Customer Reviews

Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician

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Of all of the books on Bach that I have in my library, the new biography by Christoph Wolff is first rate. In addition to presenting a full biography of Bach's life, Wolff also gives us other interesting information such as tables showing the plan of the Orgelbüchlein or one of the annual cantata performance schedules. We are also given insight into what Bach's working day might have been like in Leipzig, balancing the duties at St. Thomas with the Collegium musicum and all of his private students. There are also some pictures of the churches where Bach was employed that are often not included in other sources, including a couple of computer enhanced pictures showing what the gallery of St. Thomas might have looked like in Bach's time. The book includes the latest research on recent Bach discoveries such as the Neumeister Chorales.

This is a book that deserves to be in every library and in the hands of everyone interested in J. S. Bach.

For those who have read the many earlier works by Prof. Christoph Wolff on Bach, this is the long-anticipated culmination of the author's immense scholarship. Wolff, the dean of Bach scholars, gives us a detailed, sympathetic narrative, filled with interesting details. I now know how much a pint of beer costs in Arnstadt in the early 1700s, what Bach must have felt like when thrown into the clinker for youthful insubordination, and how disappointed Bach must have been when Louis Marchand failed to show up for the much-anticipated organ shoot-out. Wolff gives us many useful tables and charts, putting music, musicians, family history, and other complicated matters into context. Many of the stories familiar to students of Bach are richly and vividly retold: Bach's 250-mile trek to hear Buxtehude, his bouts with small-minded city bureacrats and smaller-minded princes and dukes, the desperate, but futile attempt to save his eyesight during the last months of Bach's life. What I came to appreciate most was the author's ability to put the corpus of Bach's work into persepctive. Wolff is most impressive in his final chapter, putting Bach rightly in his place: the creative genius, the foundation of Western music. If you love Bach, you will definitely cherish this book.

J.S. Bach has been my longtime favorite classical composer, but while I knew he was one of the most influential composers in history, I never quite knew why. Moreover, he always seemed to have a tacit reputation as being rule-bound and stern, unlike the more dynamic, perhaps more charismatic, figures of Mozart and Beethoven (the latter's horrible temper notwithstanding). Cristoph Wolff's book has at last provided me with a fuller picture of Bach and his influence.

The subtitle "The Learned Musician" sets a primary theme for the work, namely Bach as the scholar-musician, who was able to pass rigorous theology exams in Latin and whose mastery of organ building was a significant achievement of engineering, math and acoustics, to say nothing of raw musical genius. A motif that crops up in this book is the comparison between Bach and Newton (which was made in Bach's time). Bach thought that there were rules of causality in canons just like there is causality in Nature, and used other musical pieces to explore theological concepts. Musical science is no mere metaphor applied by Wolff to Bach, but is something that the composer himself took very serious, and this was realized even by some of his contemporaries. Likewise Wolff also points out that this does not mean that Bach was some soulless theoretician either. Rather, Bach's work worked within rules of composition, but also broke and surpassed them when necessary. Bach refused to divorce theory from practice, so his collections of music like the Well-Tempered Clavier and the Art of the Fugue served to show how a particular form of music (e.g., the keyboard or the fugue) could be applied in just about any combination imaginable. These compositions were theoretical statements, albeit ones without words. Wolff does not get too bogged down in musical terms: this layman did struggle periodically, and I would understand more if I were a musician, but a lack of music theory would not destroy this books value to you.

Throughout the book Wolff shows how Bach's methodical perfectionism formed a powerful combination when joined with Bach's surprisingly passionate, joyful life. Just as his music was rigorous, Wolff also points out the profound, genuine emotion that goes into them. He also writes about some of Bach's comic cantatas--one in particular was written for a coffeehouse, and was written on coffee addiction. This did much to endear Bach to this college graduate's heart!

Just as important, Wolff presents Bach's musical odysseys within the context of his personal life. Troubles and triumphs with jobs, Bach's family life and personal anecdotes appear throughout the book with a special chapter at the end also dedicated to Bach's later home life. We learn of a man who always entertained guests despite a brutal work schedule, and who also managed to find time to buy his wife singing birds and flowers. Much of his life would sound quite familiar in America (e.g., rebellious sons, moving to a city with a better-paying job, etc.), and does much to remind us that Bach is a man, not some musical force of nature.

In the end, we have a picture of a man who used his art to explore nature and God, but did so with joy and while surrounded with a family to support and superiors to placate in the workplace. Now I have a foundation for appreciating some of his works that I never studied before, namely Bach's Masses and cantatata, and my appreciation for other works. I had previously read and enjoyed Douglas Hofstadter's _Godel, Escher, Bach_ (which I also recommend), and now I can why Hofstadter chose Bach to help him explore the nature of intelligence in both man and computers. Bach was truly a sort of scientist or natural philosopher, and Wolff lets you appreciate how Bach was both a philosopher and composer of beautiful music.

This is unquestionably the single volume Bach biography for non-specialists, although musicologists will find it invaluable as well. Wolff has done a lot of debunking of various Bach myths (i.e., "Bach died while writing the final fugue in Art of Fugue, and dictated the chorale in his last breath"), but stilll has never lost his sense of wonder about this giant. Wolff also does a better job than most of placing Bach in European intellectual history as a whole, not just musical history. His comparison of Bach to Newton, while not original, is apt and insightful. The best thing about this book, however, is that it led me back to the music with several new insights. For example, Wolff's analysis of the famous d minor tocatta (BWV 565) led me to realize just how advanced this very early work is. Highly reccomended.

With this new Bach biography, Wolff presents us with his thorough establishment of an updated Bach image that might well become the new standard work! Although Wolff's writing style is very readable, it might be a good idea to thoroughly study the Appendix and the Table of Contents of this book before venturing into reading. Thus equipped, one will find that Wolff proceeds very systematically and logically. Let me not describe to you what this book is not but rather what it is: An excellent biography of the development of Bach's musical mind and of all his musical gifts--those of the harpsichordist, organist, organ expert, music teacher, composer, conductor and music director, as this is also reflected in the sub-title of the English original: The Learned Musician. Wolff relies on original documents, early records such as the Necrologue (started by Bach, completed by his son C.P.E. Bach and Agricola), Forkel's biography of 1802, still relevant findings of Spitta and later writers, however, also on his own research of several decades, including his 1999 discovery of the Bach family documents in Kiew. In tracing the musical heritage of the Bach family, Bach's own development during his childhood at Eisenach, his youth at Ohrdruf and Lunenburg, Wolff carefully develops before us a picture of the basis upon which Bach could build his musical career as an adult. Also in his further description of Bach's development as organist at Arnstadt, Mühlhausen and at the Weimar Court, in his Weimar promotion to Concert Master, in his work as Kapellmeister at Köthen, and right into his activity as Leipzig Thomaskantor, Bach's musical growth and maturation is described to us in a clear, systematic and understandable manner, since the development of every pre-requisite of ever musical progress is described just as systeatically and understandably. As a serious musicologist Wolff concentrates--of course!--mainly on the history of Bach's musical development, and in doing so, the biographical-anecdotal is only referred to in such a manner as it, first of all, can be considered reliable and, secondly, is relevant. Since the appendix also provides a thorough time table, one never needs to be at a loss with respect to mere bare-bone facts of Bach's curriculum vitae. Wolff's manner of proceeding, however, ensures that the musical-biographical tension of his argument never lets up! Thus we learn easily how Bach, during his early adult years (at Arnstadt, Mühlhausen, Weimar and Köthen), developed into a master composer and music teacher who would also continue to challenge himself in his (by others often considered a 'decline' of sorts) position as Leipzig Thomas Cantor, such as in his extensive Cantata work and the Passion works of the 1720's, but also his additional activity as Director Musices of the Collegium Musicum during the 1730's. Wolff argues very convincingly and understandably that Bach's alleged stubbornness might have been mainly motivated by his striving for musical excellence and only rarely left those boundaries. Only after the description of Bach's career up to 1740 do we find a chapter on his family life which I enjoyed very much both on the basis of its factual accuracy as well as on that of its great sense of tact. The Muscial Biography finds it conclusion with the description of Bach's last decade in which he mainly concentrated on the Mass in B and on the Art of the Fugue. The entire biographical core is framed in by Wolff's preface, prologue and epilogue. One of the main ideas presented in these sections is that of Bach's role as musical equivalent to Isaac Newton's striving as a physicist in this era of exploration of the turn of the 17th to the 18th century.

After reading this book I came away with a good understanding of Bach's musical achievements and his concept of what music is all about. This is a very well written and comprehensive look at Bach's music and musical evolution thru life - including his major, longer works (no minuets included) and musical surroundings. It is very well worth reading for its study of Bach's music if you have some technical musical background (more on that later).

One small complaint: most of the music titles are given in German only. Since there are hundreds of such cases, it was impractical to do always search for a translation on the internet so I'm sure I missed a few points. For example the titles of Bach's first three key teaching works are listed - with only the first in English. Wolff then says that "the carefully coordinated phraseology of all three titles" were impressive!
Fortunately, the German version of "The Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach" is obvious in meaning but shamefully without translation: for many of us, one of our first piano pieces came from that notebook!

Finally, this is not a complaint, but a warning. You will have great difficulty with this book if you don't have some background in musical terminology, notation, and Baroque music history. You should know the meaning of terms like "basso continuo", "counterpoint", "thoroughbass" (figured bass), etc. to appreciate the text. For example, there is much discussion of Bach's role in the evolution of the "Fugue". Other forms, such as the "motet" (sacred music not an integral part of the mass) are mentioned without definition. For such a background, I would recommend Kamien's "Music An Appreciation, Ed.8" - or a less expensive alternative that covers music from the Middle Ages to the Baroque Period.

This book is most ostensibly not a work intended to provide a layman's knowledge of Bach. The book assumes a fair knowledge of Bach and his oeuvre, as well as a thorough knowledge of music theory and general instrumentation. Cristoph Wolff has written a thoroughly satisfying and extraordinarily comprehensive summary of Bach's professional and personal lives. I found that despite the book's intrinsically serious tone, reading it as a whole felt not like a biography, but a story that us Bach fanatics wish would never end.

This book is thoroughly impressive in both its scope and its detail, though the numerous tables cataloguing Bach's work from the various periods such as Weimar and Cothen are not as well integrated in text as one might hope. Where Wolff makes the occasional reference to the tables, I as the reader desired to see more comparison and analysis of various works in each period.

It is also immediately apparent upon even a glance through the index that Wolff dedicates much of his analysis of Bach's major works to Bach's vocal music, and notably less space to Bach's instrumental and keyboard/organ music. As we know, Bach's Fugue "the Great" in G minor, BWV 542, is a towering masterpiece of Bach's (and Baroque) organ music, but Wolff hardly affords it the analysis it demands. He also neglects to develop much depth of analysis with Bach's instrumental works. For example, we know that nearly all of Bach's solo and multiple piano concerti have their roots in previous concerti, but little attention is paid as to why Bach chose to transcribe to piano(harpsichord), why he selected the works he did, and whether there is a distinct method/pattern to Bach's transcriptions.

Wolff does do, however, an exquisite job of analysis of Bach's vocal music, exploring the depth of Bach's passion for writing cantatas, and how skillfully he was able to interpet his vision of the words into music. Wolff provides numerous glimpses of Bach's organ expertise, especially in the field of repair and construction. These descriptions do require some prior knowledge of how an organ produces sound and how it is played in order to be enjoyed to the fullest. The book also does a magnificient job of exploring and relating the various and primary influences on Bach's musical development and style. Wolff provides an insight into the influence of Dietrich Buxtehude especially, as well as that of Johann Pachelbel and the numerous older Bach relations. Much has been heaped upon Mozart's child prodigy fame, but even those of us for whom Bach is a perpetual favorite, know little about Bach's formative years, and Wolff gives a very comprehensive look at Bach's musical training.

Wolff's small digressions notwithstanding, this book is truly one every lover of Bach should keep in his library. (And reread every so often!)

The usual view of Bach's life that I grew up with portrays him as something of a musical hermit, producing masterpieces and children at a prolific rate in relative anonymity with little or no earthly recognition. This book completely revises my view of Bach's life. Wolff shows Bach as a fantastically well-rounded and charismatic musician with a fantastic ability to create masterpieces, a great teacher, well loved and respected member of the community, a profound and simple Christian, and a fundamentally happy, joyful, complete man. Wolff also tries to show that Bach was the greatest musician who ever lived, and does a pretty convincing job at that. I always knew Bach was a great musician; this book simply reinforces and proves my intuition. His intermittant references to Newton are a little annoying and indicative of the hyperbole Wolff sometimes uses, but one gets used to them. The book also shows his human side - his mercurial temperment, his sometimes overbearing and demanding personality, and his greed. This book contains an enormous amount of personal information on Bach, far more than I knew existed. Wolff writes well and does not use an inordinate amount of musical terminology, so a musical illiterate like myself can still read and enjoy him. If you love Bach's music get this book, and you might as well the New Bach Reader along with it, as a good percentage of the quotes in Wolff's come directly from this source.

Someone else has warned that the Kindle edition lacks the illustrations that appear in the book. For me a far more serious flaw is that the Kindle edition lacks this book's substantial index (one can view the index in the Amazon "search this book" function, but it's not possible to print it out. It's true that an index in a Kindle book won't have page numbers as locators, but the index should still be included as a way of seeing what information is available. Yes, one can do a search in the Kindle, but that's not good enough. Amazon claims that the book only contains what the publisher sent them. Fine, then this is the publisher's fault; however, buyers should be warned if/when the Kindle edition does not contain the whole book.

Mr. Wolff's biography is very good but not written for populists. The biographer shouldn't be entirely blamed since it is obvious he had few original sources to research. As the author points out, it is utterly tragic that the majority of Bach's original work is lost or was destroyed, sold and neglected. One is left with the strong impression that it is a miracle in itself that Mr. Wolff was able to construct his fine biography with such little direct evidence.

Still, this reviewer regretfully find a few faults. This is not a biography for the music novice. Mr. Wolff rarely pauses to explain technicalities and terms however ancient or obscure. While his direction is generally true, he risks boredom by repetition in quoting the same clauses of Bach's obituary, a rather self-serving document. If the author intended his work for experienced musicologists, he should have stated that purpose at the onset. Johann Forkel's biography is often taken at face value and little criticised, dispite the fact it was published 52 years after Bach's death. The various town maps, though quaint and historically interesting, are useless in being blurred reproductions. Worse still are the frustratingly glossed over drawings and descriptions of Bach's Leipzig residence (pp 404-5), potential gem stones of voyeuristic information. But they are so weakly identified that they are without practical value.

However I found Mr. Wolff's work fascinating and rewarding. A patient reader clearly profits from his careful musical descriptions. A catalog of Bach's works is in itself almost worth the price of the book. Mr. Wolff paints a wonderful picture of Bach, a genius devoted to his craft, places him cleanly within his family, church and society's perspectives, and leaves us with a comprehensive rendition of this vibrant, irreplacable artist and composer.