Customer Reviews

J.S. Bach: A Life in Music

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Bach is my religion, and I am an adult beginner piano student, with roughly four years of classical piano lessons under my belt. Those two facts color my opinion of this biography and of other Bach biographies I have read, namely those by Christoph Wolff and Martin Geck. I do like the Peter Williams biography better than the other two. It is scholarly without being overly so, reverential without going overboard, analytical and informative on the music front without being exhaustive and boring. And I greatly enjoyed the approach of dissecting the obituary written at Bach's death, fleshing out the entries, and/or setting the record straight. The Wolff is very good but leaves me cold, and, to be honest, I couldn't make it all the way through the Geck. I am a tough grader -- hence the four stars. Though I found the Williams biography an extremely engaging read, I do think/hope that the definitive five-star Bach biography has yet to be written.

This book provides a useful different way of looking at Bach's life and music by working almost sentence by sentence through the well-known Obituary of 1750/1754 by C.P.E. Bach and Agricola. Williams doesn't hesitate to grapple with thorny issues, nor to question interpretations/speculations we may have become comfortable with and wrongly begun to treat as if they were fact.

I bought the book because I greatly admire Peter Williams' previous writings on Bach and organ music. I was slightly disappointed with this book, however.

I'm an amateur musician who has read a lot about Bach. For me, core references are Christoph Wolff (2000) 'Johann Sebastian Bach; the learned musician' (scholarly and fascinating to read), and 'The New Bach Reader' (David & Mendel/ Wolff). I'd suggest not bothering with the Williams book unless you are already familiar with such books. You'll only value what Williams questions in a sentence or two if you're familiar with arguments over the same issue in other places.

J.S. Bach: A Life in Music was full of gorgeous pictures and information on Bach. The CD that came with it started with Bach's early music, then progressed to his final masterpieces. I liked hearing the progression. I used this book for information I needed for a graduate level psychology class. We had to do a case study on a famous person. Bach was a great study! Wonderful book.