The life and works of Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was born in Eisenach, Germany in March 1685. He was the all-time greatest composer of religious and secular music. During his lifetimes, he composed more than a thousand works in all major musical forms, including hundreds of cantatas, oratorios, motets, and liturgical pieces, as well as many concertos, preludes, fantasies, fugues, sonatas, and suites. Bach’s three-and-a-half-century legacy of music is treasured all over the world, making him the pillar of classical music and a paragon among other composers.
Despite his importance today, Bach was not a well-known musician during his life. He had to fight for every opportunity that he got, successfully petitioning for additional duties and charges from employers. Even then, he was not adequately rewarded, and often had to bargain to make sure that he received the payment he deserved. His most successful work was directing performances of the vocal-instrumental works he wrote. He was able to establish professional ensembles at the courts of Anhalt-Cöthen and Leipzig, giving him the chance to showcase his music to a wider audience. Bach was also famously quarrelsome, leading to a number of conflicts with authorities and even lawsuits.
Bachs main output of works can be divided into four general categories: church music, instrumental music, secular cantatas, and chamber music. He wrote a great number of sacred works, such as Masses, Passions and Magnificats, all in major keys such as E-flat major and D major. His instrumental compositions include three keyboard concertos and two violin concertos. His secular cantatas, of which about 200 survive, were mostly composed for civic occasions. Lastly, Bachs chamber music is divided into two categories: sonatas and suites.
A major aspect of Bachs music was his employment of counterpoint, which allowed him to impart articulation and form to his works. He also employed a variety of voice melodies and harmonic devices, creating an incredibly memorable and individual sound. This style of writing is particularly evident in his operas, cantatas and motets, where many voices move in different directions, creating a complex and extremely rich texture. Such intricacy was common among baroque composers, yet Bachs work was far more complex and bold than the pieces of his contemporaries.
Though Bach was a composer, performer, teacher and promoter of musicians, he was also a scholar, studying music theory and using it as a foundation for his own music. His writings, including the Krebs-Bach Treatise on the Fundamental Principles of Music and the Art of Fingering Keyboard Instruments, provided students and other musicians of the time with a thorough understanding of music theory and instruction on how to apply it.
In the late 18th century, Bach was rediscovered by composers such as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, and his popularity grew. By the 19th century, he was revered as the greatest composers of all time and his works began to be published and performed all over the world. He was canonized as the “father of modern music”, and his influence is still felt today. Today, his compositions are performed by some of the finest orchestras and artists in the world, and his music is a cornerstone of classical music.
In conclusion, Johann Sebastian Bachs music stands out for its creativity, complexity, innovation and longevity. His works are beloved and admired by music-lovers all over the world and continue to inspire musicians even today. His life was marked by his unending search for perfection and his willingness to push the boundaries of music. He was, and continues to be, an undeniable genius.
