Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Essays on Johann Sebastian Bach
The history of classical music
History Ofmusic
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
The Baroque period is often thought of a period of revolution where the ideals of the Renaissance were changed. Important figures like Martin Luther who “began by criticizing the selling of indulgences, insisting that the Pope had no authority over purgatory and that the Catholic doctrine of the merits of the saints had no foundation in the gospel.” By the time of the 1600’s when the Baroque period officially started music was more expressive; drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur were some of the elements that describe the art of this period. In addition, in the history of Western art it has been said that the transition from Renaissance to Baroque started in Europe in Italy. Important composers were born during this era; Corelli, Vivaldi, Handel, and the most well-known even in this era Johann Sebastian Bach. …show more content…
Its unique styles, textures, and forms enchant and delight millions of listeners each year, from Bach to Sammartini.” (Green, Best Composers). J.S Bach gained a fantastic reputation for his virtuoso organ and clavier playing, as a composer he was not as popular because many musicians thought his compositions were irrelevant and difficult. Bach is the most influential composer and performer of the Baroque era because he took the instrumental music to a whole new level.One major reason why Bach is a major contributor to the rise of instrumental music is because of some techniques and styles he develope in his music, he mastered a technique in his music which is known as “counterpoint technique” and he adapted rhythms and textures from other composers and places he visited, especially from Italy and France. Another reason why Bach is the most important musician of the Baroque era who contributed to the rise of instrumental music is because he composed for every musical category of the Baroque period except for opera, he expanded musical composition in format, quality, and technical exactness through elevated harmonization, fugues, and intricate
His death marked the end of Baroque music. Bach left a music legacy. His music has been studied and continues to be studied by several generations of composers and musicians.
With the rejection of complicated Baroque style of music, the classical era came about. The idea of simpler music would appeal to a broader audience, thus making the classical era more popular. The change was not sudden; rather, the Rococo style was like a transition period. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was an important character in the changing of styles. The Rococo style was known as an expressive or sensitive style. Baroque music usually remained in the same mood throughout a piece, whereas this new style would sometimes change moods abruptly with highly contrasting ideas. The use of ornaments in music gradually went out with the complicated baroque music. Simpler, more original melodies emerged with this new style. During the Baroque era, instrumental music and vocal music were equally important. This contrasts the Classical era where instrumental music was more prominent than vocal.
The music of the Baroque period was focused on having music be a tool of communication to its listeners; conveying an arousal of emotions. Composers of this time thought to use this tool to have this effect or one similar to it to correctly match music from the Roman time period. One composer that goes by the name of Georg Phillip Telemann. He was a German composer born in 1681, he was known as one of the most prolific composers of the Baroque era, “At the age of just ten years old he was able to play four different instruments and had written arias, motets and instrumental works”(Norton Grove Concise Encyclopedia of Music, 756). As well as learning many skills at a young age, his fame grew immensely in Germany becoming a very famous composer and was even assigned four times as much space as the famous J.S. Bach in some contemporary dictionaries. Telemann composed in all varieties of forms and styles, from Italian-style concertos to French-style overture suites and quartets. The Sonata in F minor was one of his pieces that was played at the concert. The piece first given appearance in 1728 in a German musical periodical; though it was originally written for a bassoon and continuo the piece was altered by the performers to be played with a bass trombone and piano. One way that an individual could tell it is a piec...
Throughout history many famous concerto pianists composed various types of music. One of those pianists was named Johann Sebastian Bach. J.S. Bach was arguably one of the best composers in Western music history. Born in Eisenach, Germany to a family of musicians, Bach grew up playing the organ and keyboard. J.S. Bach’s music was characterized as a classification of Baroque music. Baroque was an era of dominant European styled art and music in the 17th century. The term baroque is “applied to art of any time or place that shows the qualities of vigorous movement and emotional intensity associated with art in its primary meaning.” Bach’s famous Baroque style was a combination of many notes, simple motoric rhythms, and a steady shift of underlying harmony.
This book by John Rupert Martin is a good introductory book in the understanding of Baroque artists and their tremendous variety. Martin defines the Baroque characteristics, but only very broadly leaving a significant amount of room for the reader to make his own deductions. In general, Martin believes that the typical definitions of the Baroque are "too restrictive and hence likely to create more problems of classification and interpretation than it solves." Even the time of the Baroque is left open to the reader when Martin says the Baroque is roughly comprehended by the seventeenth century. It is important to note at the outset that this is only a convenient approximation; for epoch as a whole can certainly not be fitted into such a strait-jacket." This helps to define the Baroque much more generally as a gradual change which can much easily be noticed from the present than the past.
Johann Sebastian Bach was one of the most famous German composers of his time. All of his work was mostly during the baroque era. The baroque period was from 1600 to 1750 and it is known to be one of the most diverse musical periods as opposed to the other classical music eras. It was in this era that “included composer like Bach, Vivaldi and Handel, who pioneered new styles like the concerto and the sonata.”(Classic FM) Johann Sebastian was born in the midst of the Baroque era as he was born on March 31, 1685 in Thuringia, Germany. Johann came from a family of musicians, which is how he himself became one as well. It was his father who showed him how to play his first instrument, which was the violin. His father was also a well-known musician in his town as he “worked as the town musician in Eisenach.”(Johann Sebastian Bach) It is known that Johann Sebastian went to a school that taught him
Johann Sebastian Bach was born into a family of musicians. It was only natural for him to pick up an instrument and excel in it. His father taught him how to play the violin and harpsichord at a very young age. All of Bach’s uncles were professional musicians, one of them; Johann Christoph Bach introduced him to the organ. Bach hit a turning point in his life when both of his parents died at the age of ten years old. Bach’s older brother Johann Christoph Bach took him in and immediately expanded his knowledge in the world of music. He taught him how to play the clavichord and exposed him to great composers at the time. At the age of fourteen, Bach and his good friend George Erdmann were awarded a choral scholarship to the prestigious musical school St. Michael’s in Luneburg. From then on, Bach began to build his career in the music industry. His first two years at the school he sang in the school’s a cappella choir. Historical evidence has shown that Bach at a young age would visit Johanniskirche and would listen to the works of organ player Jasper Johannsen. This was thought to have been the inspiration to Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor. Studying at the prestigious musical school has help Bach network his way around and become acquaintances’ with some of the best organ players at the time such as Georg Böhm, and Johann Adam Reincken. Through his acquaintance with Böhm and Reincken Bach had access to some of the greatest and finest instruments.
Classicism of the Renaissance has been replenished during the Baroque period. During the Baroque artistic period, the exploration of the fundamental components of human nature and the realm of senses and emotions were very crucial. The Baroque era was a very dynamic time that showed an abundance of radiance and color. Artists of this time are passionate and sensual. Their works were many times considered to have an overpowering emotional effect.
Bach is one the best composers of all time, or like what he liked to call himself, an organist. Bach is very popular for so many reasons. When Bach was young his passion for music started as a young age. Many might say that Bach was into music because most of his family was and it was expected for him to follow the same steps. Bach decided to follow music not just because it was part of his family, but because he was devoted to it. Many people who listen to Bach will say that listening to his compositions make them feel like they are at home, it feels natural and
The Baroque period was filled with the new idea that every issue had two sides. Great thinkers and masterminds left behind the idea that the world was either god- influenced or science-influenced. Most people embraced this notion, with the exception of a few. Johann Sebastian Bach was one of these few people. Bach, although the greatest composer of the Baroque period, led a life based on tradition and past influence, which left him virtually ignored for many years after his death.
The Baroque era was a beginning of a new style and a change in music. The name of this era was given in between the Renaissance and the Classical period. This era is dated around 1600-1750 and was a new representation of different shape and varieties in music. It pre dates the Classical era but helped towards its evolution. The music in the early Baroque era originates from the late-Renaissance usage of mannerisms. Composers would frequently use expressive gestures.
Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven both flourished in their compositions of classical music; however, their genre of music differed considerably. Bach was a German composer during the Baroque time era of western music which is estimated to have taken place during 1600 to 1750. It was during this time that he composed prolific church organ music which included such works as the Mass in B Minor, much scared choral music, and the St. Matthew Passion, as well as composing over a thousand works in nearly every musical genre except opera. On the other hand, Beethoven was a German composer whom began to emerge during the classical era of western music twenty years after Bach. This era took place throughout the years1750 and 1830. The large quantity of arrangements, over two hundred works in numerous musical genres composed by Beethoven was significantly influenced by his predecessors, onset of deafness, and his highly personal expression of intellectual depth. Such works include the first an...
Baroque era covers the period between 1600 and 1750 beginning with Monte Verdi (birth of opera) and ended with deaths of Bach and Handel. The term baroque music is borrowed from the art history. It follows the Renaissance era (1400-1600). It was initially considered to be a corrupt way of Renaissance by conservatives. The dominant trends in Baroque music correspond to those in Baroque art and literature. Some features of Baroque art included a sense of movement, energy, and tension (whether real or implied). Strong contrasts of light and shadow enhance the effects of paintings and sculptures. Opera is one of the types of music in the Baroque era. It represented melodic freedom. Baroque era was usually referred to as the thorough-bass period. In early Baroque era no tonal direction existed, but experiments in pre-tonal harmony led to the creation of tonality. [1] Baroque genre included instrumental suite, ritornello, Concerto grosso and chant. There were important composers of the Baroque period such as Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel, Antonio Vivaldi William Byrd Henry Purcell and George Phillip Telemann. Starting in northern Italy, the hierarchical state -- led by either the urban bourgeoisie or despotic nobles -- replaced the fluid and chaotic feudal system of the middle Ages. [2] For this reason, some historians refer to the Renaissance as the Early Modern Era. Sculptors, building on the techniques of artists such as Giovanni Bernini (1598-1680), found ways to create the illusion of energetic and even violent movement in their works. Painters created larger and more crowded canvases. Virtuosity was used in all the arts. The arts became an important measure of learning and culture. Music moved from the science of number to an expressive art viewed as an equal to rhetoric.
...ic landscapes. The baroque marked the time in which painters considered using subjects other than scenes from the Bible and from classical traditions. The baroque period also was the period in which artists painted portraits, and everyday life scenes. Baroque artist broke away from trying to make the calm balance known to the renaissance artists. Artists from the baroque era were interested in no longer tried in the extreme. They wanted to paint subjects possessing strong emotions; they wanted to capture those emotions and feelings in their work. Instead of just extremes of feeling sometimes, these strong emotions were personal. More often artists tried to portray intense religious emotions. Baroque art attempted to explain how and why their subjects fit as strongly as they did by representing their emotional states as vividly and analytically as possible.
Johann Sebastian Bach was born into a family of musicians on March 21, 1685 in Eisenbach, Germany and is considered to have been the greatest composer of western music. According to Classical Net Resources, "Bach's main achievement lies in his synthesis and advanced development of the primary contrapuntal idiom of the late baroque, and the music tunefullness of his thematic material." Bach began his career as a court organist and quickly moved to become a church organist. In 1717, Bach moved to Cothen as court conductor to the young Prince Leopold. This was Bach's first position outside of the church and he directed and composed for the prince's small orchestra for six years. It was during these years that he composed the Brandenberg Concertos....