Composer, born in Leipzig, EC Germany, the 11th son of J S Bach. He studied under his brother C P E Bach in Berlin, and from 1754 worked in Italy. After becoming a Catholic, he was appointed organist at Milan in 1760, and for a time composed only ecclesiastical music, including two Masses, a requiem, and a Te Deum, but later he began to compose opera. In 1762 he was appointed composer to the London Italian opera, and became musician to Queen Charlotte.
Johann Christian Bach (September 5, 1735 – January 1, 1782) was a composer of the Classical era, the eleventh and youngest son of Johann Sebastian Bach.
Life
JC Bach was born in Leipzig, Germany. His father, and possibly also Johann Christian's second cousin Johann Elias Bach, trained young Johann Christian in music. It is believed that Book II of Johann Sebastian’s The Well-Tempered Clavier was written and used for Johann Christian's instruction. Johann Christian served as copyist to his father, and, on the death of his father in 1750, Johann Christian became the pupil of his half-brother Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach in Berlin.
In 1754 JC Bach went to Italy where he studied counterpoint under Giovanni Battista Martini, and from 1760 to 1762 held the post of organist at Milan Cathedral, for which he wrote two Masses, a Requiem, a Te Deum, and other works.
He was the only one of Johann Sebastian's sons to write opera in Italian, starting with arias inserted into the operas of others, then pasticcios.
Johann Christian was appointed music master to the Queen, and his duties included giving music lessons to her and her children, and accompaniment on piano, with the King playing flute.
Later life and friendship with Mozart
During his first years in London, Bach made friends with the eight-year old Mozart, who was there as part of the endless tours arranged by his father Leopold for the purpose of displaying the child prodigy. Bach was one of the most important influences on Mozart, who learned from him how to produce a brilliant and attractive surface texture in his music.
Johann Christian Bach died in poverty in London on the first day of 1782 and was buried in an unmarked pauper's grave at St Pancras Old Church, with his surname being misspelt in the burial register as Back. Bach as a young boy, the two were described as "inseparable" by Mozart's father. They would sit at the organ, Mozart on Johann Christian's lap, both playing music for hour upon hour. It is often said by scholars that the music of Mozart was greatly influenced by Johann Christian. This is precisely why, in later years, Mozart would embrace the elder (Johann Sebastian) Bach's music as well. Johann Christian likely influenced the young Mozart in the forms of symphony and piano concerto. At the time of Bach's death, Mozart was composing his Piano Concerto No. the Andante second movement of this concerto has a theme close to one found in Bach's La calamità del cuori overture. It has been suggested that Mozart's slow movement was intended as a tribute to JC Bach, his music, and his importance to Mozart's own work.
Posthumous evaluation
Although Bach's fame declined in the decades following his death, his music still showed up on concert programmes in London with some regularity, often coupled with works by Haydn. In the 19th century, scholarly work on the life and music of Johann Christian's father began, but often this led to exaltation of J.S. Bach's music at the expense of that of his sons; Bach biography that "it is especially in Bach's sons that we may mark the decay of that power which had culminated [in Sebastian] after several centuries of growth" (Spitta, Vol. 278), and Sebastian's first biographer, Johann Nikolaus Forkel, said specifically of Christian that "The original spirit of Bach is . not to be found in any of his works" (New Bach Reader, p. It was not until the 20th century that scholars and the musical world began to realize that Bach's sons could legitimately compose in a different style than their father without their musical idioms being inferior or debased, and composers like Johann Christian began to receive renewed appreciation. Johann Christian’s early music shows the influence of his older brother Carl Philipp Emanuel, while his middle period in Italy shows the influence of Sammartini. Bach and J. Bach
Johann Christian Bach's father died when he was fifteen; this may be one reason why it is difficult to find points of obvious comparison between Johann Sebastian Bach and Johann Christian. The piano sonatas of Carl Phillip Emanuel Bach, Johann Christian's brother, tend to invoke certain elements of the father at times, considering that his father died when he had reached the age of 36.
Johann Christian's music, however, departs completely from the styles of the elder Bachs - his music is highly melodic and brilliantly structured. Bach and the Symphony
The symphonies listed in the Work List for J.C. Bach in the New Grove Bach Family number ninety-one works.
By comparison, the composer sometimes called "the Father of the Symphony," Joseph Haydn, only wrote slightly over 100. Most of these are not fully comparable to Johann Christian Bach's symphonies, because many of Bach's works in this category are closer to the Italian sinfonia than to the late classical symphony in its most fully developed state as found in the later works in this category by Haydn and Mozart. Using comparative duration as a rough means of comparison, consider that a standard recording of one of Bach's finest symphonies, Op. Bach's symphonies should come to these works with different expectations from the ones he or she brings to those of Haydn or Mozart. Bach, which probably has less to do with their relative quality (since the music of the latter is clearly accomplished and worthy of being heard) than with their relative historical positions regarding the classical symphony. Bach's music is more and more being recognized for its high quality and significance. Bach have now been published in The Collected Works of Johann Christian Bach. There are two others named Johann Christian Bach in the Bach family tree, but neither were composers.
User Comments Add a comment…