[HN Gopher] Bach's Accidental Masterpiece
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Bach's Accidental Masterpiece
Author : tintinnabula
Score : 42 points
Date : 2022-12-20 20:54 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.newstatesman.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.newstatesman.com)
| kazinator wrote:
| > _according to the musical disposition of that day, he was
| generations behind it". He used forms - particularly the fugue -
| that were unfashionable in the early 18th century._
|
| All the music from the Bach era (1680s to 1750s) that is
| emphasized today has a great deal in common with J. S. Bach. Bach
| is just a cut better at it.
|
| Bach didn't just write fugues, and he gave them fun preludes when
| he did.
|
| From a historic perspective, Bach's music cannot be called
| anachronistic w.r.t. his period, when taken together with other
| music from the period which survives.
|
| Hey, look, these three guys were 1685 babies:
|
| J.S. Bach: 1685 - 1750
|
| Scarlatti: 1685 - 1757
|
| Handel: 1685 - 1759
|
| A little senior:
|
| Vivaldi: 1679 - 1741
|
| Telemann: 1681 - 1767
|
| Lol, everyone I can think of off the top of my head is clustered
| around 1680.
|
| If one of them made old, unfashionable music, they all must have.
| jacquesm wrote:
| That music will be played and played _long_ after our societies
| are dust and forgotten.
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| Rameau, who had a pretty different style from Bach (taking
| after Couperin and the French style) was 1683.
| ramesh31 wrote:
| Am I alone in finding Gould intolerable? I don't have the musical
| expertise to criticize him technically in depth, but I can best
| describe his interpretations as "robotic" sounding. Like
| listening to a player piano.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Gould played Bach the way it is written, perfect tempo, minimal
| ornamentation, that may come across as 'robotic' to you but
| it's actually the style that most people that are into baroque
| favor.
|
| If you don't like Gould for Bach may I suggest Dinu Lipatti?
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7PNFDrcqmY
|
| And if you had not heard about him maybe dive a bit deeper and
| see what else you like, he's an amazing pianist that
| unfortunately was born before really great quality recordings
| were made but what's there is well worth listening to. His
| '(unfortunately)Last Recital' is a masterpiece. Enjoy!
| easybake wrote:
| > _Gould played Bach the way it is written, perfect tempo,
| minimal ornamentation, that may come across as 'robotic' to
| you but it's actually the style that most people that are
| into baroque favor._
|
| Indeed! These compositions were _...composed "for the profit
| and use of musical youth desirous of learning, and especially
| for the pastime of those already skilled in this study".[1]_,
| which I don't think is directly mentioned in the article
| except maybe from this quote by Gould:
|
| > _..."according to the musical disposition of that day, he
| was generations behind it"._
|
| It takes _skill_ to play these compositions the way they were
| written. Piano is not my forte but what effort I have put
| into learning these tunes was well worth it.
|
| > _If you don 't like Gould for Bach may I suggest Dinu
| Lipatti?_
|
| When I compare the two different performers, Gould sounds
| like he's playing to a metronome and Dinu Lipatti is playing
| to a pendulum.
|
| > And if you had not heard about him maybe dive a bit deeper
| and see what else you like, he's an amazing pianist that
| unfortunately was born before really great quality recordings
| were made but what's there is well worth listening to. Enjoy!
|
| Thank you for sharing.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Well-Tempered_Clavier
| acheron wrote:
| I'll put in a plug for the Netherlands Bach society's "All of
| Bach" project. https://www.bachvereniging.nl/en/allofbach
|
| Also if you have a local group that performs Bach works, they're
| great to hear live. The Washington Bach Consort in DC puts on
| some good performances regularly.
| jacquesm wrote:
| And:
|
| https://www.opengoldbergvariations.org/
| [deleted]
| telesilla wrote:
| Bach's life is so hidden from us in terms of letters from him,
| but we know enough to write some pretty good biographies. My
| personal favorite is Music in the Castle of Heaven, by John Eliot
| Gardiner the conductor. Who knows Bach better than those who know
| his music so intimately?
|
| https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17883941-bach
|
| I also recommend learning a few notes on the keyboard and playing
| something of his, perhaps the first prelude of the collection
| they mention in the article. It's magnificent, how he plays with
| time and harmony.
| diego_moita wrote:
| The book is indeed good.
|
| For those wanting a sample of Gardiner's knowledge I'd
| recommend the documentary presented by him "Bach - A Passionate
| Life"
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZVn9NZqyxs
| eternalban wrote:
| Thinking of gifting this. Is this for adults or would you think
| a budding composer aged 10 would benefit from it?
| tgv wrote:
| Fluff, or if you prefer: a highly circumlocutory string of half
| connected sentences and paragraphs around not knowing the exact
| origins of the Well-Tempered Clavier. Book 1, that is. It doesn't
| even mention the second book.
| ask_b123 wrote:
| Might be fluff but I still got to discover the existence of
| Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. Also, the 2nd book is mentioned in
| the last sentence.
| jacquesm wrote:
| The number of Bach family people with their own Wikipedia
| page is probably some kind of record for a family that old:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bach_family
| [deleted]
| devindotcom wrote:
| Love the Well-Tempered Clavier! I recommend listening to the
| harpsichord versions, which emphasize the individual notes and
| tempo, since (IMO) these were not really meant as expressive,
| emotional pieces to be interpreted liberally on pianoforte. That
| doesn't mean they can't be played or enjoyed that way, but I
| think the harpsichord (which Bach would have composed and played
| for) is the better way to hear it first.
|
| So find a harpsichord version that works for you - there are
| still many styles to choose from, but the works are short so you
| can feel out an artist even with a 30-second preview. The very
| first track, BWV 846, is an excellent litmus test.
|
| I've listened to the whole thing in sequence many times and the
| pieces are paired (as the article notes) for actual reasons, but
| now I like to put it on random and see if I can remember how
| pieces go without being primed by their position. Wonderful
| collection of music.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Harpsichord is not for everybody, listening to it for hours on
| end can be quite grating. Glenn Gould has a very nice version
| that seems to me to strike a nice balance between being true to
| the original and using an instrument that is a bit gentler on
| the ear:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CVlBSgj0bk
| olau wrote:
| In my opinion, Gould had some things that worked for him, but
| also some that certainly didn't. Like the link you sent, the
| fact that he's staccatoing the broken chords in the first
| prelude... Why? It's horrible.
|
| If you want something on the rigid tempo/clear notes end, I
| would instead recommend this Thomas Schwan recording:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IImakFsEHL8
|
| But actually if you don't know Bach, I would start with the
| gentle Andras Schiff:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ugc5FZsycAw&t=181s
|
| I agree with the parent that listening to harpsichord
| recordings does give you something different from the piano
| recordings.
|
| I don't agree with the expressive pianoforte part, though. As
| far as I'm aware Bach never left any instructions to that
| end. Also as far as I'm aware, at the time musicians were
| expected to breath life into the pieces on their own,
| deciding tempo, dynamics (sound volume) etc. according to
| their abilities and the customs at the time. This idea of a
| piece being set in stone with only one correct
| interpretation, or at least only small variations allowed,
| is, I think, a much later idea. You can see it start in say a
| composition by Chopin that will have detailed execution
| instructions, and really set in with pop songs in the past 70
| years.
|
| As I gather, around the time of Bach there were several
| different models of both harpsichords and clavichords around
| in addition to organs, all with relatively different tonal
| qualities.
|
| If you listen to harpsichord recordings, you'll note that
| they actually do customize the tempo locally (rubato) to
| infuse life into the pieces:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNQ-sUvSiV8
|
| You cannot vary the dynamics quickly on a harpsichord.
|
| Clavichords are much more expressive, though. You can even
| make a vibrato (Bebung):
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oCGNwDokT0
|
| I think Bach wrote these pieces so that people, including his
| own children, could play them at home, whether on a
| harpsichord or clavichord or something else, and I also think
| he intended the players to use their instrument to its
| fullest potential. Why wouldn't he? I have a hard time
| believing he wouldn't himself graduate the dynamics on a
| clavichord.
|
| I also think that part of what makes his music ethereal is
| that it actually does generalize over many instruments, even
| later instruments like the modern pianoforte, but also
| something like a guitar. You can find guitar players on
| Youtube delivering Bach that sounds great. He was a master of
| harmony.
| jacquesm wrote:
| There were Harpsichords with stops, much like those of an
| organ to try to give it more expressive character, as well
| as multi-clavier harpsichord models.
| SAI_Peregrinus wrote:
| Unfretted clavichord also works very well for them. IMO even
| better than the harpsichord, the sound is less grating. There
| are a few bits that aren't playable on the fretted clavichords
| of Bach's day, but very few and it can be performed on these
| (and probably was given how common they were).
|
| There's also an excellent performance on the organ[1].
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBQxfv7IZWA
| lalalandland wrote:
| "A camera pans down from high in a church to focus on a stone
| bust of a typically ill-tempered looking Johann Sebastian Bach.
| It's 1962 and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) is
| making a short film about the composer, presented by the pianist
| Glenn Gould. He's playing Bach's Fugue in E-flat major on the
| organ, initially off-camera. He completes the short piece,
| swivels round on his stool, and ad-libs the following:
|
| Select and enter your email address"
|
| I thought the Firefox Reader text was a AI piece. Haha
| AlbertCory wrote:
| The movie TAR opens with a music class where Prof. Tar plays the
| Prelude in C for a reluctant student who says he can't relate to
| Bach because he was a hetero white guy. All he can say is "You
| play very well."
|
| I've played that, of course, since there aren't any
| _conventionally_ difficult parts in it. There is something about
| that piece that just gets inside you. That has to be the
| definition of a really great work of art: you can 't say what,
| exactly, is great about it, but somehow it's just _there._
|
| I always wonder what Bach would have said about it. "Oh, yeah,
| that. Just something I tossed off."
| jacquesm wrote:
| > I've played that, of course, since there aren't any
| conventionally difficult parts in it.
|
| ouch.
|
| > "Oh, yeah, that. Just something I tossed off."
|
| What I wouldn't give for a couple of hours watching JS Bach at
| work improvising or composing. Just concentrated listening to
| all of Bach's works is a massive undertaking, it makes you
| wonder how he found the time to set it all down in between all
| of his other duties.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| > ouch
|
| Really? Sorry. I just meant it's nothing like Liszt or a
| Chopin Ballade, i.e. unplayable for someone like me.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Plenty of the WTK is perfectly unplayable for someone like
| me :) In fact, if I'm honest probably all of it, that won't
| stop me from trying though.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| Same here. The C Prelude, though: that one I can do. No
| chords; no eighths; no dotted notes.
|
| At one point in his career, Bill Evans was dissatisfied
| with his playing, and spend a year or so sight-reading
| the WTC. But then, he was Bill Evans.
| landonxjames wrote:
| https://archive.ph/Vyy7X
| prvc wrote:
| Many inaccuracies in this article. The Well Tempered Keyboard was
| certainly a deliberate realization of a particular concept, which
| makes use of several already-written preludes. Also, egregiously:
|
| >a system of tuning that's become standard ("well-tempered").
| Nothing in his description hints at what these short pieces
| really are - deep investigations into the character of each key
|
| This system of tuning is obscure, and seldom-used (only
| occasionally by historical enthusiasts). Possibly confused with
| equal temperament here. Much less ability for the keys to have
| different "characters" with equal temperament as well!
|
| >providing for his huge family - 20 children from two marriages
|
| 20 births total, yes, but never 20 children alive at the same
| time, unfortunately.
|
| >Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach's music can be dazzling, elegant and
| highly innovative, but we are unlikely to mark the 300th
| anniversary of even his best piece.
|
| Hopefully, "we" will be more enlightened than that in the coming
| few decades.
| TylerE wrote:
| For that matter, JS Bach himself very obscure as a composer
| during his lifetime, and for 50 years none of his works were in
| print... and many still weren't until the late 19th century.
|
| Any fame he had during his life or the period after was for his
| virtuoso organ performance.
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| Up until the late 1800s, "Bach" referred to his son, CPE
| Bach. Liszt, Chopin, and other piano virtuosi of the time
| really helped revive the music of JS Bach, when a lot of his
| best works were previously thought of as "too hard" or "not
| worth it."
| jacquesm wrote:
| There is a great - and probably out of print - book called
| 'Men, Women and Pianos', by Arthur Loesser, 1954. Highly
| recommended to get better insight into how the piano worked
| its way into society and how the various composers rose to
| the spotlight and/or were forgotten again. It's the best
| researched book on the subject I've read.
| TylerE wrote:
| Very much in print.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Men-Women-Pianos-Social-
| History/dp/04...
|
| May have to order a copy.
| hrnnnnnn wrote:
| You can argue that the different keys of equal temperament
| don't have any special character at all, since they differ only
| by fundamental frequency and the relationship between scale
| degrees are exactly the same in each key.
|
| What character they do have may come from how accessible they
| are on different instruments and the association we have with
| music written on those instruments. C and G major are easy on
| the guitar for example.
| eternalban wrote:
| > _Mozart was born six years after Bach died_
|
| I love these magical moments in history. Some have it as 'the
| muses' traversing the globe and inspiring humanity in the arts
| and sciences. Golden ages pop up at various points in time and
| place, and then the cluster of amazing talent that are typically
| the greats of the respective civilization. Those few centuries in
| Europe were blazing with talent.
|
| I think an interesting path through history of Humanity could
| simply follow the golden ages, wherever they are.
| motohagiography wrote:
| Such timing. I'm working through one of the Preludes (C minor)
| from the WTC now, but a rare guitar arrangement. There are things
| about his work it takes (for me) to about the 1000th time I play
| them to apprecaite, and I can see why real musicians leave his
| work to later in life. Grinding through some of his less
| complicated pieces is achievable for someone unschooled in it
| (like me), but when you play them, you can hear and feel where
| you stand as a musican, but moreso, as a being. They really are
| spiritual exercises in an Aquinian sense, written for an audience
| of one. That said, I also think the amount of woo musicians bring
| to talking about the work is inversely proportional to their
| level of ability and technique, so ymmv. I have more than one
| crackpot idea about him, but in the mean time, it's just a
| pleasure to puzzle through the pieces.
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