Bach piano concertos, BWV1056 & 1052‏

by richibi

the secular masterpieces that Bach wrote were sidelines
to the music that he was commissioned to compose, he
was severally employed by throughout his life Saxon
aristocracy to adorn essentially their churches, and,
not coincidentally, their political image 
 
Bach wrote especially, in other words, for the Church,
the Protestant, and more specifically, Lutheran, Church,
by the way, who, it appears, had forsaken graven images
but apparently not quite music, a natural devolution of the
ecstasies of the senses propounded to varying degrees by,
it would appear, all religions, a heretical notion in my
opinion considering the majesties of the world of which
we partake but once through all eternity 
 
and to have extinguished Bach for me is inconceivable,
in a world where we need even more Bach
 
 
all this to conclude that Bach was essentially jamming
when he composed his more frivolous pieces, for friends
and fellow musicians, the works we listen to mostly now
in what has been to date our most irreverent world, God
died culturally in the sixties, the more liturgical works
having, though not been lost, taken on a more retiring
position 
 
 
you’ll note a very cerebral, less bombastic, sober yet
always musically playful and inventive attitude in Bach,
that is entirely pre-Classical, not concerned with an
actual audience, hence jamming 
 
this is music for the sake of music coming from a glib
and effervescent soul just having fun with his pals and
taking on the alphabet, the possibilities, of these new 
well-tempered instruments    
 
we get to listen 
   
 
Richard
 
psst: wait till you here what he does with the cello