The Beauty of Bach

Adapting the words of the Gospel, may it not be truly said that among them that are born of women, there hath not arisen (in the world of music) a greater than John Sebastian Bach?  And just as the genius of Shakespeare is no less manifest in the lovely lyrics of “The Tempest” than in the soliloquies of Hamlet or the passion-cries of King Lear, so is the genius of Bach not less apparent in his simpler inventions than in the Chromatic Fantasia or the “Mass in B minor.”  Whatever the great master of music touched, indeed, he stamped and adorned with the unmistakable marks of a new beauty for the world.

Zoya Shuhatovich performing Bach's Chromatic Fantasia:

                Married twice, he was the father of no fewer than twenty children—eleven sons and nine daughters.  He had thus many opportunities for becoming convinced that music, more than any other practical art, must have its beginning in early childhood.  This, doubtless, was a tradition with the Bach family; for it is written that there were at least fifty of the name who were richly endowed with musical talent.  In the Sebastian household, we may be sure, music was as the light of the sun and the breathing of the air.  To the education of his ever-growing flock, we owe the little preludes, the two-part and three-part inventions “whereby admirers of the clavichord are shown a plain method of learning to play clean.”  We owe, too, the little fugues, the fughettas, and many another passage that afterwards appeared in the “Well Tempered Clavichord”—possibly in some giant fugue.

                It is very evident that the great Bach instinctively felt the importance of developing musical intelligence simultaneously with digital technic.  He knew better than to stupefy the beginner with meaningless mechanical exercises only.  Hence the beauty and melodiousness of his smaller compositions, not less remarkable in their way than his mountainous fugues and torrential choruses.

                These lighter pieces, however, much polished as they were in the process of continuous juvenile instruction (the claviers of the Bach household were never silent), have suffered much with the fading of tradition as to how they should be played.  It is not known that Bach marked or indicated the tempi of his compositions, but relied rather, it would appear, upon their manifest spirit and purport for a correct interpretation, or upon a swiftly established tradition.  It was not until late in life that he began to print, and much that has come down to us was printed a century or more after his death.  He was most sparing in his written instructions, evidently deeming them unnecessary.

                To Clementi and Czerny, famous for their technical virtuosity, must be attributed chiefly the vogue for pianistic speed, that has pervaded later years.  Following them, the numerous editors of Bach’s Preludes and Inventions have shown a preference for Allegro, Allegretto, or Con Moto rather than for Grave, Andante or Largo.  Czerny, for instance, edited the “Well-Tempered Clavichord,” but in a manner which awoke the serious displeasure of Anton Rubinstein, who wrote, “I have never been able to reconcile myself either to the indications of tempo or to the shading in the preludes or the fugues”—the reference being to Czerny’s edition.

                The craze for speed did not exist in Bach’s day.  It is a modern fad.  It takes a master now to use the courage necessary to play a simple piece of music slowly.  Because it is simple, the multitude of performers toss it off with as much haste as possible, much as the average organist of to-day seems to think it below his dignity to play his hymns with slow expressiveness.  Similarly, Bach’s simpler pieces suffer from being played and edited to be played, almost always, with indecorous speed.

                I have always been grateful to the late Henry T. Finck for having drawn my attention years ago to the beauty of the little preludes.  It was his habit, he told me, to play them every Sunday morning and pointed out to me, in particular, the poignancy and beauty of the inner voices and the balanced perfection of No.  4.

                My own copy of the Preludes was marked Allegro, and the editor had prefaced it with the remark, “This piece should sound like a jubilant organ prelude.”  I was speedily convinced that my editor was wrong and that Henry T. Finck was right in advising a slow and expressive interpretation, in which full accentuation should be given to the middle voices, with a certain solemnity for the whole number, rather than any echo of jubilation.  No. 5 in the same set was marked Lento and had made me happier with its undulating harmonies and charming quasi  fantasia.

                Even the “Six Preludes for Beginners” could have been written only by a master.  The first, in “C” played Moderato, can be played fifty times without weariness, so perfect is its form and so cheerful its content.  The passing dissonances for the left hand are delightful, while the alternations of the more rapid passages between the hands give it no little technical value.

                The second, which at first sight appears to be merely a succession of diatonic eighth-notes, speedily reveals (like No. 1 of the “Well-Tempered” in which Gounod discovered a delicious melody) hidden harmonies on the swaying summits of which are heard snatches of delightful strains that one cannot but accentuate for one’s increased pleasure.  In addition to the essential wealth of the music, notwithstanding its simplicity, its technical value in slowly extending (the only proper way) the juvenile or even senile fingers can hardly be over-estimated.  We give a few measures for a ready recognition.

 Ex. 1.

                And then, what an exquisite morceau is No. 4 in D Major, from which we must also quote a few measures.

Ex. 2.

                The pianist who finds himself, for whatever temporary reason, unequal to the task of mastering the polyphony of Bach’s more intricate fugues or concertos may thus have at hand stores of exquisite music, every measure of which reveals the master’s touch while making no insuperable demands upon technic.

                Every pianist would do well to keep by him, for the sake of their double value as music and as technical material, a selection of these minor gems.  Such a selection would include, in addition to those which we have referred, the Two-part Inventions in “C,” “C Minor” and “F”:  the first with its brief phrases which join at length into closely knit harmony; the third with a vivacity replete with the very joy of life.

                Such a selection would include also from the Three-part Inventions those in “D major,” in “E major,” and “F minor.”  The first of these begins with the orthodox triple repetition of a shorter phrase followed by an extended run of jubilant tone.  Thirds and sixths abound with the charming effect of sunshine after rain.  The one in E major, with harmonies well dispersed, is of sheer beauty in its contrapuntal structure.  How charming is the effect produced by the long pause on the third inversion of the dominant resolved upon the first inversion of the tonic!  And who can play, unmoved by its pathos and emotion, the F Minor Invention?

                No one who delights in the playing of fugues upon the piano (and their numbers steadily increase by the reason of the separate clearness of the voices as compared with the too common confusion of the organ) should neglect the “Six Little Fugues and Fuguettas”—usually published in one set.  Each one is charming.  The first three are without preludes; and for any student who has grown weary of scale-practicing and yet cannot conscientiously neglect his daily duty to his ten fingers, nothing more refreshing to the spirit of music within him, and at the same time more valuable as digital exercise, can be imagined or has been written.  And then how ripplingly sweet is the prelude to No. 3!  How mighty and grandiose are the preludes of the fourth and fifth!  One feels when he has mastered these that he is on the way to playing the Toccatas in F and D Minor, even when arranged by Ferruccio Busoni or Karl Tausig.

The "delicious melody" Gounod discovered in Bach's "Well-Tempered" No. 1?  Ave Maria.  Enjoy Kimi Skota with Andre Rieu and his orchestra in their performance of Ave Maria:

by Robert Stanley Weir

THE ETUDE MUSIC MAGAZINE – November 1930

The Attitude of the Typical Musical Audience

                Music is second only to fiction in the number of its unthinking votaries.  A typical musical audience is a curious study.  It is composed of several varieties of listeners.  There is the purely professional listener, the musician, who usually hears little besides the modulations, the thematic development, the technical structure of the work performed.  As a rule, the aesthetic side of musical art escapes him.  The most thorough ignorance of the nature and purpose of the art of music that I ever met was at a convention of music teachers.

                An Ideal Listener.

                And yet among musicians one does in the end find the most accomplished auditors, for when the musician listens with intelligence, sympathy and insight, his trained organs enable him to hear more and better than any other member of an audience.  Give me a man of lively imagination, of poetic temperament and of generous disposition, who is also acquainted with the technics of music, and I will show you an ideal listener.

                But this man is not typical.  He is a rare bird, and floats in a beautiful, impalpable ether of the mind, which seems to the ordinary prosaic or uncomprehending hearer to be an elysium of mild lunacy.  Closest to him, perhaps, stands the music critic, but he lacks one element of the musician’s nature.  I am speaking now of the broad, vigorous master, who is sure of himself and has no petty jealousy.  The critic lacks his creative enthusiasm.  The critic may rhapsodize over the beauty of a new composition, but I fancy that he can never feel it in quite the same way as a great composer would.  Gounod’s ecstasies over “Don Giovanni” were a different sort from those of a critic.

                The Musician Worshipper.

                But a competent critic at any rate listens intelligently, and in his appreciation of the purely aesthetic side of musical art he far outranks the average musician.  These persons, however, are but a minority of any audience at a musical performance.  The majority consists of what, for lack of a more precise appellation, we call music lovers.  Now, a music lover is or ought to be a person who loves music.  The truth is that most of those who honor themselves with this title are in truth nothing better than musician worshippers.  Furthermore it is the performing musician, not the composer, whom they worship.

                The most popular form of music is the opera.  Listen to the chatter between the acts at any operatic performance and how much do you hear about the opera itself?  Little indeed, for the air is filled with praise or dispraise of Nordica, Caruso, Fremstad or some other singer who has been captivating hearers with tones. And how much understanding is disclosed in the comments made on these artists?  Since opera is the most popular form of music, the public should be expert in the judgment of singing; but precisely the contrary is the fact.  There is more ignorance of the art of song than of any other branch of musical performance.  The very worst singing is applauded vociferously provided it be extremely loud or extremely soft.

                Two Styles of Music.

                It is unnecessary to go into details, for what has been said about the attitude of the average hearer toward opera is applicable in some measure to his attitude toward any other branch of musical performance.  The piano is found in almost every home, yet how few attendants at piano recitals perceive what is really great in the pianist’s art, and how many are ready to applaud what is purely superficial or actually meretricious!  A masterly interpretation of a Beethoven sonata goes for little, while a fast and highly-accentuated performance of a Liszt rhapsody excites enthusiasm.  Is it not true that the typical audience silently breathes a sigh of relief when the pianist gets through with the Bach and Beethoven numbers and comes to the Chopin and Liszt?

                My honored comfrere, Mr. Finck, has staked out for himself the comforting ground that this is because Chopin and Liszt are so much better than the others.  But the dogged musicians and critics persist in putting Bach and Beethoven in the supreme seats of honor among musical masters.  The real reason why the average audience prefers Chopin and Liszt to Bach and Beethoven is that the former composers give ample scope for the display of those brilliancies of style which the unthinking hearer can easily discern, while the other two demand of player and hearer alike emotional sympathy and intellectual insight.  Even the mentality of Chopin and Liszt is lost sight of by the typical concert-goer.  The scales, arpeggios and staccati are the things that really count.

                The Sensuous in Music.

                What the great mass of so-called music lovers get out of music is that which lies upon its surface.  Those who have made a study of the tonal art know that like all other arts it has three groups of attributes:  the sensuous, the emotional and the intellectual.  I have named these in the order of their appeal to the perceptions.  To the great mass of music lovers only the sensuous element is discernible.  A pretty bit of melody, a graceful figure, a sonorous series of chords or a gorgeous piece of instrumentation—these are all they get out of an overture or a symphony.  Listening to a singer or a violinist, they hear nothing but tones.  They talk learnedly of Mme. Saccharini’s fine head tones and her weak medium, or the admirable quality of M. Arco’s G string.

                The Emotional in Music.

                Next we come to the emotionalists, who throb and pant under the influence of music.  Some of these do truly apprehend the divine passion of noble composition or the inflaming eloquence of great song or instrumental interpretation.  But many of them are little more than mere neurotics, whose systems respond with spasms and physical ecstasies to the sensuous caress of wooing sound.  They may be deeply and palpably stirred by the music of Wagner or Beethoven without having the slightest notion what it is that moves them or in what respect it claims adoration as the art of a master mind.

                The Intellectual in Music.

                Those who perceive the intellectual qualities of music are the only ones who may pride themselves on understanding its greatness as an art.  Not he who is touched only by the broad and simple beauty and nobility of the leading themes of Beethoven’s symphonies or Wagner’s dramas is the true appreciator of music, but he who follows those ideas through their symmetrical and inexorable development into a vast and highly-organized structure.

                But let me not be misunderstood.  The intellectual listener must not neglect the sensuous and emotional elements of music, for those are the two potent forces which the brain of a composer guides toward full and convincing expression.  The intellectual listener is he whom the process does not escape, and he alone perceives the art of the artist.  For art, truly described, is method, and in music it is a method of expression.

                The careless, unthinking auditor who is in the majority, does not perceive the method.  The building up of form in a composition, the balance and symmetry of its design, the clearly-drawn plan of a pianist’s interpretation or a singer’s reading of a song, escape his notice.  That which the artist, creative or interpretative, has striven most earnestly to place before him he fails to see, while he bestows his applause upon the means which the artist employs.  He sees the paint, but not the picture.  He joys in rhythm and rhyme and neglects the poem.  Thus it is that the great mass of music lovers get out of music most of its sensuous beauty, a part of its emotional power and very little of that intellectual majesty which makes it the peer of all the other arts.  That devotees of the other arts regard music as their inferior is due to the inability of the great body of music lovers to talk intelligently about music, and they do not talk so because they do not think so.

by W.J. Henderson

THE ETUDE MUSIC MAGAZINE – February 1905

Enjoy Enrico Caruso: