Show Notes
“Whoever has once felt this wonderful tranquility has comprehended the mysterious spirit that has here expressed all it knew and felt of life in the secret language of tone, and will render Bach the thanks we render only to the great souls to whom it is given to reconcile men with life and bring them peace.” -Schweitzer, Vol. 1 W.T.F. Bach wants YOU to subscribe
A prelude in E-flat minor, with a fugue in its enharmonic other. The image attached to this episode is from the Czerny edition, who felt the need to dispense with the enharmonic intrigue, and publish the fugue in E-flat minor. Is the prelude the most crushingly beautiful thing Bach wrote? The fugue, devoid of the sensitivity found in the prelude, displays the largest repertoire of fugal technique thus far: stretto, inversion, canon in all voices, augmentation— a veritable dictionary of thematic possibilities. Here, for example, is a passage I find most striking: stretto and strict canon in all voices. First, the theme appears in blue, ascending in perfect fourths, and a moment later, in red, inverts into perfect fifths. Bach seems to have been fond of this idea (and perhaps the shape of this subject as lending itself to fugal techniques) as he employs it in four voices —nearly at the exact same spot in the fugue— in the fifth contrapuntus in The Art of Fugue: We heard from Edwin Fischer, ukuleleist Herb Ohta (whose Ukulele Bach Playlist is a trip) and at the end, Pierre Hantai. Do check out Alfredo Sanchez’ recording on guitar, he’s got a great feel for this music. We survive solely on donations. Thank you for your help! We encourage our listeners to become a paid subscriberat wtfbach.substack.comFree subscriptions are also great for our numbers.You can also make a one-time donation here: https://www.paypal.me/wtfbachhttps://venmo.com/wtfbach Supporting this show ensures its longevity. Concepts Covered: The Well-Tempered Clavier, J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in E-flat minor / D-sharp minor Expression vs. technical complexity. The prelude, written in E-flat minor, is introspective, harmonically rich. Its fugue, in the enharmonic key of D-sharp minor, moves from emotion to intellect, showcasing the most extensive use of fugal technique seen so far in the cycle: A survey of contrapuntal possibilities. Analysis, early versions such as BWV 853a, history, revisions, and study.
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More from WTF Bach
The music at the end is BWV 600, from a forthcoming ‘electrified’ arrangement of Bach’s Orgelbüchlein. The beautiful passage toward the end of my rant— with the koto accompaniment and bird song— comes from one of my absolute favorite books: R.H. Blythe’s writings about Haiku. Blyth considered the three greatest geniuses of time to be Basho, Bach, and Shakespeare— in that order! Wow! What am I missing with Basho!? More than a podcast. This is WTF Bach.
Volume 6 in ‘J.S. Bach: Complete Keyboard Works’ is on presale today! Here are the relevant links: * J.S. Bach: Complete Keyboard Works, Vol. 6 - Arrangements of Albinoni and Reincken(https://modernclassicalx.lnk.to/JSBachCompleteKeyboardWorksVol6FromArrangementsofAlbinoniandReincken) I might call this volume a ‘headphones album’ or perhaps one to listen to in the car: The sonic space shifts throughout the course of these pieces. I describe this process in depth in the episode, but essentially each track is two recordings of the piece, playing simultaneously: one recording is the original live performance, while another is that very same performance, played back through the Disklavier with the dynamics flatlined— as if the piano keyboard were incapable of dynamics — like a harpsichord. The two recordings were then ‘live panned’ during the mixing according to my feeling for the music. The result, while perhaps less extreme than this all sounds, is certainly a noticeable phenomenon, especially in headphones or seated between two speakers as in a car. But enough about that, let’s get to the music. Fugue it:
We’ve now covered the seven surviving earliest vocal works by Johann Sebastian Bach! This episode is a brief tour through the episodes we dedicated to these pieces, refreshing our memories and attempting to identify unifying stylistic features. All the episodes covering the Arnstadt/Mülhausen cantatas can be found at:https://wtfbach.substack.com/t/early-cantatas Wanna Cantata?
“The consummate expressiveness of {BWV 4] has always been marvelled at. Each verse is as if chiselled in music.” -Albert Schweitzer, Vol. 2 Bach’s early Easter cantata remains one of the most beloved in the entire canon. Barely 22 years old, he is already in full command of his tone-painting. Here are three measures particularly packed with symbolism: Filling the music with rests at the word nothing, ‘one death eating another’ through the closest possible canon, crosses both in shape and every note ‘sharped’ (gekreuzt,) dripping blood on the Passover doors with short 8th notes, leaping a diminished 12th (!) in the bass aria at the word death, this cantata is a dictionary of text painting. …und singen Halleluja!
Sometimes an article from the EB strikes me as so amusing, I simply have to share it with you. See you next week (or the week after, latest) for the conclusion of our early cantata survey, with Christ lag in Todes Banden, BWV 4. Thanks for listening! Well, That’s Fascinating!