Johann Sebastian Bach (42 page)

When Bach arrived in Leipzig for his examination and audition, he brought along with him the finished cantata scores and most of the performing parts. On February 8, the Monday after the cantorate trial, he was reimbursed 20 talers for his expenses, the same amount allowed Telemann, though Bach had a much shorter distance to travel, suggesting that he stayed in Leipzig for more than a week. (Telemann spent exactly two weeks there when he auditioned the previous year.) Bach and the Leipzig authorities needed time for all kinds of discussions relating to the position, but of utmost importance for Bach were the preparations for performing the two cantatas, “Jesus nahm zu sich die Zwölfe,” BWV 22 (for SATB, oboe, strings, and continuo), and “Du wahrer Gott und Davids Sohn,” BWV 23 (for SATB, 2 oboi d'amore, strings, and continuo). These were ambitious compositions: BWV 23, with its expansive duet solos, clearly follows the model of the Cöthen congratulatory cantatas, while BWV 22 more readily foreshadows the cantata type that would prevail in the first months of Bach's tenure as the new cantor. From the original sources of the two works, we can deduce that the performing materials brought along from Cöthen needed to be completed. We can see as well that Bach decided to extend BWV 23 by one movement, the elaborate chorale setting “Christe, du Lamm Gottes,” BWV 23/4, adding to the orchestra a cornetto and three trombones to double the choir parts and giving the work, with the text and melody of the German Agnus Dei, a more liturgical character. This movement was not a newly composed piece but was taken from a finished work, most likely the Weimar (or Gotha) Passion of 1717, BC D1, which Bach brought along to Leipzig in his baggage—perhaps to be able to show an example of a large-scale composition, perhaps to offer it for performance in case such a work was needed for the upcoming Good Friday Vespers. The need apparently did not arise, but in the added finale to BWV 23 the people in Leipzig were given a taste of what such a work might be like. Although hardly anyone would have known then how promising it really was, newpapers in Leipzig and elsewhere reported on the audition for the cantorate by the “the Hon. Capellmeister of Cöthen, Mr. Bach…the music of the same having been amply praised on that occasion by all knowledgeable persons.”
⁹⁵
Oddly, and perhaps significantly, none of the other auditions left a trail in the newspapers.

Despite the favorable impression left in Leipzig, Bach returned to Cöthen without the promise of a job; Graupner had been chosen before Bach had even arrived on the scene. But Lange's fears came true: Landgrave Ernst Ludwig of Hesse-Darmstadt did not grant his capellmeister the requested dismissal, and Graupner was forced to decline the Leipzig offer, as he informed the Leipzig authorities on March 22. On April 9, almost two weeks after Easter, the city council returned to the matter of the cantorate, but unfortunately the minutes of this important meeting have survived only incompletely. We can see, though, that the faction preferring a teacher-cantor took the lead: after

 

the man who had been favored [Graupner]…the others in view were the Capellmeister at Cöthen, Bach; Kauffmann in Merseburg; and Schott here, but none of the three would be able to teach [academic subjects] also, and in Telemann's case consideration had already been given to a division [of the duties].

Appeals Councillor Platz:
The latter suggestion he considered for several reasons somewhat questionable; since the best could not be obtained, a mediocre one would have to be accepted; many good things had once been said about a man in Pirna.
⁹⁶

 

Here the minutes break off, with the sixty-five-year-old Abraham Christoph Platz recalling what he had heard about someone whose name he could not remember: Christian Heckel, cantor in Pirna, who seemed competent in teaching both music and academic subjects (Latin grammar and Luther's Catechism were traditionally the cantor's domain). Platz urged the council to turn away from the best musicians (like Telemann, Graupner, Bach, Kauffmann, and Schott) and instead look for the best teachers, even if their musical qualifications were only “mediocre.” Though the rest of the arguments pro and con remain unknown, Lange and his followers somehow persuaded the council to reach a compromise with respect to the teaching function and to make Bach an offer. Having learned a lesson about unpredictable sovereign rulers, the council invited Bach back to Leipzig and asked him to sign a preliminary pledge that he would

 

not only within three or, at the most, four weeks from this date make myself free of the engagement given me at the Court of the Prince of Anhalt-Cöthen, but also, when I actually enter upon the duties of the said post of Cantor, conduct myself according to the School Regulations now in effect or to be put into effect; and especially I will instruct the boys admitted into the School not only in the regular classes established for that purpose but also, without special compensation, in private singing lessons. I will also faithfully attend to whatever else is incumbent upon me, and furthermore, but not without the previous knowledge and consent of a Noble and Wise Council, in case someone should be needed to assist me in the instruction in the Latin language, will faithfully and without ado compensate the said person out of my own pocket.
⁹⁷

 

On April 19, when Bach put his signature under this pledge, he already knew that his patron had generously granted him the dismissal: a letter, signed by Prince Leopold on April 13, was in the mail. It refers to the service of “the Respectable and Learned Johann Sebastian Bach, since August 5, 1717, as Capellmeister and Director of Our Chamber Music,” and states “that we have at all times been well content with his discharge of his duties, but the said Bach, wishing now to seek his fortune elsewhere, has accordingly most humbly petitioned Us to grant him a most gracious dismissal, now therefore We have been pleased graciously to grant him the same and to give him highest recommendation for service elsewhere.”
⁹⁸

On April 22, shortly after the arrival of the prince's letter, the entire city council, this time in a joint assembly of all three councils, moved to proceed with Bach's election. First, Burgomaster Lange summarized the long process by recounting how Telemann “had not kept his promise” and by clarifying that Graupner had privately (but never formally) been offered the job, but that “he could not obtain his dismissal.” He then turned to the new candidate: “Bach was Capellmeister in Cöthen and excelled on the clavier. Besides music he had the teaching equipment; and the Cantor must give instruction in the
Colloquia Corderi
[a textbook of piety, letters, and behavior] and in grammar, which he was willing to do. He had formally undertaken to give not only public but also private instruction. If Bach were chosen, Telemann, in view of his conduct, might be forgotten.”
⁹⁹

Councillor Platz spoke next, emphasizing that Bach “must accommodate himself to the instruction of the youth. Bach was fitted for this and willing to do it, and accordingly he cast his vote for him.” Since the two antagonists had now reached agreement, the entire council voted unanimously for Bach. The burgomaster concluded the meeting, but not without mentioning another crucial point that spoke in favor of Bach. He noted that “it was necessary to be sure to get a famous man, in order to inspire the [university] students.” Because the church music in Leipzig traditionally depended on qualified student performers, whom Johann Kuhnau had had trouble attracting, Lange was confident that the new appointment would change that situation for the better and that things generally “would turn out well.” And he must then have appreciated the letter that Christoph Graupner, after learning the outcome, wrote on May 4, assuring the city council that Bach is “a musician just as strong on the organ as he is expert in church works and capelle pieces,” and one who “will honestly and properly perform the functions entrusted to him.”
¹⁰⁰

Not all the technical details of the appointment were settled when Bach returned to Cöthen to inform his patron of his official election to the distinguished post at St. Thomas's and to prepare himself and his family for a major, almost instant change in their lives. About two and a half months earlier, on his way home after the Leipzig audition, the outcome had been uncertain. He may then have thought back to Hamburg in 1720, Halle in 1713, and even Sangerhausen in 1702 and realized that he had never lost an audition, however complicated the subsequent deliberations had become. And complicated they became once again, but the outcome was finally clear and right. What may have gone through his mind is hinted at in his 1730 letter to Erdmann: “it pleased God that I should be called hither to be Director Musices and Cantor at the St. Thomas School.”
¹⁰¹

A C
ANON OF
P
RINCIPLES, AND
P
USHING THE
L
IMITS

In the fall of 1722, when Bach submitted his application for the Kuhnau succession, he must have realized that he would need to present his credentials as a competent instructor of music. A simple declaration of willingness and readiness to teach would not suffice, and evidence of pertinent experience would be due at the interviews conducted, at the time of the public audition, by the rector of the St. Thomas School, M. Johann Heinrich Ernesti, and possibly by members of the inner council. There was certainly no need to prove himself as a musician outside the audition, but he held no university degree, nor had he ever studied at a university. His academic background was shaped by the excellent schools he had attended; he had received top grades and, after all, graduated from the acclaimed St. Michael's School in Lüneburg, an institution of supra-regional reputation—although by now, his education lay twenty years back. In the meantime, while he had never engaged in any school or classroom teaching, he had nonetheless developed considerable experience in the private instruction of individual students. Having attracted private pupils early on and having maintained an active and growing teaching studio ever since, he knew well that he was a passionate and successful teacher. But how could he demonstrate this to his examiners?

In reviewing his studio practices, Bach probably realized that he could, in fact, produce tangible evidence of having developed innovative and unparalleled instructional materials. Always, his teaching of keyboard instruments went well beyond the drill of mere technical skills and included an introduction to basic musical systems, especially to the principles of musical composition. With particular care, he had prepared the instruction of his ten-year-old firstborn with the
Clavier-Büchlein vor Wilhelm Friedemann Bach
(1720). He began with a quick review of the tone system (clefs, pitches, and registers of voices), ornaments, and fingering, spending no more than three pages on these preliminary matters. He then turned to little preludes, chorale elaborations, dance settings, a group of more substantial preludes in different keys (including such remote and difficult keys as C-sharp minor and E-flat minor), a simple fugue, fifteen praeambula in strict two-part counterpoint (all in different keys, in ascending and descending order), followed by fifteen strict three-part fantasias (organized in the same manner), and suites by Telemann, Johann Christoph Richter, and Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel—all interspersed with the young student's own exercises in composition. The various compositional models, examples of which are found in this Little Clavier Book, he had either already collected elsewhere more systematically (for example, the short chorale preludes of the Weimar
Orgel-Büchlein
) or would soon undertake to compile (as in
The Well-Tempered Clavier
, a collection of preludes and fugues written over the years that included some of the preludes from the Friedemann Bach Book and the
Aufrichtige Anleitung
[Upright Instruction],
¹⁰²
a revised version of the praeambula and fantasias from the Friedemann Bach Book).

The manuscript sources themselves provide no conclusive information on how far
The Well-Tempered Clavieror
the
Aufrichtige Anleitung
had progressed by the time Bach began preparing himself as a candidate for St. Thomas's. Both autograph scores are fair copies and dated 1722 and 1723, respectively. The context clearly suggests, however, that the two manuscripts were completed in the fall and winter of 1722–23 and that their corresponding title pages, including that added to the
Orgel-Büchlein
, were conceived in conjunction with Bach's application to the cantorate. All three elaborate titles emphasize the pedagogical intent and method of the materials contained in the volumes and introduce Bach as the author of exemplary and serviceable textbooks.

 

(1) “
The Well-Tempered Clavier
, or preludes and fugues through all the tones and semitones, both as regards the
tertia major
or
Ut Re Mi
and as concerns the
tertia minor
or
Re Mi Fa
. For the use and profit of the musical youth desirous of learning as well as for the pastime of those already skilled in this study” [a volume of 90 pages in folio format, dated 1722].

 

(2) “
Aufrichtige Anleitung
, wherein the lovers of the clavier, and especially those desirous of learning, are shown a clear way not only (1) to learn to play clearly in two voices but also, after further progress, (2) to deal correctly and well with three obbligato parts; furthermore, at the same time not only to have good
inventiones
but to develop the same well and, above all, to arrive at a singing style in playing and at the same time to acquire a strong foretaste of composition” [a volume of 62 pages in quarto format, dated 1723].