Mr. Lin
Lunatic Member
Lately I just cannot get enough of his music, namely that for solo instruments, particularly when it's played on a harpsichord.
But one thing I noticed is that I clearly prefer his aforementioned types of music to others, like, for example, the wildly popular (in the world of classical music) Brandenburg Concertos. Perhaps I just need more time with these, and something will click later, but with the Brandenburg Concertos I hear skillfully composed and pleasant music. With something like "The Art of Fugue," on the other hand, I hear true genius. Maybe it's just a matter of taste?
Today I started reading Bach: The Learned Musician, by Christoph Wolff. In the prologue Wolff explains how Bach's most infamous and accomplished works cover a range of compositional techniques, and lays some of them out in the following manner:
-fugue and canon (The Art of Fugue)
-major-minor tonality (Well Tempered-Clavier)
-harmonic expansion (the Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue)
-extended polyphony (the unaccompanied violin, cello, and flute pieces)
-instrumentation (Brandenburg Concertos)
...[here I skip one]
-small-scale form (the Orgel Buechlein) and large-scale form (the St. Matthew Passion)
-style and compositional technique, from retrospective to modern (the B-Minor Mass) *
As someone who could at best be considered an amateur musician, this is the first time Bach's work has been laid out for me this way. I'm familiar with fugue and canon, for example, and obviously "The Art of Fugue" is an example of that. I suppose my point is that I didn't realize how academic Bach's approach to composing music was. Wolff describes it as scientific, which is really a much more accurate way to put it.
So this is another way to look at Bach's music, and one more reason to admire his work. Thus I find myself powerfully drawn to the second example in that list, books I and II of "Das Wohltemperierte Klavier" ("The Well-Tempered Clavier"). I now have both sets (books I and II) of this on the Musica Omnia label, performed on a harpsichord that was tuned using the recently discovered well-tempered tuning that many now believe was Bach's original intention, and the meaning of the title of the work itself. Listening to these discs, night after night, I feel like I've discovered something in the world of music I'll still be trying to wrap my head around decades from now.
I find myself similarly mesmerized by his "English Suites", "The Art of Fugue," and a newly acquired CD of his complete "Orgel Buechlein."
Has anyone else looked at Bach's music this way? Regardless of the answer to that question, do you find you prefer some of his music, but don't care for other pieces?
*Wolff, Christoph, Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician. New York, London: W.W. Norton and Company, 2001.
But one thing I noticed is that I clearly prefer his aforementioned types of music to others, like, for example, the wildly popular (in the world of classical music) Brandenburg Concertos. Perhaps I just need more time with these, and something will click later, but with the Brandenburg Concertos I hear skillfully composed and pleasant music. With something like "The Art of Fugue," on the other hand, I hear true genius. Maybe it's just a matter of taste?
Today I started reading Bach: The Learned Musician, by Christoph Wolff. In the prologue Wolff explains how Bach's most infamous and accomplished works cover a range of compositional techniques, and lays some of them out in the following manner:
-fugue and canon (The Art of Fugue)
-major-minor tonality (Well Tempered-Clavier)
-harmonic expansion (the Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue)
-extended polyphony (the unaccompanied violin, cello, and flute pieces)
-instrumentation (Brandenburg Concertos)
...[here I skip one]
-small-scale form (the Orgel Buechlein) and large-scale form (the St. Matthew Passion)
-style and compositional technique, from retrospective to modern (the B-Minor Mass) *
As someone who could at best be considered an amateur musician, this is the first time Bach's work has been laid out for me this way. I'm familiar with fugue and canon, for example, and obviously "The Art of Fugue" is an example of that. I suppose my point is that I didn't realize how academic Bach's approach to composing music was. Wolff describes it as scientific, which is really a much more accurate way to put it.
So this is another way to look at Bach's music, and one more reason to admire his work. Thus I find myself powerfully drawn to the second example in that list, books I and II of "Das Wohltemperierte Klavier" ("The Well-Tempered Clavier"). I now have both sets (books I and II) of this on the Musica Omnia label, performed on a harpsichord that was tuned using the recently discovered well-tempered tuning that many now believe was Bach's original intention, and the meaning of the title of the work itself. Listening to these discs, night after night, I feel like I've discovered something in the world of music I'll still be trying to wrap my head around decades from now.
I find myself similarly mesmerized by his "English Suites", "The Art of Fugue," and a newly acquired CD of his complete "Orgel Buechlein."
Has anyone else looked at Bach's music this way? Regardless of the answer to that question, do you find you prefer some of his music, but don't care for other pieces?
*Wolff, Christoph, Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician. New York, London: W.W. Norton and Company, 2001.
Regards, Felix aka catman.
