Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach (German: Johann Sebastian Bach, March 31, 1685 - July 28, 1750 ) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. He is best known for his instrumental works, such as the Brandenburg Concertos and the Goldberg Variations, as well as vocal music, such as the Passion of St. Matthew and the Mass in B minor. Since the Bach revival of the 19th century, he is generally regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time.

Johann Sebastian Bach was the last child of a city musician in Eisenach. When he was born, the Bach family already had several composers. After being orphaned at the age of 10, he lived with his eldest brother Johann Christoph for five years, after which he continued his musical career in Lüneburg. From 1703 he worked in Thuringia. At the Weimar court he expanded his repertoire; at the K?then court he composed mainly chamber music. In 1723 he was hired as cantor of St. Thomas' Church in Leipzig. He composed for the city's Lutheran churches and for its university's conservatoire. Beginning in 1726, he published some music for keyboard and organ. In Leipzig, as had happened in some of his earlier positions, he had a difficult relationship with his employer, causing difficulties in his life. After 1736, and during the last fourteen years of his life, he redesigned and expanded many of his earlier works. Bach died of complications following eye surgery in 1750 at the age of 65.

Chinese name: Johann Sebastian Bach

Foreign name: Johann Sebastian Bach

Alias: JSBACH/J.S. Bach

Nationality: German

Ethnicity: German

Birthplace: Germany - Thuringia - Eisenach

Date of birth: March 1685 21st (Julian calendar) March 31st (Gregorian calendar)

Date of death: July 28, 1750

Occupation: Organist, conductor, composer Home

Graduation School: St. Michael's School

Faith: Lutheran Christian

Main Achievements: The Father of Western (European) Music

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Representative works: "Brandenburg Concerto", "Matthew Passion", "Mass in B Minor", "Well-Tempered Clavier"

Place of death: Leipzig, Germany

Aged: 65 years old

Music: Baroque

Good at music: organ music, religious music, concertos

Father: John Ann Brosius Bach

Mother: Maria Elisabeth Lemocht

Language spoken: German

Life of the character

Family Origin

Johann Sebastian Bach was born on March 21, 1685 in Eisenach in the Dulingen Forest in central Germany. Eisenach is built according to the mountains. The terrain is undulating and the roads are paved with bluestone slabs. It is a small mountain town with a fairy tale atmosphere in central Germany. This place has a deep musical origin. During the Middle Ages, troubadours and court musicians performed and competed in Eisenach. It can be said that it is the birthplace of German music. Although this is only a small town, its citizens love music - it is said that the words "Music always shines in our town" are engraved on the city's ancient city gate. Medieval singers often held harps and sang poems and held singing competitions here. Wagner once created the famous opera "Don Hauser" based on this. Martin Luther, the sixteenth-century religious reformer, also translated the Bible into German here. The Bach family is an authentic musical family. His family had been famous in the music industry many years before his death.

His father is an excellent violinist, two of his grandfather's brothers are talented composers, and several of his uncles and siblings are respected musicians. For the young Bach, who had extremely high musical talent, he was very lucky to grow up in such a family. However, fate wanted to find some trouble: he lost his mother when he was 9 years old and his father when he was 10 years old, so he had to rely on his elder brother to continue raising him. . The elder brother taught him a lot of valuable knowledge. However, there was a large amount of music materials stored at home, but his brother did not allow him to browse and study because the music scores were very precious and the paper for copying them was also expensive. Bach had no choice but to take advantage of his brother's absence from home and his deep sleep late at night to secretly copy down his beloved music scores one by one under the moonlight. This lasted for half a year, which greatly damaged his eyesight. He suffered from blindness until his death.

Leaving home to pursue a career

When Bach was fifteen years old, he left home alone and embarked on the road of independent life. With his beautiful singing voice and excellent playing skills on the harpsichord, violin, and organ, he was admitted to the choir attached to St. Michael's Church in Lunaiburg, and at the same time entered the theological school. The library here contains a rich collection of classical music works, in which Bach fully absorbed and integrated the artistic achievements of various European schools, broadening his musical horizons. In order to practice the piano, he often stayed up all night and stayed up all night. Every holiday, he would walk dozens of miles to Hamburg to listen to performances by famous musicians.

Employment and fame

He graduated from Saint-Michel in 1702 and became a violinist in a chamber band the next year. In the following twenty years, he worked in many professions. During his lifetime, Bach was primarily known as an outstanding organist, although he was also a composer, teacher, and orchestra conductor. In 1723, when Bach was thirty-eight years old, he began to serve as cantor of the choir at St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, a role he held for the remaining twenty-seven years of his life.

Weimar Era (1708~1717)

Bach performed his oratorio "God is My King, BWV71", and resigned in the same year to accept a more lucrative position: Served as court orchestrator to Duke Wilhelm Ernst of Weimar; became music director in 1714. It was in Weimarbach that he composed most of his organ works, discovered Vivaldi's music for the first time, and began composing concertos. In 1717 he accepted the post of Prince Leopold of Anhalt from Corden; but his resignation was blocked by Wilhelm Ernst, who even imprisoned him until he was relieved of his obligations.

The Ketten Era (1717～1723)

The days in Ketten were the golden age in Bach's life. During this period, he created a large number of outstanding secular and religious music such as the first volume of "The Well-Tempered Clavier", which is known as the "Old Testament of keyboard music", and the "Brandenburg Concerto", which is a milestone in the history of orchestral music development. At the same time, Bach also served in the Cotten Palace. The Hall of Mirrors in the Cotten Palace is very gorgeous, and there is also a statue of Bach.

In 1724, Bach’s master, Prince Ketten, seemed to have lost interest in music, so he resigned from his position in the court and came to Leipzig as the music director (music director) of St. Thomas Church School. There he spent the remaining 27 years of his life.

Since then, the town of K?ten has been full of vitality because of Bach’s music: its choir has used Bach’s name since 1906, the “Bach Music Festival” was founded in 1935, and in 1967, a memorial ceremony was held here to commemorate Bach. On the 250th anniversary of the service, the "Bach Music Festival" and "Bach Music Competition" were held in turn, and this has been continued as a tradition to this day, and the organizers at that time were established, which is today's "Keltenbach Society". In 1983, the K?ten Historical Museum opened the "Bach Memorial Hall".

The Leipzig Era (1723~1750)

The Leipzig Period was the longest period in Bach’s life and the period in which he created the most. At this time, Bach had reached the level of proficiency in both his playing skills and composition level. The masterpieces he composed in Leipzig include the touching "Mass in B Minor" and "Matthew Passion", the second volume of "The Well-Tempered Clavier" and "The Art of Fugue" which reflects his profound composition skills. .

In 1747, while traveling to Potsdam, the uncrowned king of music was summoned by another king, King Frederick II of Prussia, and performed an impromptu performance. The audience present was all impressed. The next year, Bach developed the theme of this performance and wrote another work summarizing his composition and performance art - "Musical Devotion".

In Leipzig, Bach spent 27 years as the conductor of the St. Thomas Male Chorus. Due to his long-term overuse of his eyes, Bach's eyesight decreased and he suffered from cataracts and blindness in his later years, but he still continued to compose through dictation. . A few days before his death, he was still dictating a public hymn, "Toward the Altar of the Lord." Every note of the music expresses the old man's last sincere prayer before his death, and it ends abruptly at the 26th measure, becoming the master's final work.

On the night of July 28, 1750, Bach’s life came to an end and he died in Leipzig. Three days later, Johann Sebastian Bach was buried in the churchyard of St. John's Church in Leipzig.

Children of marriage

When Bach was twenty-one, he married his cousin Maria Barbara, who was one year older. They raised seven children in one marriage. Children, but his wife died when Bach was thirty-five. The next year Bach married his second wife, Magdalena, and they lived a happy life and gave birth to thirteen new family members. After Bach's death, only nine children survived, four of whom grew up to be famous musicians.

Main works

In the catalog of Bach's works, the BWV used is the abbreviation of the German "BachWerkeVerzeichnis", which means "Bach's catalog of works". This classification system was completed in 1950 by Wolfgang Schmieder. This classification is based on genre rather than the year in which the work was created.

Creative style

Theme style

Bach's works are deep, tragic, broad and intrinsic, full of the atmosphere of real life in Germany in the first half of the 18th century. He was deeply religious and a Lutheran. He wanted his music to serve the church, and most of his compositions were religious music. His music reflects the thoughts of ordinary citizens living in Germany in the 18th century.

He is deeply affected by the pain that life has brought him, and has rich and profound feelings about life. Although he is passive and surrendered, he has not yet seen a way to change his life. But he felt that a person must have a strong will, a noble belief, a spirit of self-sacrifice - this is the main content that Bach reflected in his art. His works reflect this humanistic thought among German citizens in the eighteenth century from different angles and using different images.

He is the last great religious artist. He believes that music is "the harmonious sound of praising God" and praising God is the central content of human life. His music originally grew out of Lutheran hymns known as hymns. It can be seen through the melody that the composer combined the popular popular sounds of the time. He has no intention of innovating in musical form, but pushing existing forms to the top.

Bach’s works contain certain philosophical and ethical significance, but his form of expression is not abstract or dogmatic. On the contrary, in his works, philosophical and ethical thoughts are closely integrated with lyricism and scene description. Although he does not use as many modeling techniques as Handel, in order to express certain inner emotions, Bach does not avoid using the depiction of natural scenery. (Such as wind blowing, river). The indirectness of Bach's musical content determines the liveliness and comprehensiveness of his musical style. There is no clear distinction between Bach's vocal style and instrumental style. He created a new style of vocal and instrumental music synthesis.

Vocal works

He composed many large-scale vocal works full of dramatic elements, among which "Matthew Passion" and "Mass in B Minor" are the most influential works. In these works, Bach, as a devout Protestant, expressed his pity and sympathy for human disasters and suffering through religious music forms (passions, masses, motets, cantatas, etc.), as well as his hope for a peaceful and happy future. desire. Among Bach's vocal works, cantatas are the most colorful.

Bach gave full play to his clavichord playing skills and invented the keyboard fingering method of using five fingers together. Before Bach, the keyboards of organ and fortepiano were played without thumbs and only with four fingers. Bach invented the thumb fingering method, which laid the foundation for today's piano fingering. After the invention of this new fingering method, the skills of keyboard instruments were very developed. Pure "music" is the art of "sound" and has nothing to do with words and poetry. Of course, it cannot be "singed" with vocal music, but must be "played" with instrumental music. Therefore, the development of instrumental music means the formation and development of pure music. Bach developed instrumental music into a new and independent art form, freeing music from the constraints of other arts and liberating it into a free and independent art. Bach is therefore known as the "Father of Music" in the West.

Secondly, Bach initially applied the twelve-well-tempered scale in composition. The "Twelve Equal Temperament Scale" is to divide the intervals of a scale into twelve equal parts, and determine that one part is divided into semitones and the other two parts are whole steps. This music theory was advocated by French music theorist Rameau. But it is just a theory and has never been implemented. Bach was the first person to apply this music theory to composition and achieved satisfactory results. The use of average rate makes modulation (a composition that fixes a certain key and changes to another key on the way) very free, and the fugue of polyphonic music is therefore very developed. Fugue usually consists of three parts: presentation, development and recapitulation. The basic feature is to use imitative counterpoint to make a short and characteristic theme appear once in each part of the music in turn; then it enters an interlude developed from part of the theme's motives, and then the theme and interlude appear in each part. Different new keys appear again and again; the theme should return to the original key at the end, and often ends with a coda. The development of fugue had a great influence on the later development of sonata form. The use of average rate also allows musicians to use chromatic harmony very freely, making the harmonic effect more novel and rich. Bach himself used the harmony of the chromatic scale to compose the "Chromatic Scale Fantasy".

When Bach was alive, his works were not understood by people. He had neither a prominent position nor social recognition. In 1829, Mendelssohn conducted Bach's "Matthew Passion" in Leipzig, and from then on the world began to pay attention to Bach. Mozart and Beethoven found him valuable. They were struck by the depth, perfection and impeccability of Bach's music. When Beethoven saw some of Bach's works for the first time, he couldn't help but exclaimed: "It's not a stream (Bach's name in German means "brook"), it's the sea!" In 1829, Mendel Song resurrected Bach's "Matthew Passion" in an epoch-making performance in Berlin. Chopin practiced Bach's works before giving his concerts, Liszt transcribed some of Bach's organ works for piano, and Schumann was one of the founders of the Bach Society, the organization responsible for publishing complete versions of the master's works. Huge task. Today, traveling around the world, Bach’s music can be heard everywhere. Among them, many works have long been listed as required textbooks for students in art academies and as entries in major international music competitions. Bach is known as the "unsurpassable master" and even the "father of modern European music".

Character Evaluation

Karajan once said: "The first thing every morning is to listen to Bach's music. It is like the music of a clear spring flowing through the soul, which helps me correct my hearing." "If you are a music lover, not listening to Bach's music is like missing out on the entire Baroque.

Bach’s music is just like the person he is, with clear spring-like tones that always express emotions implicitly. When you carefully analyze his musical style, the emotions may have reached the bottom of your heart before you even react. Bach's music creation paved the way for future generations, just like philosophers or mathematicians.

French music critic Paul Landour said: "The purpose of Bach's creation was not for future generations, nor even for the Germany of his time. His ambitions did not go beyond his city, Even within the confines of his church.

Every week he just worked for the next Sunday, preparing a new work or revising an old piece; after the work was performed, he put it back in the bookcase, never thinking about taking it out. I came to publish it without even thinking of saving it for my own use. There is no other masterpiece in the world that is so innocently conceived and executed! ”

Goethe once commented on Bach’s music very insightfully: “Just like the dialogue of eternal harmony itself, just like the flow in my heart before God created the world, I seem to have no ears, let alone Eyes, no other senses, and I don't need to use them, there is a rhythm inside, flowing out. "

Lesing, the great German playwright and political commentator, once said: "Even if geniuses are not born in extremely poor classes, they are still born in very difficult classes. ”