Biography of Johann Sebastian Bach. Bach, Johann Sebastian - a short biography of Bach famous compositions

All about Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach (March 31, 1685 – July 28, 1750) was a German Baroque composer and musician. He made a significant contribution to the development of significant genres of German classical music through his mastery of counterpoint, harmonic and motivic organization, as well as adaptations of foreign rhythms, forms and structures, in particular from Italy and France. Bach's musical compositions include the Brandenburg Concertos, the Goldberg Variations, the Mass in B minor, the two Passions and over 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 revived. He is currently considered one of the greatest composers of all time.

Biography of Bach

Bach was born in Eisenach, in the Duchy of Saxe-Eisenach, into a large family of musicians. His father, Johann Ambrosius Bach, was the head of the city's orchestra, and all his uncles were professional musicians. His father probably taught him the violin and harpsichord, while his brother, Johann Christoph Bach, taught him the clavichord and introduced him to many contemporary composers. Obviously, on his own initiative, Bach entered 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 kalipdiner (music director) to Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen, and thomascantor in Leipzig, music director in famous Lutheran churches and teacher at the St. Thomas School. In 1736, August III awarded him the title of "court composer". In 1749, Bach's health and eyesight deteriorated. On July 28, 1750, he died.

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 A.D.). 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 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 renowned composer and violinist.

Bach's mother died in 1694, and his father died eight months later. The 10-year-old Bach 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 copied music, including the pen of his own brother, although this was forbidden, since the scores at that time were very personal and of great value, and clean office paper of the right type was expensive. He received valuable knowledge from his brother, who taught him to play the clavichord. Johann Christoph Bach introduced him to the great composers of his time, including South German ones such as Johann Pachelbel (under whom Johann Christoph studied) and Johann Jakob Froberger; North German composers; Frenchmen such as Jean-Baptiste Lully, Louis Marchand and Marin Marais; as well as the Italian pianist Girolamo Frescobaldi. At the same time, at the local grammar school, he studied theology, Latin, Greek, French and Italian.

On April 3, 1700, Bach and his schoolmate Georg Erdmann, who was two years older, entered the prestigious St. Michael's School in Lüneburg, which was a two-week journey from Ohrdruf. Most of this distance they probably covered on foot. The two years Bach spent at this school played a crucial 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 very demanding school to prepare for careers in other disciplines.

While in Lüneburg, Bach had access to St. John's Church and may have used the church's famous 1553 organ, as it was played by his organ teacher Georg Böhm. Thanks to his musical talent, Bach was in close contact with Böhm during his studies in Lüneburg, and also traveled to nearby Hamburg, where he attended performances by "the great North German organist Johann Adam Reinken." Stauffer reports that, discovered in 2005, the organ tablature that Bach wrote as a teenager to the works of Reinken and Buxtehude shows "a disciplined, methodical, well-prepared teenager deeply committed to the study of his art."

Bach's service as organist

In January 1703, shortly after graduating from the St. Michael's School and being refused an appointment as organist at Sangerhausen, Bach entered the service as court musician in 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-month stay in Weimar, Bach became so famous as a keyboardist that he was invited to inspect the new organ and perform the opening concert at the Neues Church (now the Bach Church) in Arnstadt, located about 30 km (19 miles) southwest of Weimar. In August 1703, he took up a position as organist at the New Church, with simple duties, a relatively generous salary, and a fine new organ, whose temperament settings allowed him to play music written in a wider keyboard range.

Despite powerful family connections and an employer passionate about music, after a few years in the service, tension arose between Bach and the authorities. Bach was dissatisfied with the level of training of the 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 Lübeck. In order to visit Buxtehude, it was necessary to cover a distance of 450 kilometers (280 miles) - according to available evidence, Bach made this journey on foot.

In 1706 Bach applied for a position as organist at the Blasius Church (also known as St. Blasius Church or 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 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 an expensive restoration of the organ in the Blasius Church. In 1708, Bach wrote "Gott ist mein König" ("The Lord is my King"), a festive cantata for the inauguration of a new consul, the cost of publication of which was 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 (musical director), where he had the opportunity to work with a large, well-funded body of professional musicians. Bach and his wife moved into a house near the ducal palace. Later that year, their first daughter, Katharina Dorothea, was born; Mary Barbara's unmarried older sister also moved in with them. She helped the Bach family with the housework and lived with them until her death in 1729. Bach also had three sons in Weimar: Wilhelm Friedemann, Carl Philipp Emmanuel and Johann Gottfried Bernhard. Johann Sebastian and Maria Barbara had three more children, but none of them survived a year, including 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 acquired the confidence that allowed him to expand the boundaries of traditional musical structures and include foreign musical influences. He learned to write dramatic introductions, use the dynamic rhythms and harmonic schemes inherent in the music of such Italians as Vivaldi, Corelli and Torelli. Bach derived these stylistic aspects in part from the arrangement of Vivaldi's string and wind concertos for harpsichord and organ; many of these pieces, in his adaptations, 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 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 called "The Well-Tempered Clavier" ("Das Wohltemperierte Klavier" - "Klavier" means clavichord or harpsichord). The cycle includes two books, compiled in 1722 and 1744, each containing 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 (church melodies). In 1713, Bach was offered a post in Halle when he advised the authorities during the restoration of the main organ in the western gallery of the Catholic Church of St. Mary, carried out by Christoph Kuntzius. Johann Kunau and Bach played again at its opening in 1716.

In the spring of 1714, Bach was promoted to accompanist, an honor that entailed a monthly performance of church cantatas in the court church. Bach's first three cantatas composed in Weimar were: "Himmelskönig, sei willkommen" ("King of Heaven, welcome") (BWV 182), written for Palm Sunday, which coincided with the Annunciation that year, "Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen , Zagen" ("Moaning, weeping, worries and anxieties") (BWV 12) by the third Sunday after Easter, and "Erschallet, ihr Lieder, erklinget, ihr Saiten!" ("Sing, choirs, shout, strings!") (BWV 172) for Pentecost. Bach's first Christmas cantata "Christen, ätzet diesen Tag" ("Christians, seal 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 report of the court clerk, was in custody for almost a month, and then dismissed with an expression of disgrace: "November 6, the former concertmaster and organist Bach, by decision of the county judge for excessive persistence in demanding his dismissal, and further, on December 2, he was released from arrest with a notice of disgrace."

Bach family and children

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

Despite the fact that Bach and Handel were born the same year, only about 130 kilometers (80 miles) apart, they never met. In 1719, Bach made the 35 kilometers (22 miles) journey from Köthen to Halle to meet Handel, but Handel had already left the city by then. 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, while Bach was with Prince Leopold in Karlsbad, Bach's wife died suddenly. A year later he met Anna Magdalena Wilcke, a young and highly gifted soprano, sixteen years his junior, who sang at court in Köthen; On December 3, 1721, they were married. Thirteen more children were born from this marriage, six of whom survived to adulthood: Gottfried Heinrich; Elisabeth Juliana Friederich (1726-81), who married Bach's pupil Johann Christoph Altnicol; Johann Christoph Friedrich and Johann Christian, both of them, especially Johann Christian, became outstanding musicians; Johanna Carolina (1737-81); and Regina Susanna (1742-1809).

Bach as an educator

In 1723, Bach received the position of thomascantor - cantor at the St. Thomas School at the Thomaskirche (St. Thomas Church) in Leipzig, which provided concerts in four churches in the city: Thomaskirche, Nikolaikirche (St. Nicholas Church), to a somewhat 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 Electorate of Saxony, where he served for twenty-seven years until his death. During this period, he strengthened his authority through the honorary court positions he held in Köthen and Weissenfels, as well as in the court of Elector Friedrich August (who was also King of Poland) in Dresden. Bach had many disagreements with his actual employers - the city administration of Leipzig, whose members he considered "misers". For example, despite receiving an offer to be appointed to the post of thomascantor, Bach, however, was invited to Leipzig only after Telemann declared 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 the students of the St. Thomas School and holding 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 instead of him. The prefects also provided assistance in musical literacy. 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 Nikolaikirche on May 30, 1723, the first Sunday after Whitsunday. Bach collected his cantatas in annual cycles. Of the five such cycles mentioned in obituaries, only three have survived. Of the more than 300 cantatas written by Bach in Leipzig, over 100 have been lost to later generations. Basically, these concert works are based on the texts of the Gospel, which were read in the Lutheran Church at every Sunday and holiday service throughout the year. The second yearly cycle, which Bach set about creating on the first Sunday after Trinity in 1724, consists exclusively of chorale contata, each based on a particular church hymn. These include "O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort" ("O eternity, word of thunder") (BWV 20), "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" ("Wake up, a 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 beautifully the light of the morning star shines") (BWV 1).

Bach recruited sopranos and altos to the choir from students of the St. Thomas School, and tenors and basses - not only from there, but from all over Leipzig. Performances at weddings and funerals provided his groups with additional income - probably especially for this, and also for learning at school, he wrote at least six motets. As part of his regular ecclesiastical activities, he performed motets by other composers, and they served as exemplary models for his own.

Bach's predecessor as cantor, Johann Kuhnau, also directed concerts at the Paulinerkirche, the church attached to the University of Leipzig. However, when Bach took over this position in 1723, he had at his disposal only concerts for "ceremonial" (held on church holidays) services in the Paulinerkirche; his request for concerts and regular 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 Paulinerkirche and began to appear there only on "special occasions". The organ in Paulinerkirche was much better and newer (1716) than in Thomaskirche or Nikolaikirche. 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 enjoyed playing the organ at the Paulinerkirche "for his pleasure".

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

In 1733, Bach composed a mass for the Dresden court (movements "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 court composer, and this attempt was subsequently successful. Later, he remade this work into a full mass, adding parts of "Credo", "Sanctus" and "Agnus Dei", the music for which he partly based on his own cantatas, partly composed entirely. Bach's appointment as court composer was part of his long struggle to strengthen his authority in disputes with the city council of Leipzig. In 1737-1739 the College of Music was headed by a former student of Bach, Karl Gotthelf Gerlach.

In 1747 Bach visited the court of King Frederick II of Prussia in Potsdam. The king played a melody for Bach and invited him to immediately impromptu fugue, based on the musical theme he had performed. Bach immediately played an improvisation of a three-voice fugue on one of Friedrich's pianos, then a new composition, and later presented the King with a "Musical Offering" consisting of fugues, canons and trios based on the motif proposed by Friedrich. His six-voice fugue incorporates the same musical theme, making it more suitable for various variations thanks to a number of changes.

In the same year, Bach joined the Society for Musical Sciences (Correspondierende Societät der musikalischen Wissenschafften) by Lorenz Christoph Mitzler. On the occasion of his entry into the society, Bach composed the Canonical Variations on the Christmas carol "Vom Himmel hoch da komm" ich her "("From heaven I will descend to earth") (BWV 769). Each member of the society was supposed to present a portrait, so in 1746 in during the preparation of Bach for the performance, the artist Elias Gottlob Hausmann painted his portrait, which later became famous. "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 also had a connection with the Society based on the theory of music.Among these works is the Art of the Fugue cycle, 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. Composed largely of processed parts of cantatas that had been written over the course of thirty-five years, he allowed Bach to examine your vocal parts and select individual parts for later revision and improvement." Although the Mass was never performed in its entirety during the composer's lifetime, it is considered one of the greatest choral works of all time.

Illness and death of Bach

In 1749 Bach's health began to fail; On June 2, Heinrich von Brühl wrote a letter to one of the burgomasters of Leipzig asking him to appoint his music director, Johann Gottlieb Garrer, to the post of thomascantor and music director "in connection with the approaching ... death of Herr Bach." Bach was losing 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 operation" as the cause of death. Spitta gives some details. He writes that Bach died of "apoplexy," that is, of a stroke. Confirming the reports in the newspapers, Spitta notes: "The treatment carried out in connection with the [unsuccessful eye] operation had such bad consequences that his health ... was greatly shaken," and Bach completely lost his sight. His son Carl Philipp Emmanuel, 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 property included five harpsichords, two lute harpsichords, three violins, three violas, two cellos, a viola da gamba, a lute and a spinet, as well as 52 "holy books", including works by Martin Luther and Joseph. Initially, the composer was buried in the old cemetery at the Church of St. John 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 a crypt in the church of St. John. During World War II, this church was destroyed by Allied bombing, so that in 1950 Bach's ashes were transferred to their current burial site in the Church of St. Thomas. In later studies, doubts were expressed 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 concertos, he did the same. When they composed suites, he did the same. The same with recitatives, followed by da capo arias, four-part chorales, the use of basso continuo, and so on. Features of his style lie in such properties as the mastery of contrapuntal invention and motivic 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, learned 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. Hundreds of church works created by him are usually regarded as manifestations not only of his skill, but also of a truly reverent attitude towards God. As a Thomascantor in Leipzig, he taught the small catechism, and this was reflected in some of his works. Lutheran chants provided the basis for many of his compositions. By reworking these hymns for his choral preludes, he created more heartfelt and integral compositions than any other, and this applies even to heavier and longer works. The large-scale structure of all of Bach's significant ecclesiastical vocal compositions shows a refined, skillful design capable of expressing all the spiritual and musical power. For example, "Passion according to Matthew", like other compositions of this kind, illustrates the Passion, conveying the biblical text in recitatives, arias, choirs and chorales; By writing this work, Bach created a comprehensive experience that is now, many centuries later, recognized as both musically exciting and spiritually profound.

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

Bach harmonic style

Four-part harmonies were invented before Bach, but he lived at a time when modal music in Western traditions was largely supplanted by the tonal system. According to this system, the musical part moves from one chord to another according to 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 chorale works, but also, for example, in the general bass accompaniment he wrote. The new system underlay Bach's entire style, and his compositions are often seen as fundamental components in shaping 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 own arrangement of Pergolesi's "Stabat Mater" in the 1740s, he improved the alto part (which in the original composition is in unison with the bass part) as an addition to the harmony, thereby bringing the composition into line with his four-part harmonic style.

In the course of the discussions that have arisen since the 19th century in Russia about the authenticity of the exposition of four-part court chants, the exposition of Bach's four-part chorales - for example, the final 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 (practically 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 D-Dorian mode (which in the tonal system corresponds to D minor).

Modulations in Bach's music

Modulation - changing the key in the course of a piece - is another stylistic feature in which Bach goes beyond the accepted traditions of his time. Baroque musical instruments greatly limited the possibility of modulation: keyboards, the temperament system of which preceded the adjustable one, had registers limited in modulation, and wind instruments, especially brass-wind instruments, such as the trumpet and horn, which existed a hundred years before being equipped with valves, depended on their tuning keys. Bach extended these possibilities: he added "strange tones" to his organ performance that confused the singers, according to an accusation he had to face in Arnstadt. Louis Marchand, another early experimenter with modulation, apparently managed to avoid a confrontation with Bach only because the latter went further in this endeavor than any of his predecessors. In the "Suscepit Israel" part of his Magnificat (1723), the trumpet parts in E-flat include a performance of the melody in the enharmonic scale in C minor.

Another significant technological breakthrough of Bach's time, in which he played an important role, is the improvement in the temperament of keyboard instruments, which made it possible to use them in all keys (12 major and 12 minor), and also made it possible to apply modulation without retuning. His "Capriccio on the Departure of a Beloved Brother" is a very early work, but it already shows a wide use of modulation, incomparable with any of the works of the time with which this composition has been compared. But this technique is most fully disclosed 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" ("Klavier book of Wilhelm Friedemann Bach").

Jewelry in Bach's music

The second page of Wilhelm Friedemann Bach's "Clavier Book" contains a transcript of the decorations and a guide to their performance, written by Bach for his eldest son, who was then nine years old. In general, Bach attached considerable 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, the "Aria" from his "Goldberg Variations" contains rich ornamentation in almost every measure. Bach's attention to embellishments can also be seen in the keyboard arrangement he wrote for Marcello's "Oboe Concerto": it was he who added notes with those embellishments to this work, which oboists play several centuries later during its performance.

Even though Bach never wrote an opera, he was not opposed to the genre, nor was he opposed to his embellished vocal style. In church music, Italian composers imitated the operatic vocal style of genres such as the Neapolitan Mass. Protestant society was more reserved about the idea of ​​using a similar style in liturgical music. For example, Kunau, Bach's predecessor in Leipzig, was known to express negative opinions in his notes about opera and vocal compositions by Italian virtuosos. Bach was less categorical; according to one review of a performance of his Matthew Passion, the whole work sounded very much like an opera.

Clavier music by Bach

In the concert performance of Bach's time, the basso continuo, consisting of instruments such as the organ and/or viola da gamba and harpsichord, was usually given the role of accompaniment: providing the harmonic and rhythmic basis of the composition. In the late 1720s, Bach introduced the performance of solo parts for organ and orchestra in the instrumental movements of cantatas, ten years before Handel published his first organ concertos. In addition to the "5th Brandenburg Concerto" and the "Triple Concerto" of the 1720s, where there are already solo parts for harpsichord, 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 the 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 concerto.

Features of Bach's music

Bach wrote virtuosic works for specific instruments, as well as music independent of instrumentation. For example, "Sonatas and Partitas for Violin Solo" 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 a bravura performer. Even though the music and the instrument seem to be inseparable, Bach transferred some parts of this collection to other instruments. Similarly with the cello suites - their virtuoso music seems to be created especially for this instrument, conveys the best of what it is capable of, but Bach managed to arrange one of these suites for the lute. This also applies to much 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.

With this in mind, 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 transcribed, 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 the 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 Fugue".

Counterpoint in Bach's music

Another characteristic feature of Bach's style is his extensive use of counterpoint (in contrast to the homophony used, for example, in his presentation of the 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 decisive in many ways. 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 contrapuntal 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, Bach's first biographer, gives the following description of this feature of Bach's works that distinguishes them 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 rightly be accused of poverty. The addition of bass provides the music with a harmonic basis and clarifies it, but overall it defines rather than enriches it. A melody with such an accompaniment, although all of its notes did not belong to a real bass, or trimmed with simple decorations or simple chords in the parts of the upper voices, was called "homophony". However, it is a completely different case when two melodies are so closely intertwined that they carry on 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 language mechanism expands accordingly, and when a variety of forms and rhythms are added, it becomes practically inexhaustible. Consequently, harmony becomes no longer just an accompaniment to the melody, but rather a powerful tool for adding richness and expressiveness to musical conversation. Mere accompaniment is not enough for this purpose. True harmony lies in the interweaving of several melodies, which occurs first in the upper, then in the middle, and finally in the lower parts.

From about 1720, when he was thirty-five years old, 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 excels all the composers of the world. At least I have not met anyone equal to him in the music I know. Even in his four-voice presentation, one can often dismiss the upper and lower parts, and the middle part will not become less melodic and acceptable.

Structure of Bach compositions

Bach paid more attention to the structure of compositions than all his contemporaries. This is evident in the minor corrections he made when transposing other people's compositions, such as in his early version of "Kaiser" from the Passion of St. Mark, where he increased 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 effect of this was the expansion of the structure of such previously composed works, such as the Mass in B minor. Bach's well-known emphasis on 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 hermeneutics full of symbolism.

Bach attached great importance to the libretto, that is, to the texts of his vocal works: to work on his cantatas and basic vocal compositions, he sought collaboration 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 in order to include them in the composition that you created. His collaboration with Picander in writing the libretto for the Matthew Passion is best known, but a similar process had taken place a few years earlier, resulting in the layered structure of the libretto for the St. John Passion.

List of compositions by Bach

In 1950, Wolfgang Schmieder published a thematic catalog of Bach's compositions under the title "Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis" ("Catalogue of Bach's Works"). Schmieder borrowed heavily from the Bach-Gesellschaft-Ausgabe, a complete edition of the composer's works published between 1850 and 1900. The first edition of the catalog contained 1,080 surviving compositions, undoubtedly 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 later additions.

Passions and oratorios by Bach

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 Paschal Oratorio and Oratorio for the Feast of the Ascension.

Bach's longest work

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

Oratorio "Passion according to John"

The Passion According to John was the first Passion written by Bach; he composed them while serving as thomascantor in Leipzig.

Spiritual cantatas by Bach

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

Bach cantatas

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

The earliest cantatas date from the years Bach spent in Arnstadt and Mühlhausen. The earliest known date of composition is "Christ lag in Todes Banden" ("Christ lay in chains of death") (BWV 4), composed for Easter 1707, which is one of his chorale 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 church cantatas written in a later period in Weimar have also survived to this day, for example "Ich hatte Viel Bekümmernis" ("Sorrows in my heart multiplied") (BWV 21).

After assuming the office of thomascantor at the end of May 1723, at every Sunday and holiday service, Bach performed a cantata that corresponded to the material of each week's lectures. The first cycle of his cantatas ran from the first Sunday after Trinity in 1723 until Trinity Sunday the following year. For example, the cantata for the day of the Virgin Mary's visit to Elizabeth, "Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben" ("With our lips, our hearts, our deeds, all our lives") (BWV 147), which contains a chorale known in English as "Jesu, Joy of Man "s Desiring" ("Jesus, my joy") belongs to this first cycle. The cycle of cantatas written in the second year of his stay in Leipzig is called the "choral cantata cycle", since it mainly included works in the form of a choral cantata The third cycle of his cantatas was composed over several years, and in 1728-29 it was followed by the Picander cycle.

Later church cantatas include the chorale 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, a voice calls to you" ) (BWV 140). Only the first three Leipzig cycles have been relatively completely preserved. In addition to his own, Bach also performed cantatas by Telemann and his distant relative Johann Ludwig Bach.

Secular music of Bach

Bach also wrote secular cantatas, for example, for members of the royal Polish and princely elector Saxon family (for example, "Trauer-Ode" - "Funeral Ode") or on other public or private occasions (for example, "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 the creation and the text of some of them nevertheless survived, in particular due to Picander's publication of their librettos (eg BWV Anh. 11-12). The plots of some secular cantatas involved the mythical heroes of Greek antiquity (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 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 authentically known: they are "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" ("Don't be afraid..."), "Komm, Jesu, komm" ("Come, Jesus"), and "Lobet den Herrn, alle Heiden" (" Praise the Lord, all nations." The motet "Sei Lob und Preis mit Ehren" ("Praise and honor") (BWV 231) is part of the compound motet "Jauchzet dem Herrn, alle Welt" ("Praise the Lord all the world") (BWV Anh. 160), the other parts of which , possibly based on Telemann's work.

Bach Chorales

Bach 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 from 1723, but the best-known version of this work is in D major from 1733.

Mass in B minor by Bach

In 1733, Bach composed the mass "Kyrie-Gloria" 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.

Clavern music by Bach

Bach wrote for the organ and other keyboard instruments of his day, mainly the harpsichord, but also the clavichord and his personal favorite: the harpsichord lute (works presented as compositions for the lute, BWV 995-1000 and 1006a were probably written for this instrument).

Organ works by Bach

During his lifetime, Bach was best known as an organist, organ consultant, and composer of organ works, both in the free genres of the German tradition, preludes, fantasies, and toccatas, and in more rigorous forms, such as the chorale prelude and fugue. In his youth, he became famous for his great creative potential and ability to integrate foreign styles into his organ works. The undeniable North German influence on him was 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 transcribed the works of numerous French and Italian composers to gain insight into 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, and The Little Organ Book, an unfinished collection of forty-six short chorale preludes that showcases compositional techniques in performance choral melodies. After leaving Weimar, Bach wrote less for the organ, although some of his most famous works (six trio sonatas, the German Organ Mass in the Clavier-Übung III of 1739, and the great Eighteen Chorales, added to in later years) he composed after his departure from Weimar. In later life, Bach took an active part in consulting organ orders, testing newly built organs, and involving organ music in daytime rehearsals. The canonical variations on "Vom Himmel hoch da komm" ich her" ("I descend from heaven to earth") and "Schübler Chorales" are organ works that Bach published in the last years of his life.

Music by Bach for harpsichord and clavichord

Bach wrote numerous works for harpsichord; some of them may have been played on the clavichord. Larger pieces are usually intended for a double-keyboard harpsichord, as when playing them on a single-keyboard keyboard instrument (such as a piano), technical difficulties can arise with crossing hands. Many of his keyboard works are almanacs that cover entire theoretical systems in an encyclopedic manner.

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

"Inventions and Symphonies" (BWV 772-801). These short two- and three-part contrapuntal works are in the same chromatic order as the Well-Tempered Clavier movements, 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 "Keyboard scores" ("(Clavier-Übung I", BWV 825-830). Each collection consists of six suites built according to standard models (allemande-curante-sarabande-(arbitrary movement)-gigue)."English suites" strictly adhere to the traditional model with the addition of a prelude before the allemande and a single arbitrary movement between the sarabande and gigue. In the "French Suites" the preludes are omitted, but there are several movements between the sarabande and the gigue.In the Partitas, further modifications of the standard principles are traced in the form of complex opening movements and varied movements 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 built on the bass part of the aria, and its melodies and musical canons, in accordance with the grandiose concept, have interpolations. The thirty variations contain nine canons, that is, the third variation is the new canon. These variations are arranged 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) (co-published as "Clavier-Übung II"), as well as "Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue" ( BWV 903).

Bach's lesser-known keyboard works include the Seven Toccatas (BWV 910-916), Four Duets (BWV 802-805), Keyboard Sonatas (BWV 963-967), Six Little Preludes (BWV 933-938), and Aria variata alla maniera italiana" (BWV 989).

Orchestral and chamber music by Bach

Bach wrote for single instruments, duets and small ensembles. Many of his solo works, such as the six sonatas and partitas for violin (BWV 1001-1006) and the six suites for cello (BWV 1007-1012), are widely regarded among the strongest 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 continuo).

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

Bach's works for violin

Surviving concerto works include two violin concertos (BWV 1041 in A minor and BWV 1042 in E major) and a concerto for two violins 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 Concertos. They received this name because they were presented by the author in the hope of obtaining a position from Margrave Christian Ludwig 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 arranged harpsichord concertos ranging from one to four. Many of the harpsichord concertos were not original works, but arrangements of his own concerti for other instruments are now lost. Of these, only a few concertos for violin, oboe and flute were restored.

Orchestral suites by Bach

In addition to the concertos, Bach wrote four orchestral suites - each of which is represented by a series of stylized dances for the 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. He later copied and arranged the music for performance and/or as teaching material for his students. Some of these works, such as "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 Sine Nomine), French masters such as François Couperin (BWV Anh. 183), and also living more within the reach of German masters, including Telemann (eg BWV 824 = TWV 32:14) and Handel (arias from the Brockes Passion), as well as the music of his own relatives. In addition, he often copied and arranged his own music (eg BWV 233-236) and his music was copied and arranged by other composers. Some of these arrangements, such as the "Aria on the G String", created at the end of the 19th century, helped Bach's music to become famous.

Sometimes it was not clear who copied whom. For example, Forkel mentions the mass for double choir among the works created by 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 grounds for believing that a work was Bach's, such works were published in an appendix to the catalog (in German: Anhang, abbreviated "Anh."), so that the aforementioned mass for double choir, for example, received the designation "BWV Anh. 167". However, the problems of authorship 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 unambiguously 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 uncertain works.

Evaluation of Bach's work

In the 18th century, Bach's music was appreciated only in narrow circles of prominent connoisseurs. The 19th century began with the publication of the first biography of the composer and ended with the complete publication of all known works by Bach by the German Bach Society. Bach's renaissance began with Mendelssohn's performance of the St. Matthew Passion in 1829. Shortly after the 1829 performance, Bach began to be regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time, if not the greatest, a reputation he has retained to this day. A new extensive 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 contributed greatly to the popularization of Bach in the second half of the 20th century. These include versions of Bach by the Swingle Singers (for example, "Air" from Orchestral Suite No. 3, or the chorale prelude from "Wachet Auf..."), as well as the Wendy Carlos album "Switched On Bach" (1968 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 Romantic era: they began to play Bach's music on historical instruments of the Baroque era, studied and practiced the techniques and performance tempos characteristic of Bach's time, and reduced the size of instrumental ensembles. and choruses up to the one used by Bach. 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 became available.

Recognition of Bach's work by contemporaries

In his 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 Kaiserling showed to his work. This high appreciation of influential persons contrasted with the humiliations that he had to endure, for example, in his native Leipzig. In addition, Bach had detractors in the press of his time, such as Johann Adolf Scheibe, who encouraged him to write "less complicated" music, but also supporters, such as Johann Mattheson and Lorenz Christoph Mitzler.

After Bach's death, his reputation first began to decline: his work began to be considered old-fashioned compared to the new gallant style. Initially, he was more famous 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 those relatives of Bach who inherited most of his manuscripts attached equal importance to their preservation, and this led to significant losses. Carl Philip Emmanuel, his second son, most carefully guarded the legacy of his father: he was a co-author of 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 subsequently, having lost his position, sold part of the large Bach collection that belonged to him. Some students of the old master, in particular, his son-in-law Johann Christoph Altnicol, Johann Friedrich Agricola, Johann Kirnberger and Johann Ludwig Krebs, contributed to the spread of 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 Itzich-Lewy became an avid collector of works by Johann Sebastian Bach and his sons; she also acted as the "patron" of Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach.

Although the performance of Bach's church music in Leipzig was limited to only some of his motets and, under the direction of Cantor Dole, a few of his Passions, a new generation of Bach's followers soon emerged: they carefully collected and copied his music, including a number of major works, for example, Mass in B minor, and unofficially performed it. One of these connoisseurs was Gottfried van Swieten, a high-ranking Austrian official who played an important role in the transfer of Bach's heritage 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, transcribed 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 Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach, and donated them to the Berlin Singing Academy. The Singing Academy occasionally held public concerts in which Bach's music was performed, such as his first keyboard concerto, with Sarah Itzich-Levy as pianist.

In the first few decades of the 19th century, the number of first publications of Bach's music increased: Breitkopf began to publish his choral preludes, Hoffmeister - works for harpsichord, and in 1801 "The Well-Tempered Clavier" was published 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 the "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 Nägeli called the Mass in B minor the greatest composition of all time. Bach's influence was felt in the next generation of early Romantic composers. 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 renewal of interest in Bach's work with his performance of the Matthew Passion in Berlin in 1829, which served as a key moment in organizing the movement that later became known as the "Bach Renaissance". The St. John Passion premiered in the 19th century in 1833, followed in 1844 by the first performance of the Mass in B minor. In addition to these and other public performances and the growing number of publications of biographies of the composer and his works, the 1830s and 40s also saw the first publications of Bach's other vocal works: six cantatas, the Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. In 1833 some organ works were first published. In 1835, inspired by the Well-Tempered Clavier, Chopin 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 B-A-C-H"). Bach's music was transcribed and arranged according to the tastes and performance practices of their time by composers such as Carl Friedrich Zelter, Robert Franz and Franz Liszt, and also combined with new music, as, for example, in the melody to Charles Gounod's "Ave Maria". Composers who contributed to the dissemination of Bach's music and spoke enthusiastically about it include Brahms, Bruckner and Wagner.

In 1850, in order to further promote Bach's music, the "Bach-Gesellschaft" (Bach Society) was formed. 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, Philipp Spitta published his book Johann Sebastian Bach, a standard description of Bach's life and music. By that time, Bach was known as the first of the "three big Bs in the history of music" (an English expression referring to the three greatest composers of all time whose last names begin with the letter B - Bach, Beethoven and Brahms). In total, 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, the work of Bach served as a symbol of national feelings; also captured the important role of the composer in the religious revival. In England, Bach was associated with the revival of church and baroque music that already existed at that time. By the end of the century, Bach had established a solid reputation as one of the greatest composers, recognized in both instrumental and vocal music.

The value of Bach's compositions

In the 20th century, the process of recognizing the musical and pedagogical value of Bach's compositions continued. Perhaps the most famous are the cello suites performed by Pablo Casals, the first of the outstanding musicians who recorded these suites. In the future, Bach's music was also recorded by other famous classical music performers, such as Herbert von Karajan, Arthur Grumio, Helmut Walha, Wanda Landowska, Karl Richter, I Muzichi, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Glenn Gould and many others.

In the second half of the 20th century, a significant development was the practice of historically competent performance, whose pioneers, such as Nikolaus Harnoncourt, became famous for their performance of Bach's music. Bach's keyboard works were again played on instruments typical of Bach's time, instead of modern grand 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 performance style of Bach's time, but the composition of their groups was reduced to the size 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 gained fame in a wide variety of performances, from piano arrangements in the romantic style of Ferruccio Busoni, to jazz interpretations such as compositions of "Swindle Singers", orchestrations , for example, in the intro to Walt Disney's Fantasia, to synth performances such as Wendy Carlos' "Switched-On Bach" recording.

Bach's music has received recognition in other genres as well. For example, jazz musicians have often adapted Bach's works; Jazz versions of his compositions have been performed by Jacques Loussier, Ian Anderson, Uri Kane and the Modern Jazz Quartet, among others. Many composers of the 20th century relied on the work of Bach when creating their works, for example, Eugène Ysaïe in his Six Sonatas for Solo Violin, Dmitri Shostakovich in Twenty-four Preludes and Fugues, and Heitor Villa-Lobos in his Brazilian Bachians. Bach has been mentioned in a wide 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 Batt, Christoph Wolff, as well as the first edition of the catalog Bach Werke Verzeichnis in 1950, but books such as Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter took 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 recordings of Bach's works for the 250th anniversary of his death.

Recordings of Bach's works take up three times as much space as any other composer's compositions on the Voyager Golden Record, a phonograph record containing a vast array of images, common sounds, languages ​​and music of the Earth, which was sent into outer 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 after him, such as 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 rebirth, then at the end of the 20th century Bach was regarded as an object of non-spiritual art as a religion (Kunstreligion).

Bach Online Library

In the 21st century, Bach's compositions have become available online, for example, on the website of the International Music Score Library Project. High-resolution facsimiles of Bach's autographs have been made available on the Bach website. Websites dedicated exclusively to the composer or specific parts of his work include jsbach.org and the Bach Cantatas Website.

Bach's 21st-century biographers include Peter Williams and the conductor John Eliot Gardiner. Also, in the current century, reviews of the best pieces of classical music tend to include many of Bach's works. For example, in The Telegraph's Top 168 Classical Music Recordings, Bach's music ranks higher than any other composer's.

The attitude of the Protestant Church to the work of Bach

The liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church commemorates Bach every year with George Frideric Handel and Henry Purcell on the patronal day 28 July; The Calendar of Saints of the Lutheran Church commemorates Bach, Handel and Heinrich Schütz on the same day.

The outstanding German composer, organist and harpsichordist Johann Sebastian Bach was born on March 21, 1685 in Eisenach, Thuringia, Germany. He belonged to a ramified German family, most of whom had been professional musicians in Germany for three centuries. Johann Sebastian received his primary musical education (playing the violin and harpsichord) under the guidance of his father, a court musician.

In 1695, after the death of his father (his mother died earlier), the boy was taken into the family of his older brother Johann Christoph, who served as a church organist at St. Michaelis Church in Ohrdruf.

In the years 1700-1703, Johann Sebastian studied at the school of church singers in Lüneburg. During his studies, he visited Hamburg, Celle and Lübeck to get acquainted with the work of famous musicians of his time, new French music. In the same years he wrote his first works for organ and clavier.

In 1703 Bach worked in Weimar as a court violinist, in 1703-1707 as a church organist in Arnstadt, then from 1707 to 1708 in the Mühlhasen church. His creative interests were then mainly focused on music for organ and clavier.

In 1708-1717, Johann Sebastian Bach served as court musician to the Duke of Weimar in Weimar. During this period, he created numerous choral preludes, an organ toccata and a fugue in D minor, a passacaglia in C minor. The composer wrote music for the clavier, more than 20 spiritual cantatas.

In 1717-1723, Bach served with Leopold, Duke of Anhalt-Köthen, in Köthen. Three sonatas and three partitas for violin solo, six suites for cello solo, English and French suites for clavier, six Brandenburg concertos for orchestra were written here. Of particular interest is the collection "The Well-Tempered Clavier" - 24 preludes and fugues, written in all keys and in practice proving the advantages of a tempered musical system, around the approval of which there were heated debates. Subsequently, Bach created the second volume of the Well-Tempered Clavier, also consisting of 24 preludes and fugues in all keys.

In Köthen, the "Notebook of Anna Magdalena Bach" was started, which includes, along with pieces by various authors, five of the six "French Suites". In the same years, "Little Preludes and Fughettas. English Suites, Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue" and other clavier compositions were created. During this period, the composer wrote a number of secular cantatas, most of them not preserved and received a second life with a new, spiritual text.

In 1723, his "Passion according to John" (a vocal-dramatic work based on gospel texts) was performed at the Church of St. Thomas in Leipzig.

In the same year, Bach received the position of cantor (regent and teacher) in the church of St. Thomas in Leipzig and the school attached to this church.

In 1736, Bach received from the Dresden court the title of Royal Polish and Saxon Electoral Court Composer.

During this period, the composer reached the pinnacle of mastery, creating magnificent examples in various genres - sacred music: cantatas (about 200 survived), "Magnificat" (1723), masses, including the immortal "High Mass" in B minor (1733), "Passion according to Matthew" (1729); dozens of secular cantatas (among them - the comic "Coffee" and "Peasant"); works for organ, orchestra, harpsichord, among the latter - "Aria with 30 variations" ("Goldberg Variations", 1742). In 1747, Bach wrote a cycle of plays "Musical Offerings" dedicated to the Prussian King Frederick II. The last work of the composer was the work "The Art of the Fugue" (1749-1750) - 14 fugues and four canons on one theme.

Johann Sebastian Bach is the largest figure in the world musical culture, his work is one of the pinnacles of philosophical thought in music. Freely crossing the features of not only different genres, but also national schools, Bach created immortal masterpieces that stand above time.

In the late 1740s, Bach's health deteriorated, with a sudden loss of sight particularly worrying. Two unsuccessful cataract surgeries resulted in complete blindness.

He spent the last months of his life in a darkened room, where he composed the last chorale "I stand before Thy throne", dictating it to his son-in-law, the organist Altnikol.

On July 28, 1750, Johann Sebastian Bach died in Leipzig. He was buried in the cemetery near the church of St. John. Due to the lack of a monument, his grave was soon lost. In 1894, the remains were found and reburied in a stone sarcophagus in the church of St. John. After the church was destroyed by bombing during World War II, his ashes were preserved and reburied in 1949 in the altar of St. Thomas Church.

During his lifetime, Johann Sebastian Bach enjoyed fame, but after the death of the composer, his name and music were forgotten. Interest in Bach's work arose only at the end of the 1820s, in 1829 the composer Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy organized a performance of the St. Matthew Passion in Berlin. In 1850, the Bach Society was created, which sought to identify and publish all the composer's manuscripts - 46 volumes were published in half a century.

With the mediation of Mendelssohn-Bartholdy in 1842 in Leipzig, the first monument to Bach was erected in front of the building of the old school at the Church of St. Thomas.

In 1907, the Bach Museum was opened in Eisenach, where the composer was born, in 1985 - in Leipzig, where he died.

Johann Sebastian Bach was married twice. In 1707 he married his cousin Maria Barbara Bach. After her death in 1720, in 1721 the composer married Anna Magdalena Wilcken. Bach had 20 children, but only nine of them survived their father. Four sons became composers - Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (1710-1784), Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach (1714-1788), Johann Christian Bach (1735-1782), Johann Christoph Bach (1732-1795).

The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources

The leader of the noble assembly Oleg Shcherbachev spoke about the "composer of all times and peoples" mystic and theologian Johann Sebastian Bach in the framework of the club "Event"

If you think that, having lived a good half of the 18th century, the Baroque century, Johann Sebastian Bach was his contemporary, then you are only partly right. In the tradition of the medieval worldview, he wrote his music beginning and ending with a prayer, and sounded old-fashioned to his contemporaries. However, the unknown instrument, for which some of his works were written, was invented only after his death, and individual moves of his compositions sounded habitually only in the 20th century.

Johann Sebastian Bach

In Bach's music, we often hear a step, a tread. The pace is key here. The measure of speed, as I recently realized, is the rhythm of the heart. If you play how you breathe, then everything turns out right.

As a composer, Bach hardly changed throughout his life, which is a rarity for any creator. His musical language was formed when he was about 20, and he died when he was 65. I suppose that in 1706 or 1707 Bach experienced some kind of strong mystical shock. We do not know which one, but it turned his life upside down, he came to know - as Dostoevsky would say - the living God, and further on this experience he went through his entire creative path.

From a biographical point of view, Bach lived two lives. By everyday standards, he was an ordinary German burgher: he moved from one service to another, very prudently choosing where it was more profitable for him to work, where the salary was higher. In a letter to a friend, he once complained that because of the good weather, his funeral "accidents" had noticeably decreased. This is also Bach.

We are accustomed to the image of a romantic creator, whose life and work are inextricably linked: he creates, refracting his life in creativity. But Bach is an anti-romantic. He is a medieval artist. The outer side of his life has practically nothing to do with creativity. But creativity for him is not even 99 percent, but more. Everyday life is just a shell, a shell; it is completely uninteresting compared to creativity, because it creates about God and for God. How much do we know about Andrei Rublev's life path? And how important is it to know his biography in order to understand his icons? Compared to his "Trinity" it is absolutely not interesting. Bach's music is a musical icon. The life of an icon painter is not part of an icon.

For Bach, the process of writing music was very important. At the end of the score, he always wrote " SoliDeogloria"(Glory to God alone" - ed.), and at the beginning - "Lord, help." Therefore, you can play Bach only by praying: you play - as if you are doing the Jesus Prayer. Only a few succeeded. For example, Albert Schweitzer, a well-known Protestant theologian and humanist. In his performances, you hear that Bach's music is always a prayer, but the most amazing thing is that it is not only a prayer, but also a dialogue. Bach doesn't just pray, he hears answers. This is unique for a composer! Bach's music is a conversation between man and God.

Bach and sons

One of Bach's most important works is the High Mass, or Mass in B minor, which he wrote almost all his life: he began in the 1720s and finished just before his death. According to the popular notion, Bach's last work is The Art of the Fugue, but this is not entirely true. It is established that it was practically completed in 1747 (however, the last fugue remained unfinished).

It is interesting that Bach wrote this mass knowing full well that it would never be performed. Those parts of the mass that were performed in the then Lutheran church ("Kyrie" and "Gloria") are so huge here that it is impossible to imagine them in liturgical practice. The entire mass was simply not performed in the Protestant church. And the mystery remains: why should a staunch Lutheran Protestant write an absolutely Catholic mass, moreover, “the best mass of all times and peoples”? I found this answer for myself. It lies in the fact that Bach goes far beyond Protestantism and belongs to the entirety of the Christian tradition.

For me personally, “Kyrie” from this mass is a universal church, universal cry to God. Humanity in the person of Johann Sebastian Bach managed to write such a mass, and I think this is a significant argument in favor of the fact that God did not make a mistake when creating the human world. This is the absolute archetype of man's prayer to God and the musical archetype of the liturgy.

Title page of Bach's autograph, with the caption Missa

The beginning of the 18th century is baroque, and baroque is primarily a melody. But Bach is not a melodist, he is a polyphonist. Schweitzer even considered that he had problems with melody. What was so easy for the Italians was difficult for him. But is it the main thing? With Italians, the melody can be wonderful, but empty. So what if everyone likes Albinoni's Adagio, for example, or Marcello's oboe concerto? (However, the well-known adagio is a later revision). Bach also liked a lot: he boldly, without hesitation, took someone else's piece, was inspired by it, and then completely German, very intellectual music was obtained from it.

Hence, by the way, a lot of pseudo-Bachian scores. It so happened that he liked some works, and he rewrote them. After all, he was a musical director, which means that he had to perform not only his own, while his own works were often written not by his hand: he did not have time to write down, for example, a cantata composed for the next Sunday service and harnessed the whole family: his wife wrote, children wrote...

Bach's baroque is high baroque, it is sculptural, relief music. Melody for Bach is always a symbol. All her movements - up and down - are very significant. In this music, you always imagine a certain picture: long descending and ascending lines, movement, soaring - all this is so embossed that sometimes it seems as if you actually see it. And if you are still looking at the score, then these upswings of notes are simply quite obvious there. Bach's music is a real sound recording, and sometimes a crossword puzzle, because behind the general polyphony of voices, some lines, nuances, strokes cannot be shown by any performer - they remain known only to the conductor who sees the score, and to God.

Bach. Autograph of the first sheet of "Credo"

In fact, Bach had no followers; a certain tradition ended with him. His sons, who already composed in the manner of early classicism, for a time eclipsed their father in popularity. If, in the time of Haydn and Mozart, one asked about Bach, one would first of all think of Carl Philipp Emmanuel or Johann Christian, but hardly of Johann Sebastian. Only later was the great Bach rediscovered by Mendelssohn and the circle of romantics. And although, of course, we must thank them for this, it was precisely their peculiar understanding of his music that laid the foundation for its not quite adequate performance. They heard it in a very different way, very romantic.

The great Mozart is perhaps the only composer of the second half of the 18th century who was able to truly understand Bach. That Mozart knew and appreciated Bach's music is beyond doubt. In his later works, he even used it: in particular, he made transcriptions of several Bach preludes and fugues.

Yes, Bach and Mozart are often contrasted. It is very thin matter. These two people were, of course, musical visionaries, there are no more like them in the foreseeable future. But Mozart, as I see it, did not pass his musical revelations through the ratio. He, like a medium, listened to music from heaven and wrote down. Perhaps he himself was sometimes frightened of her, did not understand, and even choked on her, as Foreman wonderfully shows in the film Amadeus. The main thing is to write it down as soon as possible... With Bach it is completely different.

Bach is a conscious prayer, penetrating through his whole being. His music is inspired by God, sometimes even ecstatic, but it is also passed through the intellect. It has an element of gnosis. Bach lives every note and moves from every note to the next note – you can feel it. Even in secular works you hear all the polyphony, the multi-layeredness of his musical fabric. When the performance is right, you feel such tension and density of the structure that it is simply impossible to add a single note to it! None of his contemporaries have this. But at the same time, all this merges into perfect harmony and is perceived even gracefully in a baroque way. How this is done is not clear. It's a miracle.

Bach was generally an aesthete. He subtly felt the specifics of each instrument. But he wrote some things without designating the instrument at all, so to speak, for some abstract instrument. Maybe you should just look at such scores and perform them inside yourself? The Art of the Fugue, for example. This is already a kind of mathematics, the “philosophy of the name” of Alexei Losev. Bach did not finish this work, but maybe the music simply went into some kind of “fourth dimension”, into some sky-high worlds of musical abstractions and eidos?

Bach monument in Leipzig

Bach often sounds in the cinema. You can remember, say, Tarkovsky or von Trier. Why? Maybe because Bach is a guide to the world of faith. From my own biography it is very clear why this is so. Bach was my first love, it was Bach who was one of those who led me to the Church and to God. As you understand, we are talking about the 70s, and, apart from the vague memories of the religiosity of my great-aunt, who went to church, prayed at night, I did not see inspirational examples next to me. But Bach's music itself is such that if one is imbued with it, it is impossible to remain an atheist. In the typical Soviet era, in the era of official atheism, it was quite natural for a person to yearn for God. But Bach could not be banned. Still, this is a musical Everest, and it is impossible to bypass it. But this Everest was talking about God all the time. And no matter how Soviet musicologists tried to get around this trouble, nothing could be done about it.

I graduated from MEPhI, Department of Theoretical Physics. This is my only higher education. Why do I need Bach - "physics of the XXI century"? Then, that Bach is needed by everyone and always - and the physics of the XXI century, just like the lyrics of the XXXV century. Everyone needs Bach's music, just as everyone needs to read the Holy Scriptures, just as everyone needs faith in Christ. The same is true of Bach's music.

Johann Sebastian Bach, whose biography is still being carefully studied, is included, according to the New York Times, in the top 10 most interesting biographies of composers.

In the same row with his name are such names as Beethoven, Wagner, Schubert, Debussy, etc.

Let us also get acquainted with this great musician in order to understand why his work has become one of the pillars of classical music.

J. S. Bach - German composer and virtuoso

The name of Bach comes to our minds one of the first when listing the great composers. Indeed, he was outstanding, as evidenced by the more than 1,000 pieces of music left over from his lifetime.

But do not forget about the second Bach - a musician. After all, both of them were true masters of their craft.

In both incarnations, Bach honed his skills throughout his life. With the end of the vocal school, the training did not end. It continued throughout life.

Proof of professionalism, in addition to surviving musical compositions, is an impressive career as a musician: from organist in the first position to director of music.

It is all the more surprising to realize that many contemporaries negatively perceived the composer's musical compositions. At the same time, the names of musicians popular in those years have practically not been preserved to this day. Only later did Mozart and Beethoven rave about the composer's work. From the beginning of the 19th century, the work of the virtuoso musician began to revive thanks to the propaganda of Liszt, Mendelssohn and Schumann.

Now, no one doubts the skill and great talent of Johann Sebastian. Bach's music is an example of the classical school. Books are written about the composer and films are made. The details of life are still the subject of research and study.

Brief biography of Bach

The first mention of the Bach family appeared in the 16th century. Among them were many famous musicians. Therefore, the choice of a profession by little Johann was expected. By the 18th century, when the composer lived and worked, they knew about 5 generations of the musical family.

Father and mother

Father - Johann Ambrosius Bach was born in 1645 in Erfurt. He had a twin brother, Johann Christoph. Along with most members of his family, Johann Ambrosius worked as a court musician and music teacher.

Mother - Maria Elisabeth Lemmerhirt was born in 1644. She was also from Erfurt. Maria was the daughter of a city councilor, a respected person in the city. The dowry left by him for his daughter was solid, thanks to which she could live comfortably in marriage.

The parents of the future musician got married in 1668. The couple had eight children.

Johann Sebastian Bach was born on March 31, 1685, becoming the youngest child in the family. They lived then in the picturesque city of Eisenach with a population of about 6,000 people. Johann's mother and father are Germans, therefore the son is also German by nationality.

When little Johann was 9 years old, Maria Elisabeth died. A year later, a few months after the registration of the second marriage, the father dies.

Childhood

The orphaned 10-year-old boy was taken in by his older brother, Johann Christoph. He worked as a music teacher and church organist.

Johann Christoph taught little Johann how to play the clavier and organ. It is the latter that is considered the composer's favorite instrument.

Little is known about this period of life. The boy studied at a city school, which he graduated at the age of 15, although usually young people 2-3 years older became her graduates. So we can conclude that the study was given to the boy easily.

Another fact from the biography is often mentioned. At night, the boy often rewrote the notes of the works of other musicians. One day, the older brother discovered this and strictly forbade doing this from now on.

Music training

After graduating from school at the age of 15, the future composer entered the St. Michael vocal school, which was located in the city of Lüneburg.

During these years, the biography of Bach, the composer, begins. During his studies from 1700 to 1703, he wrote the first organ music, gaining knowledge of modern composers.

In the same period, for the first time, he travels to the cities of Germany. In the future, he will have this passion for travel. Moreover, all of them were made for the sake of acquaintance with the work of other composers.

After graduating from a vocal school, the young man could go to university, but the need to earn a living forced him to abandon this opportunity.

Service

After graduating, J.S. Bach received a position as a musician at the court of Duke Ernst. He was just a performer, he played the violin. I haven't started writing my own musical compositions yet.

However, dissatisfied with the work, after a few months he decides to change it and becomes the organist of the Church of St. Boniface in Arndstadt. During these years, the composer created many works, mainly for the organ. That is, for the first time in the service I got the opportunity to be not only a performer, but also a composer.

Bach received a high salary, but after 3 years he decided to move because of tense relations with the authorities. Problems arose due to the fact that the musician was absent for a long time due to a trip to Lübeck. According to available information, he was released to this German city for 1 month, and he returned only after 4. In addition, the community expressed claims about the ability to lead the choir. All this together prompted the musician to change jobs.

In 1707, the musician moved to Mühlhusen, where he continued to work. In the Church of St. Blaise, he had a higher salary. Relations with the authorities developed successfully. The city government was satisfied with the performance of the new worker.

Yet a year later, Bach again moved to Weimar. In this city, he received a more prestigious position as a concert organizer. 9 years spent in Weimar became a fruitful period for the virtuoso, here he wrote dozens of works. For example, he composed "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor" for organ.

Personal life

Before moving to Weimar, in 1707, Bach married his cousin Maria Barbare. During their 13 years of marriage, they had seven children, three of whom died in infancy.

After 13 years of marriage, his wife died, and the composer remarried 17 months later. This time Anna Magdalena Wilke became his wife.

She was a talented singer and subsequently sang in a choir led by her husband. They had 13 children.

Two sons from his first marriage - Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Philipp Emmanuel - became famous composers, continuing the musical dynasty.

creative path

Since 1717, he has been working for the Duke of Anhalt-Köthen as a bandmaster. Numerous suites were written over the next 6 years. The Brandenburg Concertos also belong to this period. If in general to evaluate the direction of the composer's creative activity, then it is worth noting that during this period he wrote mainly secular works.

In 1723, Bach became a cantor (that is, organist and choir conductor), as well as a teacher of music and Latin at the Church of St. Thomas. For the sake of this, he again moves to Leipzig. In the same year, the work "Passion according to John" was performed for the first time, thanks to which the high position was received.

The composer wrote both secular and sacred music. He performed classical spiritual works in a new way. The Coffee Cantata, the Mass in B minor and many other works were composed.

If we briefly characterize the work of a musical virtuoso, then it is impossible to do without mentioning Bach's polyphony. This concept in music was known even before him, but it was during the composer's life that they began to talk about the polyphony of a free style.

In general, polyphony means polyphony. In music, two equal voices sound simultaneously, and not just melody and accompaniment. The skill of the musician is evidenced by the fact that students-musicians are still studying according to his works.

Last years of life and death

For the last 5 years of his life, the virtuoso was rapidly losing his sight. To keep composing, he had to dictate the music.

There were also problems with public opinion. Contemporaries did not appreciate Bach's music, they considered it obsolete. This was due to the flowering of classicism, which began in that period.

In 1747, three years before his death, the Music of the Offering cycle was created. It was written after the composer visited the court of Frederick II, King of Prussia. This music was meant for him.

The last work of the outstanding musician - "The Art of the Fugue" - consisted of 14 fugues and 4 canons. But he didn't get to finish it. After his death, his sons did it for him.

Some interesting moments from the life and work of the composer, musician and virtuoso:

1. After studying the history of the family, 56 musicians were found among the relatives of the virtuoso.
2. The musician's surname is translated from German as "stream".
3. Having once heard a work, the composer could repeat it without error, which he did repeatedly.
4. Throughout his life, the musician moved eight times.
5. Thanks to Bach, women were allowed to sing in church choirs. His second wife became the first chorus girl.
6. He wrote more than 1000 works in his entire life, therefore he is rightfully considered the most "prolific" author.
7. In the last years of his life, the composer was almost blind, and the operations performed on his eyes did not help.
8. The grave of the composer for a long time remained without a tombstone.
9. Until now, not all the facts of the biography are known, some of them are not confirmed by documents. Therefore, the study of his life continues.
10. Two museums dedicated to him were opened in the homeland of the musician. In 1907 a museum was opened in Eisenach, and in 1985 in Leipzig. By the way, the first museum contains a lifetime portrait of the musician, made in pastel, about which nothing was known for many years.

Bach's most famous musical compositions

All works of his authorship were combined into a single list - the BWV catalog. Each composition is assigned a number from 1 to 1127.

The catalog is convenient in that all works are divided by types of works, and not by year of writing.

To count how many suites Bach wrote, just look at their numbering in the catalog. For example, the French suites are numbered from 812 to 817. This means that a total of 6 suites were written within this cycle. In total, 21 suites and 15 parts of suites can be counted.

The most recognizable piece is the Scherzo in B minor from "Suite for Flute and String Orchestra No. 2", called "The Joke". This melody was often used for calling on mobile devices, but despite this, unfortunately, not everyone will be able to name its author.

Indeed, the titles of many of Bach's works are not well known, but their melodies will seem familiar to many. For example, Brandenburg Concertos, Goldberg Variations, Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

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 a 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 fund of world culture. This is a universal musician, who covered almost all known genres in his work. Creating immortal masterpieces, he turned each measure of his compositions into small works, then combining them into priceless creations of exceptional beauty and expressiveness, perfect in form, which vividly reflected the diverse spiritual world of man.

Read a brief biography of Johann Sebastian Bach and many interesting facts about the composer on our page.

Brief biography of Bach

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 common at that time in Germany, and talented parents sought to develop appropriate talents in their children. The boy's father, Johann Ambrosius, was an organist in the Eisenach church and court accompanist. Obviously, it was he who gave the first lessons in playing the violin and harpsichord little son.

From the biography of Bach, we learn that at the age of 10 the boy lost his parents, but was not left without a roof over his head, because he was the eighth and youngest child in the family. Ohrdruf's respected organist Johann Christoph Bach, Johann Sebastian's older brother, took care of the little orphan. Among his other students, Johann Christoph also taught his brother to play the clavier, but the manuscripts of modern composers were securely hidden by a strict teacher under lock and key so as not to spoil the taste of young performers. However, the castle did not prevent little Bach from getting acquainted with forbidden works.

Lüneburg

At the age of 15, Bach entered the prestigious Lüneburg school of church choristers, 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 Lüneburg, the young man met Georg Böhm, a famous organist, communication with whom had an impact on the composer's early work. He also repeatedly traveled to Hamburg to listen to the play of the largest representative of the German organ school A. Reinken. The first works by Bach for clavier and organ belong to the same period. After successfully completing school, Johann Sebastian receives the right to enter the university, but due to 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 accepted into the court chapel of Duke Johann Ernst of Saxony as a violinist. However, this did not last long, as 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 he was in the church of St. Boniface was initially offered the post of superintendent of the organ, and later the post of organist. A decent salary, work only three days a week, a good modernized instrument tuned to the latest system, all this created the conditions for expanding the musician's creative possibilities 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 true organ expert and a brilliant virtuoso, whose playing aroused unbridled delight among the listeners. It is in Arnstadt that his gift for improvisation is revealed, which the church leadership did not like very much. Bach always strived for perfection and did not miss the opportunity to get acquainted with famous musicians, for example, with the organist Dietrich Buxtehude, who served in the city of Lübeck. After receiving a four-week vacation, Bach went to listen to the great musician, whose playing impressed Johann so much that, forgetting about his duties, he stayed in Lübeck for four months. Upon returning to Arndstadt, the indignant leadership gave Bach a humiliating trial, after which he had to leave the city and look for a new job.

Mühlhausen

The next city on Bach's life path was Mühlhausen. Here in 1706 he won a competition for the position of organist in the church of St. Vlasia. He was accepted with a good salary, but also with a certain condition: the musical accompaniment of the chorales must be strict, without any kind of "decorations". The city authorities later treated the new organist with respect: 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 Tsar” composed by Bach, which was dedicated to the inauguration ceremony of the new consul. Staying in Mühlhausen in Bach's life 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 game of the Mühlhausen organist. Impressed by what he heard, the noble nobleman immediately offered Bach the positions of court musician and city organist with a salary much higher than before. 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 C-dur” and many other great works. It should also be noted that the composition of more than two dozen spiritual cantatas also belongs to this period. Such effectiveness in Bach's composing work was associated with his appointment in 1714 as vice-kapellmeister, whose duties included regular monthly updating of church music.

At the same time, Johann Sebastian's contemporaries were more admired by his performing arts, and he constantly heard remarks of admiration for his game. The fame of Bach as a virtuoso musician quickly spread not only in Weimar, but also beyond. Once the Dresden royal Kapellmeister invited him to compete with the famous French musician L. Marchand. However, the musical competition did not work out, since the Frenchman, having heard Bach play at a preliminary audition, secretly, without warning, left Dresden. In 1717, the Weimar period in Bach's life came to an end. Johann Sebastian dreamed of getting the place of bandmaster, but when this place became vacant, 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 Bach's biography, in 1717 he left Weimar to get a job in Köthen as a court bandmaster to Prince Anhalt of Köthen. In Köthen, Bach had to write secular music, because, as a result of the 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 this with excellent compositions. In Köthen, the musician had many students, and for their education he compiled “ Well-Tempered Clavier". These are 48 preludes and fugues that made Bach famous as a master of clavier music. When the prince 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 musical director of all churches in the city. Bach was engaged in the education and preparation of church choir performers, the selection of music, the organization and holding of concerts in the main temples of the city. Since 1729, heading the College of Music, Bach began to arrange 8 two-hour concerts of secular music a month in a Zimmermann's coffee house, adapted for orchestra performances. Having received an appointment as court composer, Bach handed over the leadership of the College of Music to his former student Karl Gerlach in 1737. In recent years, Bach often reworked his early works. In 1749 he graduated from 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 Fugue.

Interesting facts about Bach

• Bach was a recognized organ specialist. He was invited to check and tune instruments in various temples in Weimar, where he lived for quite some time. Each time impressing clients with the amazing improvisations he played to hear what the instrument in need of his work sounded like.
• Johann was bored during the service to perform monotonous chorales, and without restraining his creative impulse, he impromptu inserted his small embellishing variations into the established church music, which caused great displeasure of the authorities.
• Better known for his religious works, Bach also excelled in composing secular music, as evidenced by his Coffee Cantata. Bach presented this work full of humor as a small comic opera. Originally titled "Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht" ("Shut up, stop talking"), it describes the lyrical hero's addiction to coffee, and, not coincidentally, this cantata was first performed in the Leipzig coffee house.
• At the age of 18, Bach really wanted to get a place as an organist in Lübeck, which at that time belonged to the famous Dietrich Buxtehude. Another contender for this position was G. Handel. The main condition for taking this position was marriage to one of Buxtehude's daughters, but neither Bach nor Handel dared to sacrifice themselves like that.
• Johann Sebastian Bach really liked to dress up as a poor teacher and in this form visit small churches, where he asked the local organist to play the organ a little. Some parishioners, hearing an unusually beautiful performance for them, frightenedly left the service, thinking that the devil himself appeared in their temple in the form of a strange man.

• The Russian envoy in Saxony, Hermann von Keyserling, asked Bach to write a piece to which he could quickly fall into 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" to this day.
• Johann Sebastian was known to his contemporaries not only as an outstanding composer and virtuoso performer, but also as a man with a very difficult character, intolerant of the mistakes of others. There is a case when a bassoonist, publicly insulted by Bach for an imperfect performance, attacked Johann. A real duel took place, as both were armed with daggers.
• Bach, who was fond of numerology, liked to weave the numbers 14 and 41 into his musical works, because these numbers corresponded to the first letters of the composer's name. By the way, Bach also liked to play with his surname in his compositions: the musical decoding of the word “Bach” forms a drawing of a cross. It is this symbol that is the most important for Bach, who considers non-random similar coincidences.

• Thanks to Johann Sebastian Bach, not only men sing in church choirs today. The first woman who sang in the temple was the wife of the composer 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 complete works of Bach were published only in the second half of the twentieth century at the initiative of the Bach Institute, established 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 posterity includes only 1,200 compositions.
• To date, there are more than fifty-three thousand books and various publications about Bach in different languages, about seven thousand complete biographies of the composer have been published.
• In 1950, W. Schmider compiled a numbered catalog of Bach's works (BWV– Bach Werke Verzeichnis). This catalog has been updated several times as the data on the authorship of certain works has been clarified, and, unlike the traditional chronological principles for classifying the works of other famous composers, this catalog is built on the thematic principle. Works with close numbers belong to the same genre, and were not written at all 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 launched from Earth in 1977, attached to the Voyager spacecraft.

• Everyone knows that Beethoven suffered from hearing loss, but few people know that Bach went blind in his later years. Actually, the unsuccessful operation on the eyes, performed by the charlatan surgeon John Taylor, caused the death of the composer in 1750.
• Johann Sebastian Bach was buried near the Church of St. Thomas. Some time later, 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 transferred to the church building. However, due to the fact that the grave changed its place several times, skeptics doubt that the ashes of Johann Sebastian are in the burial.
• To date, 150 postage stamps dedicated to Johann Sebastian Bach have been issued worldwide, 90 of them published in Germany.
• Johann Sebastian Bach, the great musical genius, is treated with great reverence all over the world, monuments to him are erected in many countries, only in Germany there are 12 monuments. One of them is located in 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 Veit Bach, a simple baker, but very fond of music and perfectly performing folk melodies on his favorite instrument - the zither. This passion from the founder of the family 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. Within two hundred years, there were so many Bach musicians that any person whose occupation was connected with music began to be named after them. 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, the city where Bach was born.

Johann Sebastian himself was the father of a large family: from two wives he had twenty children. He first married his beloved cousin Maria Barbara, daughter of Johann Michael Bach, in 1707. Maria bore Johann Sebastian seven children, three of whom died in infancy. Maria herself also did not live a long life, she died at the age of 36, leaving Bach four young children. Bach was very upset by 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-Keten 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 housework, cared for the children, sincerely rejoiced at the success of her husband and provided great assistance in the work, rewriting his scores. The family for Bach was a great joy, he devoted a lot of time to raising children, making music with them and composing special exercises. In the evenings, the family very often arranged impromptu concerts, which brought joy to everyone. Bach's children had excellent natural gifts, but four of them had exceptional musical talent - these are Johann Christoph Friedrich, Carl Philipp Emanuel, Wilhelm Friedemann and Johann Christian. They also 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 performing.

Works of Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach was one of the most prolific composers, his heritage in the treasury of world musical culture includes about 1200 immortal masterpieces. There was only one inspirer in Bach's work - this is the Creator. Johann Sebastian dedicated almost all his works to him and at the end of the scores he always signed letters that were an abbreviation of 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 it. According to the composer, even the smallest instrumental piece should indicate the wisdom of the Creator.

Johann Sebastian Bach wrote his works in virtually all musical genres known at that time, except for opera. 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 around 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 « Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach » . Then little preludes and fugues are studied, followed by inventions, and finally « Well-Tempered Clavier » but this is high school.

Notable works by Johann Sebastian also include " Matthew Passion”, “Mass in B Minor”, ​​“Christmas Oratorio”, “John Passion” and, undoubtedly, “ Toccata and Fugue in D Minor". And the cantata "The Lord is my King" is still heard at festive services in churches in different parts of the world.

Films about Bach

The great composer, being the largest figure in the world musical culture, has always attracted close attention, therefore, a lot of books have been written on Bach's biography and his work, as well as feature films and documentaries. There are quite a lot of them, but the most significant of them are:

• "The Vain Journey of Johann Sebastian Bach to Glory" (1980, East Germany) - a biographical film tells about the difficult fate of the composer, who traveled all his life in search of "his" place in the sun.
• "Bach: The Fight for Freedom" (1995, Czech Republic, Canada) is a feature film that tells about the intrigues in the palace of the old duke, which began around Bach's rivalry with the best organist of the orchestra.
• "Dinner with Four Hands" (1999, Russia) is a feature film that shows the meeting of two composers, Handel and Bach, which never took place in reality, but is so desired.
• "My name is Bach" (2003) - the film takes the audience to 1747, at the time when Johann Sebastian Bach arrived at the court of the Prussian King Frederick II.
• The Chronicle of Anna Magdalena Bach (1968) and Johann Bach and Anna Magdalena (2003) - the films show Bach's relationship with his second wife, an able student of her husband.
• “Anton Ivanovich is angry” is a musical comedy in which there is an episode: Bach appears to the main character in a dream and says that he was terribly bored writing countless choruses, and he always dreamed of writing a cheerful operetta.
• "Silence before Bach" (2007) is a musical film that helps to immerse yourself in the world of Bach's music, which turned the Europeans' understanding of harmony that existed before him.

Of the documentaries about the famous composer, it is necessary to note such films as: “Johann Sebastian Bach: life and work, in two parts” (1985, USSR); "Johann Sebastian Bach" (series "German Composers" 2004, Germany); "Johann Sebastian Bach" (series "Famous Composers" 2005, USA); "Johann Sebastian Bach - composer and theologian" (2016, Russia).

The music of Johann Sebastian, filled with philosophical content, and also having a great emotional impact on a person, was often used by directors in the soundtracks for their films, for example:

Despite the ups and downs, Johann Sebastian Bach wrote a huge number of amazing compositions. The composer's work was continued by his famous sons, but none of them could surpass his father either in writing or in performing music. The name of the author of passionate and pure, incredibly talented and unforgettable works stands at the top of the world of music, and his recognition as a great composer continues to this day.

Video: watch a film about Johann Sebastian Bach