Method of Composing

Johann Sebastian Bach

II LIFE

Early Life
Arnstadt: 1703-1707
Mühlhausen: 1707-1708
Weimar: 1708-1717
Köthen: 1717-1723

Leipzig: 1723-1750

III WORKS

Cantatas

Motets
Oratorios and Passions
Magnificat and B-Minor Mass
Organ Work
Clavier Works
Works for Solo Instruments
Works for Instrumental Ensemble
Musical Offering, Canonic Variations, Art of Fugue

Method of Composing

As a composer living in an age when new music was required on a weekly—if not daily—basis, Bach was accustomed to writing works with great speed. On good days he appears to have been able to compose highly refined masterpieces without the aid of sketches or drafts—almost as one would write a letter. Because Bach was under pressure to produce vast quantities of music, he often pulled a previously written piece off the shelf and revised it for a new occasion. Thus violin concertos from Köthen reappear in Leipzig as harpsichord concertos, or secular birthday cantatas resurface, with new words, as Sunday church music. The B-Minor Mass, for instance, appears to consist almost wholly of revised cantata movements from earlier periods. This procedure, which might be viewed as plagiarism in modern times, was accepted as a practical recycling process in the Baroque era, and Bach frequently used it to update early works and bring the music they contained to an even higher state of beauty.

IV THE REVIVAL OF BACH’S MUSIC

Musical Offering, Canonic Variations, Art of Fugue

Johann Sebastian Bach

II LIFE

Early Life
Arnstadt: 1703-1707
Mühlhausen: 1707-1708
Weimar: 1708-1717
Köthen: 1717-1723

Leipzig: 1723-1750

III WORKS

Cantatas

Motets
Oratorios and Passions
Magnificat and B-Minor Mass
Organ Work
Clavier Works
Works for Solo Instruments
Works for Instrumental Ensemble

Musical Offering, Canonic Variations, Art of Fugue

In the last decade of his life Bach demonstrated his consummate achievements as a master of counterpoint in three works devoted to the craft of strict fugue and canon. The Musical Offering, BWV 1079, based on a theme proposed by Frederick the Great during Bach’s 1747 visit to Berlin, contains two large ricercares (old-fashioned fugues in Renaissance vocal style), a trio sonata, and a sequence of puzzle canons (canons that need to be solved). In 1747 Bach also composed the Canonic Variations on Vom Himmel Hoch, BWV 769, to mark his entry into the Society of Musical Sciences, whose select membership of 20 composers and theorists included George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann. Based on the Christmas chorale “From heaven above to earth I come,” the variations present a sequence of five elaborate canons for an organ with two manuals and pedal.

Die Kunst der Fuge (“The Art of Fugue”), BWV 1080, once thought to date from Bach’s final year, is now known to have been compiled over a period of a decade or more. Around 1740 Bach assembled the core of the collection: a series of fugues and canons of increasing complexity, all based on the same principal theme. In the first version of the collection, the fugues include pieces for one, two, and three subjects. At the very end of his life Bach picked up the collection once again, this time with an eye to publishing it, perhaps as yet another part of the Clavierübung series. He revised and expanded the music, and added a climactic concluding fugue for four subjects, the last of which spelled in music his own name: B A C H (with B as B-flat and H as B-natural in the German scale). Bach died before bringing the gigantic quadruple fugue to an end, however, and the music breaks off, unfinished, in the 239th measure. The incomplete collection was printed after his death by members the family. Although The Art of Fugue is commonly performed on various combinations of instruments—strings, brass, woodwinds, full orchestra, or even saxophone quartet—it is clear that Bach intended the piece for keyboard (harpsichord or possibly organ).

Method of Composing

IV THE REVIVAL OF BACH’S MUSIC

Works for Instrumental Ensemble

Johann Sebastian Bach

II LIFE

Early Life
Arnstadt: 1703-1707
Mühlhausen: 1707-1708
Weimar: 1708-1717
Köthen: 1717-1723

Leipzig: 1723-1750

III WORKS

Cantatas

Motets
Oratorios and Passions
Magnificat and B-Minor Mass
Organ Work
Clavier Works
Works for Solo Instruments

Works for Instrumental Ensemble

Bach’s works for instrumental ensemble include the famous six Brandenburg Concertos of 1721 (BWV 1046-1051), which summarize the art of the Italian and German concerto. They are perhaps the most famous group of chamber pieces ever written. Concertos 1, 3, and 6 are ensemble concertos of the type much favored in Germany at the time: contrasting, but evenly balanced, choirs of instruments play together and alternately, spinning forth the melodic material in marvelously varied combinations. Concertos 2, 4, and 5 are solo concertos, in which three or four solo instruments alternate with the tutti, or full band. Of these more progressive, Vivaldi-oriented works, No. 5 deserves special mention since Bach uses the harpsichord as one of the solo instruments, giving it a fiendishly difficult part that includes a long solo cadenza toward the end of the first movement. This work constitutes the first keyboard concerto ever written.

Although the Brandenburg Concertos are rich in polyphonic devices, they are enjoyed by listeners unaware of the intricacy of Bach’s counterpoint. The concertos exude a spirit of exuberance and optimism that delights as much today as it must have in Bach’s time. In these masterpieces melodic inspiration, coloristic subtlety, and technical craftsmanship match each other in a way that is rare even in Bach’s output.

A similar affirmative sparkle emanates from the four orchestral suites (BWV 1066-1069), each consisting of an overture in the French style (made up of a majestic slow introduction followed by a spirited fugue) and a series of enchanting dance movements. The Suite in C Major and the two Suites in D Major are products of Bach’s Köthen years. The stylish Suite in B Minor, BWV 1067, for flute and strings, seems to be a Leipzig collegium piece, written perhaps for a visiting virtuoso flute player from Dresden.

The concertos for one, two, three, and even four harpsichords are among the most forward-looking pieces Bach wrote. Composed for himself (the first harpsichord part in the multiple concertos is always more difficult than the others) and his gifted sons and students, the works are mostly derived from earlier concertos for violin or oboe or both. Nevertheless, Bach’s inventive handling of the harpsichord and orchestra parts points to the drama and fanciful play of the later piano concertos of Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven.

Musical Offering, Canonic Variations, Art of Fugue
Method of Composing

IV THE REVIVAL OF BACH’S MUSIC