc.

Johann Sebastian Bach is a German composer and musician of the Baroque era, who collected and combined in his work the traditions and the most significant achievements of European musical art, and also enriched all this with the virtuoso use of counterpoint and a subtle sense of perfect harmony. Bach is the greatest classic who left a huge legacy that has become the golden foundation of world culture. He is a versatile musician who has embraced almost all known genres in his work. Creating immortal masterpieces, he transformed each beat of his compositions into small pieces, then combining them into priceless creations of exceptional beauty and expressiveness, perfect in form, which vividly reflected the diverse spiritual world of man.

A short biography of Johann Sebastian Bach and many interesting facts about the composer can be found on our page.

Bach biography

Johann Sebastian Bach was born in the German town of Eisenach in the fifth generation of a family of musicians on March 21, 1685. It should be noted that musical dynasties were quite widespread at that time in Germany, and talented parents sought to develop the corresponding talents in their children. The boy's father, Johann Ambrosius, was an organist in the Eisenach church and a court accompanist. It is obvious that he was the one who gave the first lessons in the game on violin and harpsichord little son.

From the biography of Bach, we learn that at the age of 10 the boy lost his parents, but did not remain homeless, because he was the eighth and youngest child in the family. The little orphan was taken care of by the respected organist of Ohrdruf, Johann Christoph Bach, Johann Sebastian's older brother. Among his other students, Johann Christoph taught his brother to play the clavier, but the strict teacher hid the manuscripts of modern composers securely under lock and key, so as not to spoil the taste of the young performers. However, the castle did not prevent little Bach from getting acquainted with forbidden works.

Luneburg

At the age of 15, Bach entered the prestigious Lüneburg School of Church Singers, which was located at the church of St. Michael, and at the same time, thanks to his beautiful voice, young Bach was able to earn some money in the church choir. In addition, in Luneburg, the young man met Georg Boehm, a famous organist, communication with whom influenced the early work of the composer. He also traveled to Hamburg several times to listen to the play of the largest representative of the German organ school A. Reinken. Bach's first works for clavier and organ belong to the same period. After successfully graduating from school, Johann Sebastian receives the right to enter the university, but due to a lack of funds, he did not have the opportunity to continue his education.

Weimar and Arnstadt

Johann began his career in Weimar, where he was admitted to the court chapel of Duke Johann Ernst of Saxony as a violinist. However, this did not last long, since such work did not satisfy the creative impulses of the young musician. Bach in 1703, without hesitation, agrees to move to the city of Arnstadt, where in the church of St. Boniface was initially offered the post of organ superintendent, and then the post of organist. A decent salary, work only three days a week, a good modernized instrument tuned according to the latest system, all this created conditions for expanding the creative possibilities of the musician not only as a performer, but also as a composer.

During this period he created a large number of organ works, as well as capriccios, cantatas and suites. Here Johann becomes a real organ expert and a brilliant virtuoso, whose playing caused unrestrained delight among the audience. It was in Arnstadt that his gift of improvisation was revealed, which the church leadership did not like very much. Bach always strived for excellence and never missed the opportunity to meet famous musicians, for example, organist Dietrich Buxtehude, who served in Lübeck. Having received a four-week vacation, Bach went to listen to the great musician, whose playing so impressed Johann that, forgetting about his duties, he stayed in Lubeck for four months. Upon his return to Arndstadt, the indignant leadership arranged a humiliating trial for Bach, after which he had to leave the city and look for a new job.

Mühlhausen

The next city on the path of Bach's life was Mühlhausen. Here in 1706 he won the competition for the place of organist in the church of St. Blasia. He was received with a good salary, but also with a certain condition: the musical accompaniment of the chorales should be strict, without any kind of "decoration". The city authorities further respected the new organist: they approved the plan for the reconstruction of the church organ, and also paid a good reward for the festive cantata “The Lord is my King” composed by Bach, which was dedicated to the inauguration ceremony of the new consul. Staying in Mühlhausen in the life of Bach was marked by a happy event: he married his beloved cousin Maria Barbara, who later gave him seven children.

Weimar

In 1708 Duke Ernst of Saxe-Weimar heard the magnificent performance of the Mühlhausen organist. Impressed by what he had heard, the noble nobleman immediately offered Bach the posts of court musician and city organist with a salary much higher than the previous one. Johann Sebastian began the Weimar period, which is characterized as one of the most fruitful in the composer's creative life. At this time, he created a large number of compositions for clavier and organ, including a collection of choral preludes, Passacaglia in c-moll, the famous Toccata and fugue in d-moll "," Fantasy and Fugue in C-dur "and many other great works. It should also be noted that the composition of more than two dozen spiritual cantatas belongs to this period. Such efficiency in the composing work of Bach was associated with his appointment in 1714 as vice-conductor, whose duties included regular monthly updating of church music.

At the same time, Johann Sebastian's contemporaries were more fascinated by his performing arts, and he constantly heard replicas of admiration for his performance. The fame of Bach as a virtuoso musician quickly spread not only across Weimar, but also beyond its borders. Once the Dresden Royal Kapellmeister invited him to face off against the famous French musician L. Marchand. However, the musical competition did not work out, since the Frenchman, having heard Bach play at the preliminary audition, secretly left Dresden without warning. In 1717, the Weimar period in Bach's life came to an end. Johann Sebastian dreamed of getting the position of Kapellmeister, but when this place was vacated, the Duke offered him to another, very young and inexperienced musician. Bach, considering this an insult, asked for his immediate resignation, and for this he was arrested for four weeks.

Köthen

According to the biography of Bach, in 1717 he left Weimar to find a job in Köthen as a court bandmaster with Prince Anhalt of Köthen. In Köthen, Bach was to write worldly music, because, as a result of reforms, no music was performed in the church, except for the singing of psalms. Here Bach occupied an exceptional position: as a court conductor he was well paid, the prince treated him like a friend, and the composer repaid for this with excellent compositions. In Köthen, the musician had many students, and for their training he compiled “ Well-Tempered Clavier". These are 48 preludes and fugues that made Bach famous as a master of clavier music. When the prince got married, the young princess showed dislike for both Bach and his music. Johann Sebastian had to look for another job.

Leipzig

In Leipzig, where Bach moved in 1723, he reached the top of his career ladder: he was appointed cantor in the church of St. Thomas and Music Director of all churches in the city. Bach was involved in teaching and training performers of church choirs, selecting music, organizing and conducting concerts in the main temples of the city. Heading the Collegium of Music since 1729, Bach began to arrange 8 two-hour concerts of secular music a month in a certain Zimmermann's coffee shop, adapted for the performances of the orchestra. After being appointed court composer, Bach handed over the leadership of the Collegium of Music to his former student Karl Gerlach in 1737. In recent years, Bach has often reworked his early works. In 1749 he completed the High Mass in B minor, some parts of which were written by him 25 years ago. The composer died in 1750 while working on The Art of the Fugue.

Interesting facts about Bach

• Bach was an acknowledged organ specialist. He was invited to check and tune instruments in various temples in Weimar, where he lived for quite some time. Every time he amazed clients with amazing improvisations that he played to hear how the instrument in need of his work sounds.
• Johann was bored during the service to perform monotonous chorales, and he, not holding back his creative impulse, impromptuly inserted his small decorating variations into the established church music, which caused great dissatisfaction with his superiors.
• Better known for his religious writings, Bach also excelled in composing secular music, as evidenced by his Coffee Cantata. Bach presented this humorous piece as a small comic opera. Originally titled Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht (Shut up, stop chatting), it describes the lyrical hero's addiction to coffee, and it is no coincidence that this cantata was first performed at the Leipzig Coffee House.
• At the age of 18, Bach really wanted to get a job as organist in Lübeck, which at that time belonged to the famous Dietrich Buxtehude. Another contender for this place was G. Handel... The main condition for occupying this position was marriage to one of Buxtehude's daughters, but neither Bach nor Handel dared to sacrifice themselves in this way.
• Johann Sebastian Bach was very fond of dressing up as a poor teacher and, in this form, visiting small churches, where he asked the local organist to play a little on the organ. Some parishioners, hearing an unusually beautiful performance for them, left the service in fear, thinking that the devil himself appeared in their church in the form of a strange man.

• The Russian envoy to Saxony, Hermann von Keyserling, asked Bach to write a piece to which he could quickly fall asleep in a sound sleep. This is how the Goldberg Variations appeared, for which the composer received a golden cube filled with a hundred louis. These variations are still one of the best "sleeping pills".
• Johann Sebastian was known to his contemporaries not only as an outstanding composer and virtuoso performer, but also as a person with a very difficult character, intolerant of the mistakes of others. There is a known case when the bassoonist, publicly insulted by Bach for his imperfect performance, attacked Johann. A real duel took place, since both were armed with daggers.
• Bach, who was fond of numerology, liked to weave the numbers 14 and 41 into his musical works, because the first letters of the composer's name corresponded to these numbers. By the way, Bach also liked to play up his surname in his compositions: the notation of the word “Bach” forms a cross pattern. It is this symbol that is most important for Bach, who considers it not accidental similar coincidences.

• Thanks to Johann Sebastian Bach, it is not only men who sing in church choirs today. The first woman to sing in the church was the composer's wife Anna Magdalena, who has a beautiful voice.
• In the middle of the 19th century, German musicologists founded the first Bach Society, whose main task was to publish the composer's works. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the society dissolved itself and the entire collection of Bach's works was published only in the second half of the twentieth century on the initiative of the Bach Institute, created in 1950. In the world today there are a total of two hundred and twenty-two Bach Societies, Bach Orchestras and Bach Choirs.
• Researchers of Bach's work suggest that the great maestro composed 11,200 works, although the legacy known to descendants includes only 1,200 compositions.
• Today there are more than fifty-three thousand books and various publications about Bach in different languages, about seven thousand full biographies of the composer have been published.
• In 1950, W. Schmieder compiled a numbered catalog of Bach's works (BWV - Bach Werke Verzeichnis). This catalog was updated several times as the data on the authorship of certain works was clarified and, in contrast to the traditional chronological principles of classifying the works of other famous composers, this catalog is structured according to the thematic principle. Works with similar numbers belong to the same genre, and were not at all written in the same years.
• Bach's works: "Brandenburg Concerto No. 2", "Gavotte in the form of a rondo" and "HTK" were recorded on the Golden Record and in 1977 launched from Earth attached to the Voyager spacecraft.

• Everyone knows that Beethoven suffered from hearing loss, but few people know that Bach went blind in his declining years. Actually, the unsuccessful eye surgery performed by the charlatan surgeon John Taylor caused the composer's death in 1750.
• Johann Sebastian Bach was buried near the Church of St. Thomas. After some time, a road was laid through the territory of the cemetery and the grave was lost. At the end of the 19th century, during the reconstruction of the church, the remains of the composer were found and reburied. After World War II in 1949, Bach's relics were moved to the church building. However, due to the fact that the grave changed its place several times, skeptics question whether the ashes of Johann Sebastian are in the burial.
• To date, 150 postage stamps dedicated to Johann Sebastian Bach have been issued all over the world, 90 of them were published in Germany.
• Johann Sebastian Bach, a great musical genius, is treated with great reverence all over the world, monuments to him have been erected in many countries, only in Germany there are 12 monuments. One of them is located in the town of Dornheim near Arnstadt and is dedicated to the wedding of Johann Sebastian and Maria Barbara.

Family of Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian belonged to the largest German musical dynasty, whose pedigree is usually counted from Feith Bach, a simple baker, but very fond of music and perfectly performing folk melodies on his favorite instrument - zither. This passion from the founder of the genus was passed on to his descendants, many of them became professional musicians: composers, cantors, bandmasters, as well as a variety of instrumentalists. They settled not only in Germany, some even went abroad. Over the course of two hundred years, there were so many Bach musicians that any person whose occupation was associated with music began to be called by their name. The most famous ancestors of Johann Sebastian, whose works have come down to us, were: Johannes, Heinrich, Johann Christoph, Johann Bernhard, Johann Michael and Johann Nikolaus. Johann Sebastian's father, Johann Ambrosius Bach, was also a musician and served as organist in Eisenach, in the city where Bach was born.

Johann Sebastian himself was the father of a large family: from two wives he had twenty children. The first time he married his beloved cousin Maria Barbara, the daughter of Johann Michael Bach, in 1707. Maria gave birth to Johann Sebastian seven children, three of them died in infancy. Maria herself did not live a long life either, she died at the age of 36, leaving Bach with four young children. Bach was very upset about the loss of his wife, but a year later he again fell in love with the young girl Anna Magdalena Wilken, whom he met at the court of the Duke of Anhalt-Ketensky and proposed to her. Despite the big difference in age, the girl agreed and it is obvious that this marriage was very successful, since Anna Magdalena gave Bach thirteen children. The girl did an excellent job with the household, was caring for the children, was sincerely happy with her husband's successes and provided great help in her work, rewriting his scores. The family was a great joy for Bach, he devoted a lot of time to raising children, playing music with them and composing special exercises. In the evenings, the family very often put on impromptu concerts that made everyone happy. Bach's children by nature had excellent data, but four of them had exceptional musical talent - these are Johann Christoph Friedrich, Karl Philipp Emanuel, Wilhelm Friedemann and Johann Christian. They, too, became composers and left their mark on the history of music, but none of them could surpass their father either in writing or in the art of performance.

The work of Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach was one of the most prolific composers, his legacy in the treasury of world musical culture includes about 1200 immortal masterpieces. There was only one inspiration in Bach's work - the Creator. Johann Sebastian dedicated almost all his works to him and at the end of scores he always signed letters that were an abbreviation for the words: "In the name of Jesus", "Jesus help", "Glory to God alone." To create for God was the main goal in the life of the composer, and therefore his musical works absorbed all the wisdom of the "Holy Scripture". Bach was very faithful to his religious outlook and never betrayed him. According to the composer's reasoning, even the smallest instrumental piece should indicate the wisdom of the Creator.

Johann Sebastian Bach wrote his works in virtually all, except for opera, musical genres known at that time. The compiled catalog of his works includes: 247 works for organ, 526 vocal works, 271 works for harpsichord, 19 solo works for various instruments, 31 concertos and suites for orchestra, 24 duets for harpsichord with any other instrument, 7 canons and others works.

Musicians all over the world perform Bach's music and begin to get acquainted with many of his works from childhood. For example, every little pianist studying at a music school must have in his repertoire pieces from « Music book by Anna Magdalena Bach » ... Then little preludes and fugues are studied, then there are inventions, and ultimately « Well-Tempered Clavier » , but this is already a high school.

The famous works of Johann Sebastian also include “ Passion for Matthew"," Mass in B Minor "," Christmas Oratorio "," St. John Passion "and, undoubtedly," Toccata and Fugue in D minor". And the cantata "The Lord is my King" and at the present time sounds at festive services in churches in different parts of the world.

Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565 is a work for organ by Johann Sebastian Bach, one of his most popular compositions.

Toccata and Fugue in D minor BWV 565 is included in all editions of the authoritative BWV catalog and in the (most complete) new edition of Bach's works (Neue Bach-Ausgabe, known as the NBA).

The work is believed to have been written by Bach during his stay in Arnstadt between 1703 and 1707. In January 1703, after completing his studies, he received the position of court musician from the Weimar Duke Johann Ernst. It is not known exactly what his responsibilities were, but most likely this position was not related to performing activities. During his seven months of service in Weimar, the fame of him as a performer spread. Bach was invited to the post of organ superintendent at the Church of St. Boniface in Arnstadt, located 180 km from Weimar. The Bach family had long-standing ties with this oldest German city.

In August, Bach took over as organist of the church. He had to work three days a week and his salary was relatively high. In addition, the instrument was well maintained and tuned to a new system that expanded the capabilities of the composer and performer. During this period, Bach created many organ works.

A feature of this small polyphonic cycle is the continuity of the development of the musical material (without a break between toccata and fugue). The form consists of three parts: toccata, fugue and coda. The latter, echoing with the toccata, forms a thematic arch.

The title page of BWV 565 in handwritten copy by Johannes Ringk. Due to the fact that Bach's autograph was lost, this copy, as of 2012, is the only source close to the time of creation.

Toccata (in Italian toccata - touch, blow, from toccare - touch, touch) is a virtuoso piece of music for keyboard instruments (clavier, organ).

The beginning of the toccata

Fugue (Italian fuga - running, flight, fast flow) is the most developed form of polyphonic music, which has absorbed all the richness of polyphonic means. The content range of the fugue is practically unlimited, however, the intellectual principle predominates or is always felt in it. Fugu is distinguished by emotional fullness and at the same time restraint of expression.

This piece begins with a disturbing but courageous strong-willed cry. It is heard three times, descending from one octave to another, and leads to a thunderous chord rumble in the lower register. Thus, at the beginning of the toccata, a gloomy shaded, grandiose sound space is outlined.

Johann Sebastian Bach "s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor BWV 565 played by organist Hans-André Stamm on the Trost-Organ of the Stadtkirche in Waltershausen, Germany.

Further powerful "swirling" virtuoso passages are heard. The juxtaposition of rapid and slow movement is reminiscent of watchful respites between fights with violent elements. And after the freely, improvisationally constructed toccata, a fugue sounds, in which the volitional principle seems to curb the elemental forces. And the last bars of the entire work are perceived as a stern and dignified victory of the unshakable human will.

All about Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach (March 31, 1685 - July 28, 1750) - German composer and musician of the Baroque era. He made significant contributions to the development of significant genres of German classical music through his mastery of counterpoint, harmonic and motive organization, and adaptation of foreign rhythms, forms and structures, in particular from Italy and France. Bach's musical works include Brandenburg Concertos, Goldberg Variations, Mass in B minor, two Passions and more than three hundred cantatas, of which about two hundred have survived. His music is renowned for its technical excellence, artistic beauty and intellectual depth.

Bach's abilities as an organist were highly regarded during his lifetime, but as a great composer he was not widely recognized until the first half of the 19th century, when interest in his music and its performance was revived. He is now considered one of the greatest composers of all time.

Bach biography

Bach was born in Eisenach, in the Duchy of Saxe-Eisenach, into a large family of musicians. His father, Johann Ambrosius Bach, was the leader of the city orchestra, and all of his uncles were professional musicians. His father probably taught him to play the violin and harpsichord, and his brother, Johann Christoph Bach, taught him to play the clavichord and introduced him to the work of many contemporary composers. Apparently, on his own initiative, Bach entered the St. Michael's School in Lüneburg, where he studied for two years. After graduation, he held a number of musical positions throughout Germany: he served as conductor (music director) for Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen, and thomascanter in Leipzig, music director in famous Lutheran churches and teacher at St. Thomas's school. In 1736 August III awarded him the title of "court composer". In 1749, Bach's health and eyesight deteriorated. He died on July 28, 1750.

Bach's childhood

Johann Sebastian Bach was born in Eisenach, the capital of the Duchy of Saxe-Eisenach, located in what is now Germany, on March 21, 1685, Art. style (March 31, 1685 AD). He was the son of Johann Abrosius Bach, leader of the city orchestra, and Elisabeth Lemmerhirt. In the family of Johann Abrosius, he was the eighth and youngest child, and his father probably taught him to play the violin and the basics of music theory. All his uncles were professional musicians, among them were church organists, court chamber musicians and composers. One of them, Johann Christoph Bach (1645-93), introduced Johann Sebastian to the organ, and his older cousin, Johann Ludwig Bach (1677-1731), was a famous composer and violinist.

Bach's mother died in 1694, and his father died eight months later. Bach, 10, moved in with his older brother, Johann Christoph Bach (1671-1721), who served as organist at St. Michael's Church in Ohrdruf, Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg. There he studied, played and rewrote music, including the pen of his own brother, although it was forbidden to do so, since the scores at that time were very personal and of great value, and clean office paper of a suitable type was expensive. He received valuable knowledge from his brother, who taught him to play the clavichord. Johann Christoph Bach introduced him to the works of great composers of his time, including South German ones, such as Johann Pachelbel (under whose guidance Johann Christoph studied) and Johann Jacob Froberger; North German composers; French people such as Jean-Baptiste Lully, Louis Marchand and Maren Mare; as well as the Italian pianist Girolamo Frescobaldi. At the same time, at the local gymnasium, he studied theology, Latin, Greek, French and Italian.

On April 3, 1700, Bach and his school friend Georg Erdmann, who was two years older, entered the prestigious St. Michael's School in Lüneburg, which was two weeks away from Ohrdruf. They probably covered most of this distance on foot. Bach's two years at this school played a vital role in shaping his interest in various branches of European culture. In addition to singing in the choir, he played the School's three-manual organ and harpsichords. He began to associate with the sons of aristocrats from northern Germany, who were sent to this highly demanding school to prepare for careers in other disciplines.

While in Lüneburg, Bach had access to the Church of St. John and may have used the famous organ of the church from 1553, as it was played by his organ teacher Georg Boehm. Due to his musical talent, Bach closely associated with Boehm while studying in Lüneburg, and also traveled to nearby Hamburg, where he attended performances by the "great North German organist Johann Adam Reinken". Stauffer reports on the organ tablatures discovered in 2005, which Bach wrote out to the works of Reinken and Buxtehude as a teenager, - they traced "a disciplined, methodical, well-trained teenager, deeply committed to the study of his art."

Bach's service as organist

In January 1703, shortly after graduating from St. Michael's School and refusing to be appointed organist at Sangerhausen, Bach entered the service as court musician at the chapel of Duke Johann Ernst III in Weimar. It is not known exactly what his duties were there, but they were probably rough and had nothing to do with music. During his seven months in Weimar, Bach became so famous as a keyboard player that he was invited to inspect the new organ and perform an introductory concert at the New Church (now the Bach Church) in Arnstadt, located about 30 km (19 mi) southwest of Weimar. In August 1703, he took up the position of organist at the New Church, with simple duties, a relatively generous salary, and a splendid new organ whose temperament settings allowed him to play music written over a wider keyboard range.

Despite influential family ties and a passionate employer, tensions arose in the service between Bach and the authorities a few years later. Bach was dissatisfied with the level of training of singers in the choir, and his employer did not approve of his unauthorized absence from Arnstadt - in 1705-06, when Bach left for several months to visit the great organist and composer Dietrich Buxtehude and attend his evening concerts in the church St. Mary in the northern city of Lubeck. In order to visit Buxtehude, it was required to cover a distance of 450 kilometers (280 miles) - according to the available evidence, Bach made this journey on foot.

In 1706, Bach applied for the position of organist at the Church of Blasius (also known as the Church of St. Blasii, or as Divi Blasii) in Mühlhausen. As a demonstration of his skills, he performed a cantata for Easter, April 24, 1707 - this was probably an early version of his composition "Christ lag in Todes Banden" ("Christ lay in the chains of death"). A month later, Bach's application was accepted, and in July he took the desired position. The salary in this service was significantly higher, the conditions and the choir were better. Four months after arriving in Mühlhausen, Bach married Maria Barbara Bach, his second cousin. Bach managed to convince the church and city authorities of Mühlhausen to finance the costly restoration of the organ in the Church of Blasius. In 1708, Bach wrote "Gott ist mein König" ("The Lord is my King") - a festive cantata for the inauguration of the new consul, the costs of publication of which were paid by the consul himself.

The beginning of Bach's work

In 1708, Bach left Mühlhausen and returned to Weimar, this time as organist, and from 1714 as court accompanist (music director), where he had the opportunity to work with a large, well-funded cast of professional musicians. Bach and his wife moved to a house near the ducal palace. Later that year, their first daughter, Katarina Dorothea, was born; the unmarried elder sister of Maria Barbara also moved in with them. She helped the Bach family with the housework and lived with them until her death in 1729. In Weimar, Bach also had three sons: Wilhelm Friedemann, Karl Philipp Emanuel and Johann Gottfried Bernhard. Johann Sebastian and Maria Barbara had three more children, but none of them survived a year, including the twins born in 1713.

Bach's life in Weimar marked the beginning of a long period of composing clavier and orchestral works. He honed his skills and gained the confidence that allowed him to expand the boundaries of traditional musical structures to include foreign musical influences. He learned how to write dramatic introductions, using the dynamic rhythms and harmonic schemes inherent in the music of Italians such as Vivaldi, Corelli and Torelli. These stylistic aspects were partly drawn by Bach during his transcriptions of Vivaldi's strings and wind concertos for harpsichord and organ; many of these works in his adaptation are regularly performed to this day. In particular, Bach was attracted by the Italian style, in which solo parts on one or more instruments alternated with the playing of a full orchestra throughout the entire movement.

In Weimar, Bach continued to play and compose for organ, and also performed concert music with the Duke's ensemble. In addition, he began to write preludes and fugues, which later entered the monumental cycle entitled The Well-Tempered Clavier (Das Wohltemperierte Klavier - Klavier means clavichord or harpsichord). The cycle includes two books, compiled in 1722 and 1744, each of which contains 24 preludes and fugues in all major and minor keys.

In addition, in Weimar, Bach began work on the "Organ Book" containing complex arrangements of traditional Lutheran chorales (melodies of church hymns). In 1713, Bach was offered a post in Halle, where he advised government officials during Christoph Kuntzius's restoration of the main organ in the western gallery of St. Mary's Catholic Church. Johann Kuhnau and Bach played again at its opening in 1716.

In the spring of 1714, Bach was promoted to the position of accompanist, an honor that led to the monthly performance of church cantatas in the court church. Bach's first three cantatas composed in Weimar were: "Himmelskönig, sei willkommen" ("Heavenly King, welcome") (BWV 182), written for Palm Sunday, which coincided that year with the Annunciation, "Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen , Zagen "(" Wailing, lamentation, care and anxiety ") (BWV 12) by the third Sunday after Easter, and" Erschallet, ihr Lieder, erklinget, ihr Saiten! " ("Sing, choirs, shout, strings!") (BWV 172) to Pentecost. Bach's first Christmas cantata Christen, ätzet diesen Tag (Christians, Seize This Day) (BWV 63) was first performed in 1714 or 1715.

In 1717, Bach eventually fell out of favor in Weimar and, according to the translation of the court clerk's report, was in custody for almost a month, and then dismissed out of favor: "On November 6, the former accompanist and organist of Bach was imprisoned by the county judge. for excessive persistence in demands for his dismissal, and further, on December 2, released from arrest with notification of an expression of disfavor. "

Bach family and children

In 1717, Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen, hired Bach to be the bandmaster (musical director). Being a musician himself, Prince Leopold appreciated Bach's talents, paid him a good salary and provided considerable freedom in composing and performing musical works. However, the prince was a Calvinist and did not use sophisticated music in his services. As a consequence, the works written by Bach during this period were mostly secular, including orchestral suites, cello suites, sonatas and scores for solo violin, and the Brandenburg Concertos. Bach also wrote secular court cantatas such as Die Zeit, die Tag und Jahre macht (Time and days are years) (BWV 134a). Stauffer describes an important component of Bach's musical development during the years of his service with the prince as "his complete acceptance of dance music, which had, perhaps, the most important influence on the flourishing of his style, along with the music of Vivaldi, mastered by him in Weimar."

Despite the fact that Bach and Handel were born in the same year, only about 130 kilometers (80 miles) apart, they never met. In 1719, Bach traveled 35 kilometers (22 miles) from Köthen to Halle to meet Handel, but Handel had already left the city by that time. In 1730, Bach's eldest son, Wilhelm Friedemann, traveled to Halle to invite Handel to visit the Bach family in Leipzig, but no visit followed.

On July 7, 1720, when Bach was with Prince Leopold in Carlsbad, Bach's wife suddenly died. A year later he met Anna Magdalena Wilke, a young and highly gifted soprano singer who was sixteen years his junior and sang at court in Köthen; They were married on December 3, 1721. From this marriage thirteen more children were born, six of whom survived to adulthood: Gottfried Heinrich; Elisabeth Juliana Frideric (1726-81), who married Bach's pupil Johann Christoph Altnikol; Johann Christoph Friedrich and Johann Christian - both of them, especially Johann Christian, became outstanding musicians; Johann Caroline (1737-81) and Regina Suzanne (1742-1809).

Bach as a teacher

In 1723, Bach received the post of tomaskantor - cantor at the school of St. Thomas at the Tomaskirche (Church of St. Thomas) in Leipzig, which provided concerts in four churches of the city: Tomaskirche, Nikolaikirche (St. Nicholas Church), to a lesser extent Neue Kirche (New Church) and Peterskirche (St. Peter's Church). It was the "leading cantorate of Protestant Germany" located in a commercial city in the Electorship of Saxony, where he served for twenty-seven years until his death. During this period, he strengthened his authority thanks to the honorary court positions that he held in Köthen and Weissenfels, as well as at the court of Elector Friedrich August (who was also king of Poland) in Dresden. Bach had a lot of disagreements with his actual employers - the city administration of Leipzig, whose members he considered "curmudgeons". For example, despite the offer he received for an appointment as a tomaskantor, Bach, however, was invited to Leipzig only after Telemann stated that he was not interested in moving to Leipzig. Telemann went to Hamburg, where "he had his own conflicts with the city's senate."

Bach's duties included teaching singing to pupils of the St. Thomas School and conducting concerts in the main churches of Leipzig. In addition, Bach was obliged to teach Latin, but he was allowed to hire four "prefects" (assistants) who did this in his place. The prefects also provided assistance in musical literacy. The cantatas were performed during Sunday and holiday services throughout the church year. As a rule, Bach himself directed the performance of his cantatas, most of which he composed during the first three years after moving to Leipzig. The very first was Die Elenden sollen essen (Let the poor eat and be satisfied) (BWV 75), first performed at the Nikolaikirch on May 30, 1723, the first Sunday after Trinity. Bach collected his cantatas in annual cycles. Of the five such cycles mentioned in obituaries, only three have survived. Of the more than three hundred cantatas written by Bach in Leipzig, more than a hundred were lost to subsequent generations. Basically, these concert works are based on the texts of the Gospel, which were read in the Lutheran Church at every Sunday and festive service throughout the year. The second annual cycle, which Bach began to create on the first Sunday after Trinity in 1724, consists exclusively of choral contatas, each of which is based on a specific church hymn. These include "O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort" ("O eternity, thunderous word") (BWV 20), "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" ("Wake up, the voice calls to you") (BWV 140), "Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland "(" Come, Savior of the nations ") (BWV 62), and" Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern "(" Oh, how beautiful the light of the morning star shines ") (BWV 1).

Bach recruited sopranos and altos to the choir from the students of the St. Thomas school, and tenors and basses - not only from there, but also from all over Leipzig. Performing at weddings and funerals provided additional income for his teams - probably especially for this, as well as for learning at school, he wrote at least six motets. As part of his usual church activities, he sang motets by other composers, and these served as models for his own.

Bach's predecessor as cantor, Johann Kuhnau, also directed concerts at the Paulinerkirch, a church at the University of Leipzig. However, when Bach assumed this position in 1723, he was at his disposal to hold concerts only for "solemn" (held on church holidays) services in the Paulinerkirch; his petition for concerts and for ordinary Sunday services in this church (with a corresponding increase in salary) reached the elector himself, but was refused. After that, in 1725, Bach "lost interest" in working even on solemn divine services in the Paulinerkirch and began to appear there only on "special occasions." The organ at Paulinerkirch was much better and newer (1716) than at the Tomaskirche or Nikolaikirch. In 1716, when the organ was built, Bach was asked to give official advice, for which he arrived from Köthen and presented his report. Bach's formal duties did not include playing any organ, but it is believed that he loved to play the organ in the Paulinerkirch "for his own pleasure."

In March 1729, Bach took over as head of the Collegium Musicum, a secular concert ensemble founded by Telemann, and this allowed him to expand his activities as a composer and performer outside church services. The Collegium of Music was one of many closed collectives founded by musically gifted university students in large German-speaking cities; at that time such collectives acquired more and more importance in public musical life; as a rule, they were headed by the most prominent professional musicians of the city. According to Christoph Wolff, the adoption of this manual was an astute move that "strengthened Bach's firm grip on the main musical institutions of Leipzig." Throughout the year, the Leipzig Collegium of Music held regular concerts at venues such as the Zimmermann Café, a coffee shop on Catherine Street near the main market square. Many of Bach's compositions, written in the 1730s and 1740s, were composed for and performed by the Collegium of Music; among them are selected works from the collection "Clavier-Übung" ("Piano Exercises"), as well as many of his violin and keyboard concertos.

In 1733 Bach composed a Mass for the Dresden Court (parts "Kyrie" and "Gloria"), which he later included in his Mass in B minor. He presented the manuscript to the Elector in the hope of persuading the prince to appoint him as court composer, and this attempt was subsequently crowned with success. He later reworked this piece into a full mass, adding parts of "Credo", "Sanctus" and "Agnus Dei", the music for which he based in part on his own cantatas, and in part composed entirely. Bach's appointment as court composer was part of his long struggle to consolidate his authority in disputes with the Leipzig city council. In the years 1737-1739, the former student of Bach, Karl Gotthelf Gerlach, was the head of the Musical College.

In 1747, Bach visited the court of King Frederick II of Prussia in Potsdam. The king played a melody for Bach and suggested that he immediately make amends for the fugue, based on the musical theme he performed. Bach immediately played on one of Friedrich's pianos an improvisation of a three-part fugue, then a new composition, and later presented the king with a "Musical Offering", consisting of fugues, canons and a trio based on the motive proposed by Frederick. His six-part fugue includes the same musical theme, thanks to a number of changes, more suitable for different variations.

In the same year, Bach joined Lorenz Christoph Mitsler's Correspondierende Societät der musikalischen Wissenschafften. On the occasion of his entry into the society, Bach composed the Canonical Variations for the Christmas carol "Vom Himmel hoch da komm" ich her "(" I will descend from heaven to earth ") (BWV 769). while Bach was preparing for the performance, the artist Elias Gottlob Hausmann painted his portrait, which later became famous. The Triple Canon for Six Voices (BWV 1076) was presented along with this portrait as a dedication to the Society. Perhaps other later works of Bach were also related to the Society. based on music theory. Among these works is the cycle "The Art of the Fugue", which consists of 18 complex fugues and canons based on a simple theme. "The Art of the Fugue" was published only posthumously in 1751.

Bach's last significant work was the Mass in B minor (1748-49), which Stauffer describes as “Bach's most comprehensive ecclesiastical work. examine your vocal parts and select individual parts for later revision and improvement. " Although the mass in its entirety was never performed during the composer's lifetime, it is considered one of the greatest choral works of all time.

Bach's illness and death

In 1749, Bach's health began to deteriorate; On June 2, Heinrich von Bruhl wrote a letter to one of the Leipzig burgomasters asking him to appoint his music director, Johann Gottlieb Garrer, to the post of tomaskantor and music director "in connection with the impending ... death of Herr Bach." Bach lost his sight, so the British eye surgeon John Taylor operated on him twice during his stay in Leipzig in March and April 1750.

On July 28, 1750, Bach died at the age of 65. Local newspaper reports cited "the tragic consequences of a very unsuccessful eye surgery" as the cause of death. Spitta gives some details. He writes that Bach died of "apoplectic stroke", that is, from a stroke. Confirming reports in the newspapers, Spitta notes: "The treatment given in connection with the [unsuccessful eye] operation was so bad that his health ... was severely shaken," and Bach was completely blind. His son Karl Philipp Emanuel, in collaboration with his student Johann Friedrich Agricola, compiled an obituary for Bach, which was published in the Mitzler Music Library in 1754.

Bach's estate included five harpsichords, two lute harpsichords, three violins, three violas, two cellos, viola da gamba, lute and spinet, as well as 52 "sacred books", including works by Martin Luther and Joseph. The composer was originally buried in the old cemetery at St. John's Church in Leipzig. Later, the inscription on his tombstone was erased, and the grave was lost for almost 150 years, but in 1894 his remains were discovered and moved to the crypt in the Church of St. John. During the Second World War, this church was destroyed during the Allied bombing, so in 1950 the remains of Bach were transferred to their current burial site in the Church of St. Thomas. In later studies, doubts were expressed about the fact that the remains lying in the grave really belong to Bach.

Bach's musical style

Bach's musical style largely corresponds to the traditions of his time, which was the final stage in the era of the Baroque style. When his contemporaries such as Handel, Telemann and Vivaldi wrote concerts, he did the same. When they composed the suites, he did the same. It is the same with recitatives, followed by da capo arias, four-part chorales, basso continuo, etc. His style features qualities such as mastery of contrapuntal invention and motivational control, as well as his talent for creating tightly woven musical compositions with a powerful sound. From an early age, he was inspired by the works of his contemporaries and previous generations, drew everything possible from the work of European composers, including French and Italian, as well as people from all over Germany, and few of them were not reflected in his own music.

Bach devoted most of his life to sacred music. The hundreds of ecclesiastical works he has created are usually viewed as manifestations of not only his skill, but also a truly reverent attitude towards God. As a tomaskant in Leipzig, he taught a small catechism, and this was reflected in some of his works. Lutheran chants served as the basis for many of his compositions. In processing these hymns for his choral preludes, he created compositions that are more soulful and complete than any other, and this applies even to the heavier and longer works. The large-scale structure of all of Bach's significant ecclesiastical vocal compositions reveals a refined, artful design capable of expressing all the spiritual and musical power. For example, "St. Matthew Passion", like other compositions of this kind, illustrates the Passion, conveying the biblical text in recitatives, arias, choirs and chants; by writing this work, Bach created an all-encompassing experience that is now, many centuries later, recognized as both musically exciting and spiritually deep.

Bach published and compiled a large number of collections from manuscripts that explored the range of artistic and technical possibilities available to virtually all musical genres of his time, with the exception of opera. For example, The Well-Tempered Clavier consists of two books, which include preludes and fugues in all major and minor keys, demonstrating a dizzying variety of structural, contrapuntal and fugal techniques.

Bach's harmonious style

The four-part harmonies were invented before Bach, but he lived at a time when the tonal system largely supplanted the scale music in Western traditions. According to this system, the musical part moves from one chord to another in accordance with certain rules, with each chord being characterized by four notes. The principles of four-part harmony can be found not only in Bach's four-part choral works, but also, for example, in the bass general accompaniment written by him. The new system formed the basis of the entire style of Bach, and his compositions are often considered as fundamental components in the formation of the scheme that prevailed in the musical expression of subsequent centuries. Some examples of this characteristic of Bach's style and its influence:

When Bach staged his arrangement of Pergolesi's "Stabat Mater" in the 1740s, he perfected the alto part (which in the original composition is played in unison with the bass part) as a complement to harmony, thus aligning the composition with his four-part harmonic style.

In the course of discussions that arose in Russia since the 19th century about the authenticity of the presentation of four-part court chants, the presentation of Bach's four-part chorales - for example, the concluding parts of his choral cantatas - compared with earlier Russian traditions served as an example of foreign influence: such influence, however, was considered inevitable.

Bach's decisive intervention in the tonal system and his contribution to its formation does not mean that he worked less freely with the old modal system and related genres: more than his contemporaries (almost all of whom "switched" to the tonal system) Bach often returned to outdated techniques and genres. An example of this is his Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue - this work reproduces the genre of chromatic fantasy, in which such predecessor composers as Dowland and Sweelinck worked, and it is written in the Dorian mode (which corresponds to D minor in the tonal system).

Modulations in Bach's music

Modulation - the change in key over the course of a piece - is another stylistic feature in which Bach transcends the conventional wisdom of his time. Baroque musical instruments greatly limited the possibility of modulation: keyboards, whose temperament system preceded the tunable, had limited registers in modulation, and winds, especially brass, for example, the trumpet and French horn, which existed a hundred years before being equipped with valves, depended on their tuning keys. Bach expanded these possibilities: he added "strange tones" to his organ performance, which confused the singers, according to the accusation he faced in Arnstadt. Louis Marchand, another early modulation experimenter, apparently managed to avoid confrontation with Bach because the latter went further in this endeavor than any of his predecessors. In the Suscepit Israel portion of his Magnificat (1723), the trumpet parts in E flat include a melody in the enharmonic scale in C minor.

Another significant technological breakthrough in Bach's time, in which his participation played an important role, is the improvement of the temperament of keyboards, which made it possible to use them in all keys (12 major and 12 minor), and also made it possible to apply modulation without re-tuning. His "Capriccio for the Departure of a Beloved Brother" is a very early work, but it already shows a widespread use of modulation, incomparable with any of those works of the time with which this composition was compared. But this technique is most fully revealed only in the "Well-Tempered Clavier", where all keys are used. Bach worked on its improvement from about 1720, the first mention of which is found in his "Klavierbüchlein für Wilhelm Friedemann Bach" ("Keyboard book of Wilhelm Friedemann Bach").

Jewelry in Bach's music

The second page of "Wilhelm Friedemann Bach's Keyboard Book" contains a transcript of the decorations and a guide to their execution, written by Bach for his eldest son, who was then nine years old. In general, Bach attached great importance to ornamentation in his works (although at that time decorations were rarely composed by composers, being rather the privilege of the performer), and his decorations were often very detailed. For example, Aria from his Goldberg Variations contains rich ornamentation in almost every measure. Bach's attention to embellishments is also traced in the keyboard arrangement he wrote for Marcello's "Concerto for Oboe": it was he who added notes with those embellishments to this work, which several centuries later played by oboists in his performance.

Despite the fact that Bach did not write a single opera, he was not an opponent of the genre, as well as his vocal style with the use of decorations. In church music, Italian composers imitated the operatic vocal style of genres such as the Neapolitan Mass. Protestant society was more restrained in the idea of ​​using a similar style in liturgical music. For example, Kuhnau, Bach's predecessor in Leipzig, is known to have expressed negative opinions about the opera and vocal compositions of Italian virtuosos in his recordings. Bach was less categorical; according to one of the reviews for a performance of his St. Matthew Passion, the whole piece sounded very much like an opera.

Bach's keyboard music

In a concert performance of Bach's time, the basso continuo, consisting of instruments such as organ and / or viola da gamba and harpsichord, was usually assigned the role of accompaniment: providing a harmonious and rhythmic basis for the composition. In the late 1720s, Bach introduced the performance of solo parts for organ and orchestra in the instrumental parts of the cantatas, ten years before Handel published his first organ concertos. In addition to the "5th Brandenburg Concerto" and "Triple Concerto" of the 1720s, where solo parts for the harpsichord are already present, Bach wrote and arranged his harpsichord concertos in the 1730s, and in his sonatas for viola da gamba and harpsichord one of these instruments does not participate in continuo parts: they are used as full-fledged solo instruments, which goes far beyond the general bass. In this sense, Bach played a key role in the development of genres such as the keyboard concert.

Features of Bach's music

Bach wrote virtuoso works for specific instruments, as well as music independent of instrumentation. For example, "Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin" is considered to be the apotheosis of all works written for this instrument, accessible only to skilled musicians: the music corresponds to the instrument, fully revealing its capabilities, and requires a virtuoso, but not bravura performer. Despite the fact that music and instrument seem to be inseparable from each other, Bach transposed some parts of this collection for other instruments. The same is with the cello suites - their virtuoso music seems to have been created especially for this instrument, conveys the best of what it is capable of, but Bach managed to arrange one of these suites for lute. This applies to most of his most virtuoso keyboard music. Bach revealed the possibilities of the instrument in full, while preserving the independence of the core of such music from the instrument of performance.

Taking this into account, it is not surprising that Bach's music is often and easily performed on those instruments for which it is not always written, that it is so often rearranged, and that his melodies are found in the most unexpected cases, for example, in jazz. In addition, in a number of compositions Bach did not indicate instrumentation at all: this category includes the canons BWV 1072-1078, as well as the main parts of the "Musical Offering" and "The Art of the Fugue".

Counterpoint in Bach's music

Another characteristic feature of Bach's style is his extensive use of counterpoint (as opposed to homophony, used, for example, in his presentation of a four-part chorale). Bach's canons and, above all, his fugues are most characteristic of this style: and although Bach is not its inventor, his contribution to this style was so fundamental that it became in many ways defining. Fugues are as characteristic of Bach's style as, for example, the sonata form is characteristic of composers of the classical period.

However, not only these strictly counterpoint compositions, but most of Bach's music as a whole is characterized by special musical phrases for each of the voices, where chords, which consist of notes sounding at a certain time, follow the rules of four-part harmony. Forkel, the first biographer of Bach, gives the following description of this feature of Bach's works that sets them apart from all other music:

If the language of music is only the pronunciation of a musical phrase, a simple sequence of musical notes, such music can rightfully be accused of poverty. The addition of bass provides the music with a harmonious foundation and clarifies it, but generally defines it rather than enriches it. A melody with such accompaniment, although all of its notes did not relate to real bass, or the decoration of simple decorations or simple chords in the parts of the upper voices, it was customary to call "homophony". However, a completely different case, when two melodies are so closely intertwined that they conduct a conversation with each other, like two people sharing a pleasant equality. In the first case, the accompaniment is subordinate and serves only to support the first or main part. In the second case, the parties have a different connection. Their interweaving serves as a source of new melodic combinations that give rise to new forms of musical expression. If more parties are intertwined in the same free and independent way, the linguistic mechanism expands accordingly, and with the addition of a variety of forms and rhythms, it becomes practically inexhaustible. Consequently, harmony is no longer just an accompaniment to the melody, but rather a powerful tool for giving richness and expressiveness to musical conversation. Simple accompaniment is not enough for this purpose. True harmony lies in the interweaving of several melodies, which appears first in the upper, then in the middle, and finally in the lower parts.

From about 1720, when he was thirty-five years old, and until his death in 1750, Bach's harmony consisted in this melodic interweaving of independent motifs, in their fusion so perfect that every detail seems to be an integral part of the true melody. In this, Bach surpasses all composers in the world. At least I have not met anyone equal to him in the music I know. Even in his four-part presentation, it is often possible to dismiss the upper and lower parts, and the middle part will not become less melodic and acceptable.

The structure of Bach compositions

Bach paid more attention to the structure of compositions than all of his contemporaries. This is noticeable in minor corrections that he made when transcribing other people's compositions of the composition, for example, in his early version of "Kaiser" from "The Passion of St. Mark", where he strengthened the transitions between scenes, and in the construction of his own compositions, for example, "Magnificat", and his Passions, written in Leipzig. In the last years of his life, Bach made changes to some of his earlier compositions, often the most significant consequence of this was the expansion of the structure of such previously composed works, such as Mass in B minor. Bach's renowned importance to structure led to various numerological studies of his compositions, which peaked around the 1970s. Subsequently, however, many of these overly detailed interpretations were rejected, especially when their meaning was lost in the full symbolism of hermeneutics.

Bach attached great importance to the libretto, that is, the texts of his vocal works: to work on his cantatas and main vocal compositions, he sought cooperation with various composers, and at times, when he could not rely on the talents of other authors, he wrote or adapted such texts with his own hand so that include them in the composition that I created. His collaboration with Pikander in writing the libretto for St. Matthew's Passion is best known, but a similar process had taken place several years earlier, which resulted in the multilayered structure of the libretto for St. John's Passion.

List of works by Bach

In 1950 Wolfgang Schmieder published a thematic catalog of Bach compositions called Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis (Catalog of Bach's works). Schmider borrowed a lot from Bach-Gesellschaft-Ausgabe, a complete edition of the composer's work, published between 1850 and 1900. The first edition of the catalog contained 1080 surviving compositions, no doubt composed by Bach.

BWV 1081-1126 were added to the catalog in the second half of the 20th century, and BWV 1127 and above were even more recent additions.

Bach Passions and Oratorios

Bach wrote The Passion for Good Friday services and oratorios such as The Christmas Oratorio, which includes a set of six cantatas to be performed during the liturgical season of Christmas. Shorter works in this form are his "Easter Oratorio" and "Oratorio for the Feast of the Ascension".

Bach's longest work

St. Matthew Passion, with double chorus and orchestra, is one of Bach's longest-running works.

Oratorio "St. John Passion"

John Passion was Bach's first Passion; he composed them while serving as a tomaskant in Leipzig.

Bach's spiritual cantatas

According to Bach's obituary, he composed five annual cycles of sacred cantatas, as well as additional ecclesiastical cantatas, for example, for weddings and funerals. Of these sacred works, about 200 are currently known, that is, about two-thirds of the total number of church cantatas composed by him. The Bach Digital website lists the composer's 50 famous secular cantatas, about half of which have survived or are largely subject to restoration.

Bach cantatas

Bach's cantatas vary greatly in form and instrumentation. Among them are written for solo performance, individual choir, small ensembles and large orchestras. Many consist of a large choral introduction, followed by one or more pairs of "recitative-aria" for soloists (or duets) and a closing chorale. The melody of the closing chorale often served as the cantus firmus of the opening piece.

The earliest cantatas date from the years that Bach spent in Arnstadt and Mühlhausen. The earliest known date of writing is Christ lag in Todes Banden (BWV 4), composed for Easter 1707, which is one of his choral cantatas. Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit (God's time is the best time) (BWV 106), also known as Actus Tragicus, is a funerary cantata from the Mühlhausen period. About 20 ecclesiastical cantatas, written in a later period in Weimar, have also survived to this day, for example, Ich hatte Viel Bekümmernis ("My heart's afflictions multiplied") (BWV 21).

After taking up the post of tomaskantor at the end of May 1723, at every Sunday and holiday service, Bach performed a cantata that corresponded to the lecture material of each week. The first cycle of his cantatas lasted from the first Sunday after Trinity in 1723 until the Sunday of Trinity the following year. For example, the cantata for the day of the visit of the Virgin Mary to Elizabeth, "Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben" ("Lips, heart, our deeds, all life") (BWV 147), containing a chorale, in English known as "Jesu, Joy of Man "s Desiring" ("Jesus, my joy") belongs to this first cycle. The third cycle of his cantatas was composed over several years, and in 1728-29 it was followed by the Picander cycle.

Later ecclesiastical cantatas include the choral cantatas "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott" ("The Lord is our stronghold") (BWV 80) (final version) and "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" ("Wake up, the voice calls to you" ) (BWV 140). Only the first three Leipzig cycles are relatively completely preserved. In addition to his own, Bach also performed cantatas of Telemann and his distant relative Johann Ludwig Bach.

Bach's secular music

Bach also wrote secular cantatas, for example, for members of the royal Polish and princely electors Saxon family (eg, "Trauer-Ode" - "Funeral Ode") or on other public or private occasions (eg, "The Hunting Cantata") ... The text of these cantatas was sometimes written in dialect (eg Peasant Cantata) or in Italian (eg Amore traditore). Subsequently, many of the secular cantatas were lost, but the reasons for their creation and the text of some of them nevertheless survived, in particular due to the publication by Picander of their librettos (eg, BWV Anh. 11-12). In the plots of some secular cantatas, mythical heroes of Greek antiquity took part (for example, "Der Streit zwischen Phoebus und Pan" - "The dispute between Phoebus and Pan"), others were practically miniature buffoonery (for example, "Coffee cantata").

A cappella

Bach's music for a cappella performance includes motets and choral harmonizations.

Bach's motets

Bach's Motets (BWV 225-231) are works on sacred themes for choir and continuo with solo instrumental parts. Some of them were composed for burials. Six motets composed by Bach are reliably known: "Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied" ("Sing to the Lord a new song"), "Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf" ("The Spirit strengthens us in our weaknesses"), "Jesu, Meine Freude" ("Jesus, my joy"), "Fürchte Dich Nicht" ("Do not be afraid ..."), "Komm, Jesu, komm" ("Come, Jesus"), and "Lobet den Herrn, alle Heiden" (" Praise the Lord, all peoples "). The motet "Sei Lob und Preis mit Ehren" (Praise and Honor) (BWV 231) is part of the composite motet "Jauchzet dem Herrn, alle Welt" (Glory to the Lord all the world) (BWV Anh. 160), the other parts of which possibly based on the work of Telemann.

Bach Chorales

Bach's Church Music

Bach's ecclesiastical works in Latin include his Magnificat, the four Kyrie-Gloria Masses, and the Mass in B minor.

Bach's Magnificat

The first version of Bach's Magnificat dates back to 1723, but the most famous version of this work in D major in 1733.

Bach's Mass in B minor

In 1733 Bach composed the Kyrie-Gloria mass for the Dresden court. In the last years of his life, around 1748-49, he completed this composition into a grandiose Mass in B minor. During Bach's lifetime, this work was never performed in its entirety.

Bach's clavern music

Bach wrote for the organ and other keyboards of his time, mostly for the harpsichord, but also for the harpsichord and his personal favorite: the harpsichord lute (works presented as lute compositions, BWV 995-1000 and 1006a, were probably written for this tool).

Bach Organ Works

During his lifetime, Bach was best known as an organist, organ consultant and composer of organ works, both in the free genres of German traditions - preludes, fantasies and toccata, and in more strict forms, for example, in the choral prelude and fugue. In his youth, he became famous for his immense creativity and ability to integrate foreign styles into his organ works. The undisputed North German influence on him was exerted by Georg Böhm, whom Bach met in Lüneburg, and Buxtehude, whom the young organist visited in Lübeck in 1704 during a long absence from his post in Arnstadt. Around this time, Bach rewrote the works of numerous French and Italian composers to gain an understanding of their compositional languages, and later arranged violin concertos by Vivaldi and others for organ and harpsichord. During his most productive period (1708-14), he wrote about a dozen paired preludes and fugues, five toccatas and fugues, as well as The Little Organ Book, an unfinished collection of forty-six short choral preludes that showcased compositional techniques. choral melodies. After leaving Weimar, Bach began to write less for organ, although he composed after his departure from Weimar. At a later age, Bach took an active part in consulting organ designs, testing newly constructed organs, and involving organ music in daytime rehearsals. The canonical variations on the theme "Vom Himmel hoch da komm" ich her "(" From Heaven I Descend to Earth ") and" Schuebler's Chorales "are organ works that Bach published in the last years of his life.

Bach's Music for Harpsichord and Clavichord

Bach wrote many works for the harpsichord; some of them may have been performed on the clavichord. Larger pieces are usually intended for a harpsichord with two keyboards, because when playing on a single-keyed keyboard instrument (such as a piano), there may be technical difficulties with crossing hands. Many of his keyboards are almanacs, which encyclopedic whole theoretical systems.

The Well-Tempered Clavier, Books 1 and 2 (BWV 846-893). Each book consists of a prelude and fugue in each of 24 major and minor keys in chromatic order from C major to B minor (because of this, the entire collection is often referred to as "48"). The phrase "well-tempered" in the title refers to temperament (tuning system); many temperaments of the period before Bach's time lacked flexibility and did not allow the use of more than two keys in works.

"Inventions and Symphonies" (BWV 772-801). These short two- and three-part contrapuntal works are arranged in the same chromatic order as the parts of The Well-Tempered Clavier, with the exception of a few rare keys. These parts, as conceived by Bach, were intended for educational purposes.

Three collections of dance suites: "English Suites" (BWV 806-811), "French Suites" (BWV 812-817), and "Keyboards" ("(Clavier-Übung I", BWV 825-830). Each collection consists of of six suites, built according to standard models (allemand-courante-sarabanda- (free part) -figuring). "English suites" strictly adhere to the traditional model with the addition of a prelude before the allemand and a single arbitrary part between sarabanda and gigue. In "French suites" the preludes are omitted, but there are several parts between the sarabanda and the gigue.The Partitas show further changes in the standard principles in the form of complex introductions and various parts between the main elements of the model.

Goldberg Variations (BWV 988) is an aria with thirty variations. The collection has a complex and non-standard structure: variations are based on the bass part of the aria, and its melodies and musical canons are interpolated in accordance with the grandiose concept. There are nine canons in thirty variations, that is, the third variation is a new canon. These variations are ranked sequentially from the first canon to the ninth. The first eight are paired (first and fourth, second and seventh, third and sixth, fourth and fifth). The ninth canon, due to its compositional differences, is located separately. The last variation instead of the expected tenth canon is the quadlibet.

Various works such as "French Style Overture" ("French Overture", BWV 831) and "Italian Concerto" (BWV 971) (jointly published as "Clavier-Übung II"), and Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue ( BWV 903).

Bach's lesser-known keyboard works include seven toccatas (BWV 910-916), four duos (BWV 802-805), keyboard sonatas (BWV 963-967), Six Little Preludes (BWV 933-938), and Aria variata alla maniera italiana "(BWV 989).

Bach's orchestral and chamber music

Bach wrote for individual instruments, duets and small ensembles. Many of his solo works, such as six violin sonatas and partitas (BWV 1001-1006) and six cello suites (BWV 1007-1012), are widely recognized among the most powerful works in the repertoire. He wrote sonatas for solo performance on instruments such as the viola de gamba with harpsichord or continuo accompaniment, as well as trio sonatas (two instruments and a continuo).

The Musical Offering and The Art of the Fugue are later contrapuntal works that contain parts for undefined instruments (or combinations thereof).

Bach's works for violin

The surviving concert works include two violin concertos (BWV 1041 in A minor and BWV 1042 in E major) and a two violin concerto in D minor (BWV 1043), often referred to as Bach's "double" concerto.

Bach's Brandenburg Concertos

Bach's most famous orchestral works are the Brandenburg Concerts. They got this name because they were presented by the author in the hope of getting a position from the Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg-Schwedt in 1721, although his expectations were not met. These works serve as examples of the Concerto Grosso genre.

Bach's Clavier Concertos

Bach wrote and rearranged one to four harpsichord concertos. Many of the harpsichord concertos were not original works, but arrangements of his own concertos for other instruments are now lost. Of these, only a few concertos for violin, oboe and flute were restored.

Bach's orchestral suites

In addition to the concerts, Bach wrote four orchestral suites, each of which is represented by a series of stylized dances for orchestra, preceded by an introduction in the form of a French overture.

Bach's self-education

In his early youth, Bach copied the works of other composers in order to learn from them. Later he copied and arranged music for performance and / or as teaching material for his students. Some of these works, for example, "Bist du bei mir" ("You are with me") (copied not even by Bach himself, but by Anna Magdalena), managed to become famous before they were no longer associated with Bach. Bach copied and arranged the works of Italian masters such as Vivaldi (e.g. BWV 1065), Pergolesi (BWV 1083) and Palestrina (Missa Sinus Nomine), French masters such as François Couperin (BWV Anh. 183), as well as those who lived in the greater reach of German masters, including Telemann (for example, BWV 824 = TWV 32:14) and Handel (arias from "Passion for Brokes"), as well as the music of their own relatives. In addition, he frequently copied and arranged his own music (such as BWV 233-236), and his music was copied and arranged by other composers. Some of these arrangements, such as "Aria on a G string", created at the end of the 19th century, helped to make Bach's music famous.

Sometimes it was unclear who copied whom. For example, Forkel mentions the Mass for the Double Choir among the works of Bach. The composition was published and performed at the beginning of the 19th century, and although there is some evidence that the handwriting in which it was written belonged to Bach, this work was subsequently considered a fake. Such works were not included in the catalog "Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis" published in 1950: if there were serious reasons to believe that the work belongs to Bach, such works were published in an appendix to the catalog (in German: Anhang, abbreviated "Anh."), So that the aforementioned double choir mass, for example, was designated "BWV Anh. 167". The problems of authorship, however, did not end there, attributions, for example, "Schlage doch, gewünschte Stunde" ("Strike, the desired hour") (BWV 53) were later re-attributed to the work of Melchior Hoffmann. In the case of other works, doubts about the authenticity of Bach's authorship have never been unequivocally confirmed or refuted: even the most famous organ composition in the BWV catalog, Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (BWV 565) at the end of the 20th century fell into the category of these indefinite works.

Assessment of Bach's creativity

In the 18th century, Bach's music was appreciated only in narrow circles of outstanding connoisseurs. The 19th century began with the publication of the first biography of the composer and ended with the full publication of all the famous works of Bach by the German Bach Society. Bach's renaissance began with Mendelssohn's performance of the St. Matthew Passion in 1829. Soon after the performance of 1829, Bach was regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time, if not the greatest — a reputation he still retains today. An extensive new biography of Bach was published in the second half of the 19th century.

In the 20th century, Bach's music was widely performed and recorded; at the same time, the New Bach Society published, among other works, its study of the composer's work. Modern adaptations of Bach's music made a great contribution to the popularization of Bach in the second half of the 20th century. These include versions of Bach's compositions performed by the Swingle Singers (for example, Air from Orchestral Suite No. 3, or a choral prelude from Wachet Auf ...), as well as Wendy Carlos's album Switched On Bach (1968 g.), which used a Moog electronic synthesizer.

By the end of the 20th century, more and more classical performers gradually moved away from the style of performance and instruments popular in the era of romanticism: they began to perform Bach's music on historical instruments of the Baroque era, studied and practiced the techniques and tempo of performance characteristic of Bach's time, and reduced the size of the instrumental ensembles and choirs before that which Bach used. The B-A-C-H motif, used by the composer in his own compositions, was used in dozens of dedications to Bach, created from the 19th century to the 21st century. In the 21st century, online, on sites dedicated to the great composer, a complete collection of his surviving works has become available.

Recognition of Bach's work by his contemporaries

At one time, Bach was no less famous than Telemann, Graun and Handel. During his lifetime, he received public recognition, in particular, the title of court composer from August III of Poland, and the approval that Frederick the Great and Hermann Karl von Keyserling showed to his work. This high assessment of influential persons contrasted with the humiliation that he had to endure, for example, in his native Leipzig. In addition, in the press of his time, Bach had detractors such as Johann Adolph Scheibe, who suggested that he write "less complex" music, but also supporters such as Johann Matteson and Lorenz Christoph Mitsler.

After the death of Bach, his reputation first began to decline: his work began to be considered old-fashioned in comparison with the new gallant style. Initially, he was better known as a virtuoso organist and as a music teacher. Of all the music published during the composer's lifetime, the most famous were his works written for organ and harpsichord. That is, initially his fame as a composer was limited to keyboard music, and even its importance in music teaching was greatly underestimated.

Not all of Bach's relatives who inherited most of his manuscripts gave equal importance to their preservation, and this resulted in significant losses. Karl Philip Emmanuel, his second son, most carefully guarded the legacy of his father: he co-wrote his father's obituary, contributed to the publication of his four-part chorales, staged some of his compositions; most of his father's previously unpublished works also survived only thanks to his efforts. Wilhelm Friedemann, the eldest son, performed many of his father's cantatas in Halle, but later, after losing his position, sold part of his large collection of works by Bach. Some of the old master's students, notably his son-in-law Johann Christoph Altnikol, Johann Friedrich Agricola, Johann Kirnberger and Johann Ludwig Krebs, helped spread his legacy. Not all of his early admirers were musicians, for example, one of the admirers of his music in Berlin was Daniel Itzich, a high-ranking official at the court of Frederick the Great. His older daughters took lessons from Kirnberger; their sister Sarah studied music with Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, who lived in Berlin from 1774 to 1784. Subsequently, Sarah Itzikh-Levy became an avid collector of works by Johann Sebastian Bach and his sons; she also acted as the "patroness" of Karl Philip Emanuel Bach.

Although in Leipzig the performance of Bach's church music was limited to only a few of his motets and, under the direction of Dole's cantor, several of his Passions, a new generation of Bach followers soon emerged: they meticulously collected and copied his music, including a number of major works, for example, Mass in B minor, and unofficially performed. One such connoisseur was Gottfried van Swieten, a high-ranking Austrian official who played an important role in the transmission of Bach's legacy to the composers of the Viennese school. Haydn owned handwritten copies of The Well-Tempered Clavier and the Mass in B minor, and Bach's music influenced his work. Mozart had a copy of one of Bach's motets, rearranged some of his instrumental works (K. 404a, 405), and wrote contrapuntal music influenced by his style. Beethoven played the entire Well-Tempered Clavier at the age of eleven, and referred to Bach as "Urvater der Harmonie" ("progenitor of harmony").

The first biography of J.S.Bach

In 1802, Johann Nikolaus Forkel published his book "Über Johann Sebastian Bachs Leben, Kunst und Kunstwerke" ("On the life, art and works of Johann Sebastian Bach") - the first biography of the composer, which helped him become famous among the general public. In 1805, Abraham Mendelssohn, married to one of Itzich's granddaughters, acquired an extensive collection of Bach manuscripts, preserved through the efforts of Karl Philip Emanuel Bach, and donated them to the Berlin Singing Academy. The Singing Academy occasionally held public concerts featuring Bach's music, such as his first keyboard concert, with Sarah Itzikh-Levi as pianist.

In the first few decades of the 19th century, the number of the first publications of Bach's music increased steadily: Breitkopf began to publish his choral preludes, Hoffmeister - works for the harpsichord, and in 1801 The Well-Tempered Clavier was printed simultaneously by Simrock (Germany), Negeli (Switzerland) and Hoffmeister (Germany and Austria). The same applies to vocal music: "Motets" were published in 1802-1803, then a version of "Magnificat" in E flat major, the mass "Kyrie-Gloria" in A major, as well as the cantata "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott "(" Our God is a stronghold ") (BWV 80). In 1818, Hans Georg Negeli called the Mass in B minor the greatest composition of all time. Bach's influence was felt in the next generation of early composers of romanticism. In 1822, when Abraham Mendelssohn's son, Felix, composed his first arrangement of the Magnificat at the age of 13, it was obvious that he was inspired by the D major version of Bach's Magnificat, which was still unpublished in those years.

Felix Mendelssohn made a significant contribution to the renewed interest in Bach's work with his performance of St. Matthew Passion in Berlin in 1829 - it was a key moment in the organization of the movement, which later became known as Bach's Renaissance. The 19th century premiere of The Passion for John took place in 1833, followed by the first performance of Mass in B minor in 1844. In addition to these and other public performances and an increase in the number of publications of biographies of the composer and his works, the first publications of other vocal works of Bach took place in the 1830s and 40s: six cantatas, St. Matthew Passion and Mass in B minor. In 1833, some organ works were published for the first time. In 1835 Chopin, inspired by the Well-Tempered Clavier, began composing his 24 Preludes, Op. 28, and in 1845 Schumann published his Sechs Fugen über den Namen B-A-C-H (Six Fugues on a B-A-C-H). Bach's music has been rearranged and arranged according to the tastes and performances of their times by such composers as Karl Friedrich Zelter, Robert Franz and Franz Liszt, and also combined with new music, such as the melody for "Ave Maria" by Charles Gounod. Composers who have contributed to the dissemination of Bach's music and have rave about it include Brahms, Bruckner and Wagner.

In 1850, the Bach-Gesellschaft (Bach Society) was created to further promote Bach's music. In the second half of the 19th century, the Society published an extensive edition of the composer's works. Also in the second half of the 19th century, Philip Spitta published his book "Johann Sebastian Bach" - a standard description of the life and music of Bach. By this time, Bach was known as the first of the "three big Bs in the history of music" (an English expression that refers to the three greatest composers of all time, whose surnames began with the letter B - Bach, Beethoven and Brahms). A total of 200 books dedicated to Bach were published in the 19th century. By the end of the century, local societies dedicated to Bach were founded in many cities, and his works were performed in all significant musical institutions.

In Germany, throughout the century, Bach's work served as a symbol of national feelings; the important role of the composer in the religious revival is also captured. In England, Bach was associated with the revival of church and Baroque music already existing at that time. By the end of the century, Bach had built a solid reputation as one of the greatest composers, recognized in both instrumental and vocal music.

The value of Bach's writings

In the 20th century, the process of recognizing the musical and pedagogical value of Bach's works continued. Probably the most famous are the cello suites performed by Pablo Casals, the first of the prominent musicians to record these suites. In the future, Bach's music was recorded by other famous performers of classical music, such as Herbert von Karajan, Arthur Grumjo, Helmut Walcha, Wanda Landowska, Karl Richter, I Muzyci, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Glenn Gould and many others.

In the second half of the 20th century, significant development was prompted by the practice of historically competent performance, the pioneers of which, for example, Nikolaus Arnoncourt, became famous for their performance of Bach's music. Bach's keyboard works began to be played again on instruments characteristic of the time of Bach, instead of modern pianos and romantic organs of the 19th century. The ensembles that performed Bach's instrumental and vocal compositions not only adhered to the instrumentation and style of performance of Bach's time, but also the composition of their ensembles was reduced to the sizes that Bach used in his concerts. But this is by no means the only reason why Bach's music came to the fore in the 20th century: his works have gained fame in a wide variety of performances, ranging from piano arrangements in the romantic style of Ferruccio Busoni, such jazz interpretations as the compositions "Swindle Singers", orchestrations such as the intro to Walt Disney's Fantasia, and ending with synth renditions such as Wendy Carlos's "Switched-On Bach".

Bach's music has gained recognition in other genres as well. For example, jazz musicians have often adapted Bach's works; jazz versions of his compositions were performed in particular by Jacques Lussier, Jan Anderson, Uri Kane and "Modern Jazz Quartet". Many composers of the 20th century relied on the work of Bach when creating their works, for example, Eugene Ysaye in his Six Sonatas for Solo Violin, Dmitry Shostakovich in 24 Preludes and Fugues and Heitor Villa-Lobos in his Brazilian Bachians. Bach was mentioned in a variety of publications: this applies not only to the annual almanac "Bach Jahrbuch" published by the New Bach Society and other studies and biographies, including the authorship of Albert Schweitzer, Charles Sanford Terry, John Butt, Christoph Wolff, but also the first edition of the catalog "Bach Werke Verzeichnis" in 1950, but books such as "Gödel, Escher, Bach" by Douglas Hofstadter viewed the composer's art from a broader perspective. In the 1990s, Bach's music was actively listened to, performed, broadcast on radio and television, arranged, arranged and commented on. Around 2000, three record companies released commemorative sets of the complete Bach recordings for the 250th anniversary of his death.

Bach's recordings take up three times the space of any other composer on the Voyager Golden Record, a gramophone record containing a vast array of images, common sounds, languages ​​and music of the Earth that was sent into space with two Voyager probes ... In the 20th century, many statues were erected in honor of Bach; Many things are also dedicated to his name, including streets and space objects. In addition, such musical ensembles as "Bach Aria Group", "Deutsche Bachsolisten", "Bachchor Stuttgart" and "Bach Collegium Japan" were named after the composer. Bach festivals were held in different parts of the world; in addition, many competitions and prizes are named in his honor, for example, the International Johann Sebastian Bach Competition and the Bach Prize of the Royal Academy of Music. If at the end of the 19th century, Bach's work symbolized national and spiritual revival, then at the end of the 20th century, Bach was viewed as an object of spiritless art as a religion (Kunstreligion).

Bach Online Library

In the 21st century, Bach's compositions became available online, for example, on the website of the International Music Score Library Project. High-resolution facsimiles of Bach's autographs are now available on a website dedicated to Bach. Websites dedicated solely to the composer or parts of his work include jsbach.org and the Bach Cantatas Website.

Bach's biographers of the 21st century include Peter Williams and conductor John Eliot Gardiner. In addition, reviews of the best classical music in the current century tend to include many of Bach's works. For example, in The Telegraph's Top 168 Classical Recordings, Bach's music is ranked more than any other composer.

The attitude of the Protestant Church to the work of Bach

The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church commemorates Bach annually, together with George Friedrich Handel and Henry Purcell, on the 28th of July; The Calendar of Saints of the Lutheran Church honors the memory of Bach, Handel and Heinrich Schütz on the same day.