The WTF Bach Podcast

Since I was a child I’ve known the story of Bach pulling out a blade. What really happened? In this short episode, I read the contemporary reports from the Arnstadt Consistory Court, where this famous fisticuffs was first recorded.

About halfway through the episode (14 minutes), I’ve given you some “chill” chorales, played over a drone. One of my listeners mentioned they wanted some Bach for doing yoga/meditation, so this is what I came up with. If you like the way it sounds, I’ll put a full hour-long track on Spotify for all my Bach enthusiast yogis.

Meanwhile, stay tuned for some cool episodes coming up during the holiday season.

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Last week I posted this piece on YouTube:

The most intriguing part of studying this piece was the overwhelming amount of differences between the three earliest sources of this work. Here is a list of the sources I reference in the episode , the copyists, and when they were made:

The ‘Andreas Bach Book’ (D-LE III.8.4) J. Christoph Bach; copyist, between 1705-1714

P 801 J. Tobias Krebs; copyist, between 1710-1717

P 804 J. Peter Kellner; copyist, before 1725

In the episode I simply refer to these as Andreas Bach, Krebs, and Kellner.

You will hear a great amount of textual variation between these sources. Part of any performer’s job of playing music from Bach’s era includes combing through sources, determining how and why certain discrepancies appear. In the Aria Variata, however, the discrepancies are inconsistent— and perplexing.

My current understanding of source tradition hasn’t led me to any conclusion, but were I bold enough to take a stab, I’d guess Andreas Bach is the most accurate source, Kellner made a very sloppy copy from which Krebs copied. Kellner’s copy is full of corrections, but these were probably entered at a later date, and Krebs didn’t get the memo. A taste of what this looks like:

That is Kellner’s copy. Notice the ornaments. Compare to Krebs:

Both have an E-flat in on the downbeat of the third bar (all three sources in this episode use soprano clef on top). Now here is Andreas Bach:

D-sharp in bar three! Also, the ornamentation is fuller.

There are many other details in the episode, so please, enjoy! Here are more images to stimulate your fancy:

Krebs’ wavy hand.

Kellner making mistakes, corrected by— whom? Kellner himself?

The baffling passage in variation 4 in Andreas Bach. Notice what look like erasures on some of the notes.

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Yes, that recording at the end is none other than Jascha Heifetz with Primrose and Piatigorksy, who apparently recorded three of the sinfonias. The wonderful pianist with that golden sound playing before the string trio arrangement is (I think!) Marcelle Meyer recorded sometime around 1948.

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Today’s episode focuses on the ‘black pearl’ of the inventions and sinfonias. The f minor sinfonia is highly complex piece of passion music embedded within a seemingly innocent collection of music intended for the beginner. Here, rather than the more typical obligato upper voices with the bass occasionally joining in with a theme here and there, the f minor sinfonia relies on convertible counterpoint where all three voices are judged— and juggled— equally. Bach shows us this technique using different themes:

A lament bass:

Musical crosses:

And a wildly avant-garde motif, which I refer to as the wailing motif:

Writing certainly exists on these three motifs seen as “God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.” Not for any particular reason, I refrain from making such an analogy in this episode.

As mentioned in the episode, Bach changed some of the enharmonics when transfering the piece from the Notebook for W.F. Bach into the Aufrichtige Anleitung. Here are some examples:

The E-double-flat (middle voice) in the notebook for his son:

is later changed to a D natural:

The B-double-flat in the top voice in the previous examples remain, but Bach will change the spelling in the bass voice of the same note (again, in the notebook:)

to an A natural:

There are a few other similar changes throughout.

Thanks for listening! Have you told your high-school band teacher you’re super into Bach?

N.B. My substack is about 1 year old, and in that time I released some 27 episodes and three essays. Should you decide to become a paid subscriber, that’s less than 3 dollars an episode (paying per year: about $3.70 paying per month.) Your contribution ensures the existence of this podcast. I really couldn’t— and wouldn’t be able to— continue devoting the time without your support. Thank you.

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Becoming familiar with Bach’s music is a never-ending process. First, there is the initial reading, which alone can occupy many happy years. What’s remarkable is that with each further reading, you’re astonished by the details you missed before—quite honestly amazed. You ask yourself: Where—or even who—was I during those earlier readings? You begin to measure your growth as a musician against the depth with which you can now understand the pieces.

One fugue, which I initially read with little interest, is the one featured in this episode: BWV 537. Suddenly, I’m struck by its raw power and its structural reliance on a chromatic line. Now that it has revealed itself to me, it will forever remain a favorite. I hope to share with you a glimpse of this experience in today’s episode.

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In this episode, we’ll explore Bach’s constant involvement with weddings. Weddings and funerals occupied a weekly place in Bach’s life in Leipzig and we’ll shed light on the various ways in which he was involved musically.

[I forgot to credit the last recording in this episode to Rudolph Lutz and the J.S. Bach foundation.]

Here are (some of) the beautiful parts which make up the chorales, BWVs 250-252. They are beautiful examples of Bach’s handwriting ca. 1730. Note that all three chorales are on the same page.

Soprano:

Alto:

Tenor:

Bass:

And the second horn part I fondly discuss in this episode:

All the parts are viewable at:

https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00002475

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A brief(er) episode for you today: Bach’s first published opus was his six partitas for keyboard. In some of the sources within Bach’s circle, copies retained as a ‘Handexemplar’ include revisions by a scribe we can almost say with certainty is Bach himself. The most consequential of these revisions appears at the end of the third partita, where the second half of the Gigue is re-written with what one might call ‘updated’ or ‘refined’ counterpoint.

Here we see the main source (G 25) in question:

Hard to see here, but if we zoom in, we see that this:

Is a correction of the original printings, which read:

This link here should allow you to download the original print of all six partitas.

N.B. As that link is the download of the original print, it will not contain any of the corrections mentioned in this episode. For a full list of the scholarship on these changes, see:

Wolff, C. (1999). Text-critical comments on the original print of the Partitas. In Bach: Essays on his life and music (pp. 214-222). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

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The final performer’s commentary episode for you. This is live commentating (the program notes of the future) on the last of my three simultaneous releases. This album is a bunch of preludes and fugues— some maybe you know, some maybe you don’t.

You can stream and individually purchase any track including the performer’s commentary from the third volume below. [More streaming links (including youtube playlists) at the bottom:]

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The first three albums of the 'Complete Works for Solo Keyboard' are live everywhere. Stream while sleeping to achieve maximum effect.

Volume One:

Youtube playlist!

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/ycy2fab7

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/nhfuws4t

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/mrxj7pws

Volume Two:

Youtube playlist!

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/msjyhamh

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mtykbxnz

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3m7b9v6w

Volume Three:

Youtube playlist!

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/4xneak6r

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mr44kwmf

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3e4kwnsb

Johann Adolph Scheibe went down in history for attacking Bach’s “turgid and confused” style.

“…from the natural to the artificial, and from the lofty to the obscure ... one wonders at the painful labor of it all, that nevertheless comes to nothing, since it is at variance with reason.”

Let’s examine the controversy from the beginning.

How To Support This Podcast:

https://www.paypal.me/wtfbach

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The first three albums of the 'Complete Works for Solo Keyboard' are live everywhere. Stream while sleeping to achieve maximum effect.

Volume One:

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/ycy2fab7

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/nhfuws4t

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/mrxj7pws

Volume Two:

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/msjyhamh

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mtykbxnz

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3m7b9v6w

Volume Three:

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/4xneak6r

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mr44kwmf

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3e4kwnsb

On March 1, 1749, Bach penned the following into a Stammbuch:

Today’s episode covers this canon in depth. What does it mean? How does it sound?

Here is a link to the article by scholar, Anatoly Milka.

The book, Bach and the meaning of Counterpoint, by David Yearsley is available here.

How To Support This Podcast:

https://www.paypal.me/wtfbach

https://venmo.com/wtfbach

https://cash.app/$wtfbach

or become a paid subscriber at wtfbach.substack.com

The first three albums of the 'Complete Works for Solo Keyboard' are live everywhere. Stream while sleeping to make me a millionaire.

Volume One:

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/ycy2fab7

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/nhfuws4t

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/mrxj7pws

Volume Two:

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/msjyhamh

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mtykbxnz

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3m7b9v6w

Volume Three:

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/4xneak6r

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mr44kwmf

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3e4kwnsb

Another performer’s commentary episode for you. If you’ve missed out on the second of my three simultaneous releases, you’ll have a chance to listen to it here, with my live commentary.

You can stream and individually purchase any track including the performer’s commentary from the second volume here. —More streaming links (including youtube playlists) at the bottom:

How To Support This Podcast:

https://www.paypal.me/wtfbach

https://venmo.com/wtfbach

https://cash.app/$wtfbach

or become a paid subscriber at wtfbach.substack.com

The first three albums of the 'Complete Works for Solo Keyboard' are live everywhere. Stream while sleeping to achieve maximum effect.

Volume One:

Youtube playlist!

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/ycy2fab7

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/nhfuws4t

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/mrxj7pws

Volume Two:

Youtube playlist!

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/msjyhamh

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mtykbxnz

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3m7b9v6w

Volume Three:

Youtube playlist!

Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/4xneak6r

Apple Music: https://tinyurl.com/mr44kwmf

Amazon Music: https://tinyurl.com/3e4kwnsb