Johann Sebastian Bach: Difference between revisions

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==Biography==

=== Early years===

Johann Sebastian Bach was a member of one of the most extraordinary musical families of all time. For more than 200 years, the [[Bach family]] had produced dozens of worthy performers and composers during a period in which the church, local government and the aristocracy provided significant support for professional music making in the German-speaking world, particularly in the eastern electorates of [[Thuringia]] and Saxony. Sebastian's father, [[Johann Ambrosius Bach]], was a talented violinist and trumpeter in [[Eisenach]], a town of some 6,000 residents in Thuringia. The post involved the organisation of secular music and participation in church music. Sebastian's uncles were all professional musicians, ranging from church organists and court chamber musicians to composers. Contemporary documents indicate that, in some circles, the name Bach had come to be used as a synonym for "musician". The Bach family were proud of their musical achievements, and around 1735 Bach drafted a geneaology, ''Ursprung der musicalisch-Bachischen Familie'', tracing the history of generations of successful musical Bachs.

[[Image:JSBWohnorte.png|right|thumb|250px|Places in which Bach resided throughout his life]]

Bach's mother died in 1694, and his father the following year. The 10-year-old orphan moved in with his eldest brother, Johann Christoph Bach, the organist at [[Ohrdruf]], a nearby town. There, he copied, studied and performed music, and apparently received valuable tuition from his brother. This exposed him to the work of the great South German composers of the day—such as [[Johann Pachelbel|Pachelbel]] and [[Froberger]]—and possibly to the music of North German composers, and of Frenchmen such as [[Jean-Baptiste Lully|Lully]], [[Louis Marchand]] and [[Marin Marais]]. The boy probably witnessed and assisted in the maintenance of the [[organ (music)|organ]]; this would have been a precursor to his lifelong professional activity as a consultant in the building and restoration of organs. Bach's obituary indicates that he copied music out of Johann Christoph's scores, but his brother had apparenty forbidden him to do so, possibly because scores were valuable and private commodities at the time.

At the age of 14, Johann Sebastian was awarded a choral scholarship, with his older school friend, Georg Erdmann, to study at the prestigious St Michael’s School in [[Lüneburg]], not far from the largest city in Germany, the northern seaport of Hamburg. This involved a long journey with his friend, probably partly on foot and partly by coach. His two years there appear to have been critical in exposing him to a wider palette of European culture than he would have experienced in Thuringia. In addition to singing in the ''a cappella'' choir, it is likely that he played the School’s three-manual organ and its harpsichords. He probably learned French and Italian, and received a thorough grounding in theology, Latin, history, geography and physics. He would have come into contact with sons of noblemen from northern Germany sent to the highly selective school to prepare for careers in diplomacy, government and the military. It is likely that he had significant contact with organists in Lüneburg, in particular [[Georg Böhm]], and visited several of them in Hamburg, such as [[Johann Adam Reincken|Reincken]] and [[Nicolaus Bruhns|Bruhns]]. Through these musicians, he probably gained access to the largest instruments he had thus far played. It is likely that during this stage, he became acquainted with the music of the North German tradition, especially the work of [[Dieterich Buxtehude]], and with music manuscripts and treatises on music theory that were in the possession of these musicians.