Johann Sebastian Bach was born into a musical family. Bach (begun January 22, 1720), some of the French Suites, the Inventions (1720), and the first book (1722) of Das Wohltemperierte Klavier (The Well-Tempered Clavier, eventually consisting of two books, each of 24 preludes and fugues in all keys and known as “the Forty-Eight”). Born in Germany. Johann Sebastian Bach was born on March 21, 1685, in Eisenach, the youngest child of Johann Ambrosius Bach, organist at St. George's Church, and Elizabeth Lämmerhirt Bach. 1 in F major, BWV 1046, Concerto for violin, strings & continuo No. Bach's. Johann Sebastian Bach (Eisenach, 21. ožujka 1685. Bach nació en el seno de una estirpe de músicos e intérpretes muy influyentes en la música alemana a partir de 1561. Though incomplete and inaccurate, the obituary is of very great importance as a firsthand source of information. At Mühlhausen things seem, for a time, to have gone more smoothly. Cantata No. On Bach, the 34-year-old’s lean but immensely expressive playing captivates listeners, his eloquence and the sensuous delight he takes in experimentation holding them spellbound. Johann Sebastian started school in 1692 or 1693 and did well in spite of frequent absences. Johann Sebastian Bach biography Johann Sebastian Bach (March 21, 1685 – July 28, 1750). He is most famous for his work Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, St. Matthew Passion, St. John Passion, Mass in B minor, and the Brandenburg Concertos.He spent several years working at courts of noblemen.Here he wrote most of … Anne”] in E-flat Major (BWV 552), appeared in 1739. Arnstadt documents imply that he had been court organist at Weimar; this is incredible, though it is likely enough that he had occasionally played there. The famous organ Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (BWV 565), written in the rhapsodic northern style, and the Prelude and Fugue in D Major (BWV 532) may also have been composed during the Mühlhausen period, as well as the organ Passacaglia in C Minor (BWV 582), an early example of Bach’s instinct for large-scale organization. In the summer of 1705 he had made some offensive remark about a bassoon player, which led to an unseemly scuffle in the street. Johann Sebastian Bach (lahir di Eisenach, Jerman, 21 Maret 1685 – meninggal 28 Juli 1750 pada umur 65 tahun) adalah seorang komponis dan organis Jerman zaman Barok.Beliau menggubah musik untuk alat musik organ, harpsichord, clavichord, dan juga untuk orkestra.Ia telah menggubah lebih dari 1000 lagu. Updates? By this time he was already a reasonably proficient organist. Satz. But the prince married on December 11, 1721, and conditions deteriorated. Johann Sebastian Bach (31. března 1685 Eisenach – 28. července 1750 Lipsko) byl německý hudební skladatel a virtuos hry na klávesové nástroje, považovaný za jednoho z největších hudebních géniů všech dob a završitele barokního hudebního stylu. Bach's, The aria “Have mercy, Lord, on me” from J.S. In later days the most important musicians in the family were Johann Sebastian’s sons—Wilhelm Friedemann, Carl Philipp Emanuel, and Johann Christian (the “English Bach”). Johann Sebastian Bach was born in the small German town of Eisenach on this day in 1685 (under the old Julian calendar). Voltaire's Candide. German composer. The third part, consisting of the Organ Mass with the Prelude and Fugue [“St. The results of this encounter can be seen in such cantatas as No. The “Kyrie” and “Gloria” of the Mass in B Minor, written in 1733, were also dedicated to the elector, but the rest of the Mass was not put together until Bach’s last years. It is generally supposed that he had become involved in a theological controversy between his own pastor Frohne and Archdeacon Eilmar of the Marienkirche. By 1695 both his parents were dead, and he was looked after by his eldest brother, also named Johann Christoph (1671–1721), organist at Ohrdruf. At Arnstadt, on the northern edge of the Thuringian Forest, where he remained until 1707, Bach devoted himself to keyboard music, the organ in particular. However, he learnt to keep time, and this apparently was the beginning of music in our family.”. Read Full Biography. Das "Air" von Johann Sebastian Bach aus der 3. Unfortunately, Bach’s development cannot be traced in detail during the vital years 1708–14, when his style underwent a profound change. As the latter was not sure that he would be able to accept, Bach gave a trial performance (Cantata No. Bach, Johann Sebastian (sābäs`tyän bäkh), 1685–1750, German composer and organist, b.Eisenach; one of the greatest and most influential composers of the Western world. As with many things in Bach's life, family was everything. Bach's use of counterpoint was brilliant and innovative, and the immense complexities of his compositional style -- which often included religious and numerological … He also had to think of the education of his elder sons, born in 1710 and 1714, and he probably began to think of moving to Leipzig as soon as the cantorate fell vacant with the death of Johann Kuhnau on June 5, 1722. Since the 19th-century Bach Revival he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers of all … Late in 1713 Bach had the opportunity of succeeding Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow at the Liebfrauenkirche, Halle; but the duke raised his salary, and he stayed on at Weimar. His employers proceeded with relief to appoint a successor; Burgomaster Stieglitz remarked, “The school needs a cantor, not a musical director—though certainly he ought to understand music.” Anna Magdalena was left badly off. Johann Sebastian Bach is a 19th-century biography of Johann Sebastian Bach by Philipp Spitta.The work was published in German in two volumes, in 1873 and 1880 respectively. Since the 19th-century Bach Revival he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers of all … Apart from his first wife’s death, these first four years at Köthen were probably the happiest of Bach’s life. Johann Sebastian Bach had 20 children, 7 with his first wife and 13 with his second wife. Air on a G String (1720) Aria da Capo (1741) Brandenburg Concerto No. For some reason, her stepsons did nothing to help her, and her own sons were too young to do so. Johann Sebastian Bach composed over 1,000 pieces of music. Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March 1685 – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. / 31 de marzo de 1685 greg.-Leipzig, en la actual Sajonia, Sacro Imperio Romano Germánico, 17 de julio jul. The Art of Fugue (or The Art of the Fugue; German: Die Kunst der Fuge), BWV 1080, is an incomplete musical work of unspecified instrumentation by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750). Please select which sections you would like to print: Corrections? I feel that he is an example and a model for men in general not only in the musical field. The next few months are wrapped in mystery, but by March 4, 1703, he was a member of the orchestra employed by Johann Ernst, duke of Weimar (and brother of Wilhelm Ernst, whose service Bach entered in 1708). Johann Sebastian remarked, “A pretty noise they must have made together! [1] Although he introduced no new forms, he enriched the prevailing German style with a robust contrapuntal technique, an unrivalled control of … The resulting ill feeling had become serious by 1730. Bach, Johann Sebastian (1685-1750), German organist and composer of the baroque era, one of the greatest and most productive geniuses in the history of Western music. Johann Sebastian Bach nació el 21 de marzo de 1685 en Eisenach (Turingia). Johann Sebastian Bach was born in the small German town of Eisenach on this day in 1685 (under the old Julian calendar). Johann Sebastian Bach (Eisenach, 1685. március 31. Orphaned before he turned 10 years old, he was looked after by his eldest brother, an organist who gave him his first keyboard lessons. (a Julián naptár szerint március 21.) J.S. The fact that no other composer of the period, with the arguable exception of Handel, even remotely approached Bach’s achievement indicates clearly enough that the application of the “mechanical” procedures was not literally “automatic” but was controlled throughout by something else—artistic discrimination, or taste. Français : Jean-Sébastien Bach (en Allemand, Johann Sebastian Bach) (né à Eisenach le 21 mars 1685, mort à Leipzig le 28 … Encouraged by Wilhelm Ernst, he concentrated on the organ during the first few years of his tenure. 22 Solos from J.S. Furthermore, the authorities insisted on admitting unmusical boys to the school, thus making it difficult for Bach to keep his churches supplied with competent singers; they also refused to spend enough money to keep a decent orchestra together. His music is notable for its intellectual rigor and emotional expressiveness. Musicians … A 17. század elejéig visszavezethető Bach dinasztia legjelentősebb alakja volt. His real reason for resigning on June 25, 1708, is not known. Almost any number may be called “symbolic” (3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 14, and 41 are only a few examples); any multiple of such a number is itself symbolic; and the number of sharps in a key signature, notes in a melody, measures in a piece, and so on may all be considered significant. The “Sanctus” of the Mass in B Minor was produced at Christmas. At the same time, The Well-Tempered Clavier is a compendium of the most popular forms and styles of the era: dance types, arias, motets, concerti, etc., presented within the unified aspect of a single compositional technique—the rigorously logical and venerable fugue. Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March 1685 – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. (Sheila Blanco) pronunciation Pronunciation by Covarrubias (Male from Spain) Bach did well at school, and he was selected for a choir of poor boys at the school in Michaelskirche, Lüneburg, Germany. It attracted little attention and was reissued in 1752 with a laudatory preface by Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, a well-known Berlin musician who later became director of the royal lottery. Johann Sebastian Bach se casó en dos ocasiones. In spite of Marpurg and of some appreciative remarks by Johann Mattheson, the influential Hamburg critic and composer, only about 30 copies had been sold by 1756, when Emanuel Bach offered the plates for sale. On June 11, 1724, the first Sunday after Trinity, Bach began a fresh annual cycle of cantatas, and within the year he wrote 52 of the so-called chorale cantatas, formerly supposed to have been composed over the nine-year period 1735–44. 75, Die Elenden sollen essen. barokk kori német zeneszerző, orgonista, hegedűművész, a zeneművészet kiemelkedő egyénisége, a protestáns egyházi zene jeles képviselője. He was the culmination of the family's long line of musicians, beginning with his great-grandfather, Veit Bach, who was a professional violinist in Gotha, and the name Bach was considered a synonym for musician. There were Bachs in the area before then, and it may be that, when Veit moved to Wechmar, he was returning to his birthplace. Bach's family. Trouble flared up again in July 1736; it then took the form of a dispute over Bach’s right to appoint prefects and became a public scandal. Johann Sebastian Bach. The first half of 1724 saw the production of the St. John Passion, which was subsequently revised. Con la primera, Maria Bárbara Bach, tuvo siete hijos y ambos se fueron a vivir a Mulhose donde él … To some extent, no doubt, he accepted engagements because he needed money—he complained in 1730 that his income was less than he had been led to expect (he remarked that there were not enough funerals)—but, obviously, his routine work must have suffered. Bach's, Third movement, “Allegro assai,” of J.S. Bach was a German composer of the Baroque period and virtuoso organist. / 28 de julio de 1750 greg.) On the death of his […] Bach presumably resented being thus passed over, and in due course he accepted an appointment as musical director to Prince Leopold of Köthen, which was confirmed in August 1717. In 1726, after he had completed the bulk of his cantata production, Bach began to publish the clavier Partitas singly, with a collected edition in 1731, perhaps with the intention of attracting recognition beyond Leipzig and thus securing a more amenable appointment elsewhere. His music is notable for its intellectual rigor and emotional expressiveness. Haunted houses?Bach. Bach's parents both died when he was ten years old. Johann Sebastian Bach Biography by Robert Cummings + Follow Artist. Su familia era depositaria de una vasta tradición musical y había dado a lo largo de varias generaciones un buen plantel de compositores e intérpretes. The princess—described by Bach as “an amusa” (that is to say, opposed to the muses)—required so much of her husband’s attention that Bach began to feel neglected. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Johann-Sebastian-Bach, British Library - Biography of Johann Sebastian Bach, Making Music Fun! In May 1747 he visited his son Emanuel at Potsdam and played before Frederick II (the Great) of Prussia; in July his improvisations, on a theme proposed by the king, took shape as The Musical Offering. While at Lüneburg he had apparently had no opportunity of becoming directly acquainted with the spectacular, flamboyant playing and compositions of Dietrich Buxtehude, the most significant exponent of the north German school of organ music. 5 in D major, BWV 1050, Italian Concerto, for solo keyboard in F major, BWV 971 (BC L7) (Clavier-Übung II/1), Passacaglia and Fugue, for organ in C minor, BWV 582 (BC J79), Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue, for keyboard in D minor, BWV 903 (BC L34), French Suite, for keyboard No. Fortunately for Bach, he became court composer to the elector of Saxony in November 1736. March 21, 1685 - July 28, 1750. Español: Johann Sebastian Bach (*21 de marzo, 1685; † 28 de julio, 1750) era un compositor y organista alemán del periodo Barroco. She died on February 27, 1760, and was given a pauper’s funeral. Read Full Biography. At the Peterskirche the choir merely led the hymns. About September a contest between Bach and the famous French organist Louis Marchand was arranged at Dresden. As far as is known, they were sold for scrap. He became friendly with a relative, Johann Gottfried Walther, a music lexicographer and composer who was organist of the town church, and, like Walther, Bach took part in the musical activities at the Gelbes Schloss (“Yellow Castle”), then occupied by Duke Wilhelm’s two nephews, Ernst August and Johann Ernst, both of whom he taught. And he found time to compile pedagogical keyboard works: the Clavierbüchlein for W.F. Biografía de Johann Sebastian Bach. At all events, his resignation was accepted, and shortly afterward he moved to Weimar, some miles west of Jena on the Ilm River. David Goode performs the complete organ works of Johann Sebastian Bach on the renowned Metzler Söhne organ of Trinity College Chapel, Cambridge, in a new a set spanning 16 CDs and over 17 hours and 40 minutes of music. Only 10 of them lived to adulthood. Friction between Bach and his employers thus developed almost at once. Of his musical education at this time, nothing definite is known; however, he may have picked up the rudiments of string playing from his father, and no doubt he attended the Georgenkirche, where Johann Christoph Bach was organist until 1703. He took a musical pilgrimage that puts every road trip to Woodstock to shame. Johann Sebastian Bach. He brought polyphonic baroque music to its culmination, creating masterful and vigorous works in almost every musical form known in his period. There, as musical director, he was concerned chiefly with chamber and orchestral music. He moved there soon after and married his cousin Maria Barbara Bach at Dornheim on October 17. Perhaps the real reasons for his neglect were that he was temporarily obsessed with the organ and was on bad terms with the local singers and instrumentalists, who were not under his control and did not come up to his standards. On October 17, 1707, Johann Sebastian Bach married his cousin Maria Barbara Bach at Dornheim. His experience at Lüneburg, if not at Ohrdruf, had turned him away from the secular string-playing tradition of his immediate ancestors; thenceforth he was chiefly, though not exclusively, a composer and performer of keyboard and sacred music. As a result of his intense activity in cantata production during his first three years in Leipzig, Bach had created a supply of church music to meet his future needs for the regular Sunday and feast day services. For these concerts, he adapted some of his earlier concerti as harpsichord concerti, thus becoming one of the first composers—if not the very first—of concerti for keyboard instrument and orchestra, just as he was one of the first to use the harpsichordist’s right hand as a true melodic part in chamber music. The latter was a talented composer who wrote concerti in the Italian manner, some of which Bach arranged for keyboard instruments; the boy died in 1715, in his 19th year. - Biography of Johann Sebastian Bach, AllMusic - Biography of Johann Sebastian Bach, Johann Sebastian Bach - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Johann Sebastian Bach - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). 1 Bach Composes the Brandenburg Concertos 1.1 Introduction 1.2 Early Years 2 Passion of St. Matthew 2.1 Later Years 2.2 The Bach Revival 2.3 Master of Counterpoint Add a photo to this gallery Add a photo to this gallery Bach … Set lagu oleh Bach Brandenburg Concertos, lagu gereja Mass in B minor, adalah yang paling … 3 in G major, BWV 1048, Concerto for violin, strings & continuo No. He was born in Eisenach, now Germany. From the series of cantatas written in 1714–16, however, it is obvious that he had been decisively influenced by the new styles and forms of the contemporary Italian opera and by the innovations of such Italian concerto composers as Antonio Vivaldi. In 1705, 20-year-old … Since the 19th-century Bach Revival he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time. The Brandenburg Concertos were finished by March 24, 1721; in the sixth concerto—so it has been suggested—Bach bore in mind the technical limitations of the prince, who played the gamba. Certainly, he was friendly with Eilmar, who provided him with librettos and became godfather to Bach’s first child; and it is likely enough that he was not in sympathy with Frohne, who, as a Pietist, would have frowned on elaborate church music. Bach's Violin and Cello Works (Bach, Johann Sebastian) 3 Sonatas for Viola da Gamba and Harpsichord, BWV 1027-1029 (Bach, Johann Sebastian) 80 Songs and Airs (Bach, Johann Sebastian) These are just two of several respects in which the basically conservative and traditional Bach was a significant innovator as well. Alle Musik geht auf ihn zurück. Even though some of the works may have been composed earlier and revised later, it was at Köthen that the sonatas for violin and clavier and for viola da gamba and clavier and the works for unaccompanied violin and cello were put into something like their present form. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. In October 1705, Bach was invited to study for one month with the renowned Danish-born German organist and … – Lipcse, 1750. július 28.) Bach and his contemporaries, subject to the hectic pace of production, had to invent or discover their ideas quickly and could not rely on the unpredictable arrival of “inspiration.” Nor did the musical conventions and techniques or the generally rationalistic outlook of the time necessitate this reliance, as long as the composer was willing to accept them. 22, Jesu nahm zu sich die Zwölfe [Jesus Called unto Him the Twelve]) on February 7, 1723; and, when Graupner withdrew (April 9), Bach was so deeply committed to Leipzig that, although the princess had died on April 4, he applied for permission to leave Köthen. One of the most respected attributes in the culture of the 18th century, “taste” is an utterly individual compound of raw talent, imagination, psychological disposition, judgment, skill, and experience. About 1733 Bach began to produce cantatas in honour of the elector of Saxony and his family, evidently with a view to the court appointment he secured in 1736; many of these secular movements were adapted to sacred words and reused in the Christmas Oratorio. Written in the last decade of his life, The Art of Fugue is the culmination of Bach's experimentation with monothematic instrumental works. 2 in F major (1721) Coffee Cantata (1734) Jesu, Joy Of Man's Desiring (1723) Mass in B Minor (1749) Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (1705) More Songfacts: Mellow YellowDonovan. His compositions represent the best of the Baroque era. He was able to successfully integrate and expand upon the harmonic and formal … Bach was the youngest child of Johann Ambrosius Bach and Elisabeth Lämmerhirt. The second part of the Clavierübung, containing the Concerto in the Italian Style and the French Overture (Partita) in B Minor, appeared in 1735. He is known for instrumental compositions such as the Brandenburg Concertos and the Goldberg Variations, and vocal music such as the St Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. He is celebrated as the creator of many masterpieces of church and instrumental music. Johann Sebastian Bach was better known as a virtuoso organist than as a composer in his day. The Bach … The young Bach was offered a choral scholarship to the prestigious St Michael's School in 1699. This phenomenal pace raises the question of Bach’s approach to composition. Emanuel Bach and the organist-composer Johann Friedrich Agricola (a pupil of Sebastian’s) wrote an obituary; Mizler added a few closing words and published the result in the journal of his society (1754). Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March 1685 – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and … Bach played the viola by choice; he liked to be “in the middle of the harmony.” He also wrote a few cantatas for the prince’s birthday and other such occasions; most of these seem to have survived only in later versions, adapted to more generally useful words. Bach was a … At the Neue Kirche, Nikolaikirche, and Thomaskirche, part singing was required; but Bach himself conducted, and his own church music was performed, only at the last two. Perhaps this emboldened him to renew his request for permission to leave Weimar; at all events he did so but in such terms that the duke imprisoned him for a month (November 6–December 2). He is known for instrumental compositions such as the Brandenburg Concertos and the Goldberg Variations, and vocal music such as the St Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. On his visits to Dresden, Bach had won the regard of the Russian envoy, Hermann Karl, Reichsgraf (count) von Keyserlingk, who commissioned the so-called Goldberg Variations; these were published as part four of the Clavierübung in 1741, and Book Two of “the Forty-Eight” seems to have been compiled about the same time. A family genealogy was drawn up by Johann Sebastian Bach himself in 1735, his 50th year, and completed by his son Carl Philipp Emanuel.. As such, after some delay, he was able to induce his friends at court to hold an official inquiry, and his dispute with Ernesti was settled in 1738. Considerado por muchos como el más grande compositor de todos los tiempos, Johann Sebastian Bach nació en el seno de una dinastía de músicos e intérpretes que desempeñó un papel determinante en la música alemana durante cerca de dos siglos y cuya primera mención documentada se remonta a 1561. Bach's, The third movement, “Allegro,” of J.S. Bach came from a long line of composers - over 300 years' worth of Bachs all worked as professional musicians. He lived in the last part of the Baroque period. There is no point in looking for resurrection motifs in The Well-Tempered Clavier. Bach's main achievement lies in his synthesis and advanced development of the primary contrapuntal idiom of the late Baroque, and in the basic tunefullness of his thematic material. 1759. Johann Sebastian Bach example in a phrase... Es barroco, fastuoso, espiritual, indescriptible, es la música de Dios: Johann Sebastian Bach. His world was shaped by the theology of Martin Luther, a great church reformer but also a man who saw music as a gift of God. Besides the melody types, the Baroque composer also had at his disposal similar stereotypes regarding the further elaboration of these themes into complete compositions, so that the arias and choruses of a cantata almost seem to have been spun out “automatically.” One is reminded of Bach’s delightfully innocent remark “I have had to work hard; anyone who works just as hard will get just as far,” with its implication that everything in the “craft” of music is teachable and learnable. 5 in G major, BWV 816 (BC L23), Goldberg Variations, for keyboard, BWV 988 (BC L9) (Clavier-Übung IV), Brandenburg Concerto No. https://www.liveabout.com/johann-sebastian-bach-profile-723877 A. Fuller Maitland, Johann Sebastian Bach: His Work and Influence on the Music of Germany, 1685–1750, was published by Novello & Co in three volumes. “Everything is there in Johann Sebastian’s music: architectural perfection and profound emotion,” says Ólafsson. Such a combination of traits is surely hard to encounter throughout history. 2 in E major, BWV 1042, Sonata for solo violin No. Unfinished as it was, The Art of the Fugue was published in 1751. But the deliberate search for such symbolism in Bach’s music can be taken too far. About Johann Sebastian Bach. There is an English translation of it in The Bach Reader. 28 July 1750) was a German composer and organist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity. Johann Sebastian Bach [ˈjoːhan zeˈbasti̯an ˈbax] (31. märts (vana kalendri järgi 21. märts) 1685 Eisenach – 28. juuli 1750 Leipzig) oli saksa helilooja ja organist, Bachide suguvõsa kõige väljapaistvam liige.. Oma eluajal ja ka veel 18. sajandi lõpul oli Bach tuntud vaid võrdlemisi kitsas ringkonnas, heliloojana hakati teda laialt tunnustama alles 19. sajandi esimesel poolel. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Closely related to these “figures” are such examples of pictorial symbolism in which the composer writes, say, a rising scale to match words that speak of rising from the dead or a descending chromatic scale (depicting a howl of pain) to sorrowful words. It is just as possible, however, that it was the dismal state of musical life in Mühlhausen that prompted Bach to seek employment elsewhere. He himself said that his plans for a “well-regulated [concerted] church music” had been hindered by conditions in Mühlhausen and that his salary was inadequate. Bach's mother died in 1694, and Johann's father died eight months later, leaving the … Among other works almost certainly composed at Weimar are most of the Orgelbüchlein (Little Organ Book), all but the last of the so-called 18 “Great” chorale preludes, the earliest organ trios, and most of the organ preludes and fugues. barokk kori német zeneszerző, orgonista, hegedűművész, a zeneművészet kiemelkedő egyénisége, a protestáns egyházi zene jeles képviselője. Author of. Johann Sebastian Bach Song list. His music is notable for its intellectual rigor and emotional expressiveness. The Bach family never left Thuringia until the sons of … Bach's, The aria “Lasset uns den nicht Zerteilen” from J.S. Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) was music's most sublime creative genius. Living as he did at a time when music was beginning to be regarded as no occupation for a gentleman, he occasionally had to stand up for his rights both as a man and as a musician; he was then obstinate in the extreme. He was on the best terms with the prince, who was genuinely musical; and in 1730 Bach said that he had expected to end his days there. This he obtained on April 13, and on May 13 he was sworn in at Leipzig. On December 3, 1721, Bach married Anna Magdalena Wilcken, daughter of a trumpeter at Weissenfels. Bach was a German composer of the Baroque period and virtuoso organist. From c. 1729 to 1736 Bach was honorary musical director to Weissenfels; and, from 1729 to 1737 and again from 1739 for a year or two, he directed the Leipzig Collegium Musicum. During these early years, Bach inherited the musical culture of the Thuringian area, a thorough familiarity with the traditional forms and hymns (chorales) of the orthodox Lutheran service, and, in keyboard music, perhaps (through his brother, Johann Christoph) a bias toward the formalistic styles of the south. Johann Sebastian Bach (Eisenach, actual Alemania, 1685 - Leipzig, 1750) Compositor alemán. The exact circumstances are not known, but Marchand avoided the contest by leaving Dresden a few hours before it should have taken place. He enriched established German styles through his skill in counterpoint, harmonic and motivic organisation, and the adaptation of rhythms, forms, and textures from abroad, particularly from Italy and France. In addition to his responsibilities as director of church music, Bach also had various nonmusical duties in his capacity as the cantor of the school at Thomaskirche. Bach may be the most important figure in Western music, with an influence that can be felt in popular and classical music to this day.