PROGRAM NOTES UNDERWRITTEN BY THOMAS WARD

In May 1747 Johann Sebastian Bach was 62 years old. In three years he would be dead, closing one of the most significant chapters in music history. The breadth and technical mastery of Bach’s output is unparalleled, though he never achieved the international fame during his lifetime that posterity would gradually accord to him. For instance, the complete catalog of his works produced posthumously under his son’s guidance, the far-reaching Baroque revival inspired by Felix Mendelssohn in the mid 19th century, the virtuoso transcriptions of Bach’s works for all kinds of instruments and ensembles, the global name recognition – all this could not have been foreseen when the aged Kapellmeister rumbled down the royal road outside Potsdam, heading for an historic meeting with Prussian monarch Frederick the Great at his summer palace, Sans-Souci.

Bach had come to court to visit his son, Carl Philip Emanuel, and play on the King’s new fortepiano. Frederick however had a surprise in store: a challenging theme for improvisation that he thought would stump even old Bach himself. Apparently, Bach rose magnificently to the occasion, spontaneously creating a three-voice fugue on the Royal Theme. Later he wrote a whole series of canons on the theme and mailed them to the King as a gift. Thus Bach’s beloved Musical Offering . . . .

Frederick (1712-1786) was deeply fond of music and, as we will see, had musical aspirations of his own. Those interests didn’t always sit well with his militaristic father, Frederick William. Young Frederick’s life included many confrontations between father and son, and it was only after several drastic, debilitating actions that Frederick acquiesced to parental control over his future. At one point Frederick rebelled and planned to flee to England with his most intimate friend – who was probably also his lover. Their plan was leaked to the king, who had both young men arrested for treason and imprisoned. To teach his son a lesson, Frederick William cruelly forced him to watch as his companion was beheaded.

Frederick was then sent to military school for formal training, but he never left music behind. Years later evening concerts, with Frederick himself playing flute, were a regular feature of life at court. And upon ascending to the throne in 1740 and establishing his alternate residence at Sans-Souci, he retained most of his musicians, including his long-time flute teacher Johann Joachim Quantz and young Carl Philip Emanuel Bach, J. S. Bach’s second son.

Frederick’s own music primarily features the flute, of course, and he wrote over a hundred flute sonatas. In the year of Bach’s visit (1747), the King tried his hand at a larger composition, the Sinfonia in D Major. This glittering work shows the transition taking place from the dense polyphony of Bach’s era to the melody and accompaniment manner (“homophony”) of the burgeoning Classical era. Indeed, while simple and rather formulaic, the Sinfonia’s opening Allegro could pass for an early effort by Haydn or Mozart. The central movement, enlivened by countless trills, offers a quiet duet for winds with basic string accompaniment. Frederick closes the Sinfonia with a vibrant binary-form Allegro that is perhaps the finest and most varied of the three movements. Clearly the King had deep musical understanding – or at least attentive and thoughtful teachers – and we wonder just how important such creative outlets were to a figure not naturally suited for his militaristic life.

One of the most significant factors shaping the Baroque style in Germany was the gradual import of musical forms and virtuosic styles from Italy. Many figures played a role in that migration, including Heinrich Schütz and Johann Jakob Froberger. Rarely heard today, Johann Rosenmüller (1619-1684) also took part in connecting Italy to central and northern German territories. Rosenmüller was born in Saxony and spent time professionally in Leipzig. A great deal of his music, to be expected from a church music director, is sacred and includes vocal-instrumental concertos, a Requiem mass, and a Dixit Dominus setting. Unfortunately he became embroiled in a scandal in 1655; as a gay man employed in a Lutheran parish, he was accused of improper relationships with choirboys and fled to Italy to avoid prison. In Italy he received work at St Mark’s basilica and also taught at the same orphanage that would one day hire Antonio Vivaldi as music director. Rosenmüller eventually returned to Saxony for the final years of his career.

Little else is known about Rosenmüller’s career and the chronology of his works. Clearly he absorbed the prevailing instrumental style prevalent in Germany and in Italy. In 1682 he published a collection of sonatas in Nuremberg, works that follow the Italian trio texture (two trebles plus bass) developed so fully a generation later by Corelli, Vivaldi, and others. However, his Sonata in C Major also shows the lingering hold of an older tradition, which favored short sections alternating between fast and slow tempos. The tonal language of the opening Allegro is untroubled by chromaticism; it includes hardly any pitches outside the C major key. By contrast, the following Adagio luxuriates in a fugue theme rife with chromaticism, adding to the poignant affect. A brief Grave, punctuated by rhetorical pauses and striking chromatic progressions, sets the stage for a brilliant fugue. If we needed any confirmation of Rosenmüller’s astounding ability, this fugue settles the matter. After sprinting by, a final comically hushed cadence abruptly calls a temporary halt. Another short Adagio clears the air for the finale, which marks a circular reprise of the opening Allegro.

Years earlier, perhaps just after his return to Germany, Rosenmüller composed a series of sacred concertos. In 1669 he produced Vater, ich have gesundigt (Father, I have sinned), a concerto for four voices with modest instrumental support. The alto voice begins, embodying the Prodigal Son returned, confessing his sins before his father. Scored for bass voice, the father welcomes his son as if returned from the dead. The following section features two tenors, the first portraying the anxious elder son and exclaiming, “What is this?” He is informed by a servant that his younger brother has returned and been welcomed with open arms. The musical style rarely becomes melodic; these are recitatives rather than arias, but the simplicity of Rosenmüller’s setting aptly serves the liturgical lesson to be learned from this famous parable.

The genre of Bach’s Orchestral Suite in D Major, BWV 1069, is one with a long pedigree. In the 18th century, a suite for large ensemble featured a collection of French Baroque dances headed by an overture in the French style. In deference to the grand opening movements – and Bach’s are no different in that respect – the entire suite is sometimes also called an Ouverture. Bach wrote far fewer such suites than many of his contemporaries; Telemann composed well over 100, for instance. Moreover, it is not entirely clear when these four suites took shape. Several seem to originate around 1730, while Bach was employed in Leipzig. Others, including the Suite No. 4 in D Major, likely stem from older material Bach created during his time at the Pietist court in Cöthen. In Cöthen church music was less important than at other times in Bach’s career, and he delved deeply into all manner of instrumental music.

D major was the go-to key for music on festive or ceremonial occasions, usually involving added trumpets and timpani. The most characteristic aspects of the opening movement are gestural dotted rhythms and sweeping violin runs inherited from the French overture. Bach also explores oppositions between small and large ensembles borrowed from the Italian concerto. His contrapuntal skills are on full display in the fugue that forms the middle section of the overture. The fugue features a galloping theme in 9/8 meter where the imitation happens very compactly; in other words, the answering (imitating) voice begins only moments after the leading voice, creating a kind of polyphonic pile-up. Moreover, the theme itself does not contain a hummable melody so much as pure rhythmic energy. Bach relieves the motoric monotony by paring the texture down to small groups at times, such as an extended passage for three oboes and bassoon alone, before the opening Overture theme is reprised.

Bach maintains a fairly rigid harmonic structure among the dances. The dances are all in two-part (binary) form, where the A section covers a move from the tonic to the dominant key – typically D to A major, though sometimes the companion dances are in the relative minor mode (B minor) – and the B section touches on related minor keys on its way back to tonic. The pacing and manner in which these tonal moves are undertaken remains consistent from one dance to the next. The pair of Bourées function like a miniature da capo aria: the first Bourrée in D major is played twice, both before and after the more intimate second Bourrée in B minor. A sober Gavotte contrasts nicely with the lively Minuet pair, and the entire Suite closes with a movement titled Réjoiussance. That title, perhaps familiar from Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks (1749), refers not to a particular dance. Instead, it points to a mood of rejoicing or jubilation. Handel used it in light of a specific occasion (the end of the War of the Austrian Succession), but we can only speculate whether Bach had a similar motivation?

Jason Stell, © 2026