Scan 54
The American history and encyclopedia of music, 1910
19 lines. Read by computer on 7 September 2026. Printed page 32. See the scan on archive.org.
1Bach
2which his conception of the church cantata had been through long years the preparation. The Passions according to St. John and St. Matthew lie before us as the noblest monuments of Bach's spirit. Each is in truth incomparable, whether in relation to the other, or to the rest of sacred music. The St. John Passion is the perfection of church-music; the St. Matthew reaches the goal of all sacred art, while its colossal dimensions take it, almost, happily not quite, out of the range of church performance." The Mass in B Minor was written probably for production in the Leipsic churches. On it, it is said, Bach put all his strength and consecrated every resource of inspiration and art, every possibility of voice and instrument. To quote again from Poole, "Words, however, can give but a very faint impression of this masterpiece of universal Christendom; and daring with forced fingers rude, to touch its perfect outline, I leave inviolate the lyrical tenderness of the Agnus Dei and the yearning desire of the Dona nobis pacem, the restful consummation of the whole, nor can I describe the infinite fertility of the design, the happy frequency with which, in the arias, a single instrument, violin, flute, hautboy or horn, is made to enhance the delicacy of the human voice; or the splendor of the grouping of the orchestra, equally noble in sonorous magnificence and in chastened softness. Whether in its art or in its religion, the High Mass stands among the creations of Bach's master-spirit, first and alone, and for its sole equal the Passion according to Saint Matthew."
4One writer has said, "It is not too much to assert, that without Sebastian Bach and his matchless studies for the piano, organ and orchestra, we could not have had the varied musical development, in sonata and symphony from such masters as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven." Apthorp, a musical critic of ability, has said of Bach, "No one man has left so deep a mark on the history of music, nor has exerted so strong and far-reaching an influence upon the subsequent development of the art as he. In a word, Sebastian Bach is the great source and fountain-head from whom well nigh all that is best and most enduring in modern music has been derived."
6Bach
7BIBLIOGRAPHY.
8Bach, Emanuel and Agricola, J F.—Necrology, published in the Musikalische Bibliothek in 1754.
9Bitter, C. H.—Life of Bach.
10Forkel, J. N.—Life of Bach.
11Poole, R. L.—Sebastian Bach.
12Shuttleworth, Kay—Life of Bach.
13Spitta, J. A. P.—Biography of Johann Sebastian Bach, 2 vols. (Standard and exhaustive work.)
14Thorne, E. H.—Bach.
15Williams, C. F. A.—Bach.
17Bach, Karl Philipp Emanuel. 1714-1788.
18The third son of Johann Sebastian Bach, and although the least gifted musically, he became, on account of his capacity for work, the most famous. His father intended that he should study philosophy and he was educated at the Thomas School, Leipsic, and later studied law at Frankfort, but his inherited love of music was too strong and the musical training he had received from his father too thorough, to allow him to become anything but a musician. While at Frankfort he composed some music for a singing society, which he conducted there. In 1738 he went to Berlin and in 1746 was appointed chamber-musician to Frederick the Great. This position he held until 1767, when he went to Hamburg, where he remained until his death as music-director of the principal church. Emanuel Bach was great as a composer, a teacher and a director and was also a man of much culture and refinement. He is considered the real founder of the modern school of piano playing and is said to be the link between his father and Handel on the one hand and Haydn and Mozart on the other. His most pronounced characteristic was, perhaps, his great attention to form and finish, which, in his day, were considered the chief requisites of music. He was a most voluminous composer, his instrumental works being the most valuable. He wrote two hundred and ten solo pieces for the piano; two beautiful sonatas for the violin and piano; eighteen orchestral works; fifty-two concertos with orchestral accompaniments; thirty-four compositions for wind instruments; beside pieces for the flute, oboe and violoncello. His vocal works consisted of two ora-
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