Concerning the Chaconne (from Bach’s Partita No. 2 in D Minor): “On one stave, for a small instrument, the man writes a whole world of the deepest thoughts and most powerful feelings. If I imagined that I could have created, even conceived the piece, I am quite certain that the excess of excitement and earth-shattering experience would have driven me out of my mind. If one doesn’t have the greatest violinist around, then it is well the most beautiful pleasure to simply listen to its sound in one’s mind.” — Romantic composer Johannes Brahms in a letter to fellow composer Clara Schumann.

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That, I submit, is the worship woven with love and beauty that made Bach’s work ultimately authentic.