J.S. Bach & Sons: The Composer’s Legacy and Family

German composer, conductor, performer, and teacher, Max Reger (1863-1916) famously said: “Bach is the beginning and end of all music.” Bach’s influence can be found in all spheres of the musical world — from the classical genre through heavy metal to rock’n’roll and pop. His genius has touched all spheres of the music world and inspired countless composers and compositions, and his sons also achieved greatness and carried the J.S. Bach torch forward.

It is a bold statement to call J.S. Bach the alpha and omega of music, but when you consider his influence on musicians today, it doesn’t seem too far-fetched. As Douglas Adams put it in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: “Beethoven tells you what it’s like to be Beethoven and Mozart tells you what it’s like to be human. Bach tells you what it’s like to be the universe.”

Bach has inspired countless generations of musicians and still does. In our own time, Beyoncé’s album, Cowboy Carter, draws inspiration from J.S. Bach. Procol Harum’s song, Whiter Shade of Pale, did the same. He even inspired jazz musician Nina Simone’s Love or Leave Me. The Jacques Loussier Trio and the Charl du Plessis Trio respectively turned Bach into jazz. Even symphonic metal and heavy metal look to J.S. Bach for inspiration and pay homage to the master. He even inspires mathematicians who analyze his works to discover hidden patterns that show his genius in a new light.

NASA included three pieces of J.S. Bach’s music on the golden record they sent into space further solidifying his legacy as the most outstanding composer humanity has ever produced. To capture the breadth of Bach’s genius is nearly impossible.

Bach was bound by his duty to his patrons and the church, but musicologists and biographers speculate he also found joy in having a family. All the male members of the Bach family were preordained to become musicians and a few of them succeeded. Unfortunately, we do not know too much about J.S. Bach the man and father because of a lack of personal letters, diaries, and other writings.

When you mention the name “Bach,” most people will think of Johann Sebastian Bach. It shows that his legacy is enduring, to say the least. The problem arises when you learn about the other Bach family members — eleven of his sons carried the first name “Johann.” He even named two of his daughters Johanna.

German naming conventions at the time did not place a strong emphasis on first names. Instead, they used a middle name or a nickname — for example, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach would simply be Emanuel Bach to his friends and family. For this reason, we refer to the Bach family members by their full names or initials. But confusion may still slip in when you refer to J.C. or J.C.F. Bach.

To make matters slightly more confusing, the Bach family is large and contains multiple musicians in each generation. To make matters easier, look at the Bach family tree at the aptly named, Bach Cantatas Website. If you are still perplexed by all the Bach family members, refer to this short and handy guide prepared by the WCRB.

Below we’ll look at four of Bach’s most famous sons: Wilhelm Friedemann, Carl Philipp Emanuel, Johann Christoph Friederich, and Johann Christian. We will also look at a fictional son, P.D.Q. Bach—the creation of American composer Peter Shickele—who has no relation to the Bach family but who deserves a special mention.

1. Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (1710-1784): The Halle Bach

Wilhelm was J.S. Bach’s eldest son with his first wife, Maria Barbara Bach. His early life slightly mirrors that of his father: he lost his mother when he was ten years old. W.F. Bach inherited much of his father’s talent and was a gifted improviser.

Unfortunately, his great talent also came with a drinking problem. He was an unreliable employee and difficult to work with (probably relying on his father’s reputation to get ahead). He often found himself in financial straits too. He even sold some of his father’s manuscripts to pay his debts — there is a chance that he either lost or sold his father’s score of the St. Matthew Passion.

However, according to the Bach Archive in Leipzig, it is possible this is a biased and one-sided view of the composer perpetuated by Albert Emil Brachvogel’s novel. Claims of absentmindedness, immodesty, belligerence, and drunkenness unfairly tarnished his image in his autumn years. Luckily the record was set straight in 1999 when Christoph Wolff discovered a significant portion of his works in Kiev. Wolff’s discovery led to a re-evaluation of W.F. Bach’s music, a re-cataloguing of his output, and a reexamination of his reputation.

W.F. Bach’s music is marked with a free-spirited creativity one would (kind of) expect from a composer living during the Rococo Period — it is certainly a break from his father’s “strict” and intellectual style of composition.

Mozart once famously said, “Bach is the father, we are the children.” However, he was not referring to J.S. Bach but his son, C.P.E. Bach. He played an important role in the transition from the Baroque Era to the Classical Era.

C.P.E. Bach’s prestige outshone that of his father. He is considered the leading composer of the newfound Empfindsamer Stil (“sensitive style”) of music, and he was a major influence on the next generation of composers, counting Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven among his followers. C.P.E. Bach learned from his father to use the thumb while playing a keyboard instrument and popularized its use when performing keyboard works. Before J.S. Bach and C.P.E. Bach, musicians avoided using the thumb because it was considered to be blunt and unwieldy. What’s more, C.P.E. Bach wrote a book on keyboard technique teaching people how to play.

C.P.E. Bach grew up in Leipzig, attended the Thomasschule (where his father was director of music at the Thomaskirche), and received his first music lessons from his father too. He attended the University of Leipzig to study law while living at home with his parents and assisting his father with his musical projects. He was also a meticulous record keeper. It is due to his record and note-keeping habits that much of J.S. Bach’s music survives today.

Eventually, he followed in his father’s footsteps and became a composer while giving music lessons and conducting orchestras. Like his father, he had dreams of becoming the musical director of an important town. His dream was realized when he took over from his godfather Georg Philip Telemann as director of music and cantor of the Johanneum grammar school in Hamburg in 1768. His workload was heavy with around 200 performances over five churches per year, composing music for various occasions, organizing public concerts, and performing as a soloist. He established Hamburg as an important musical center, as his father did for Leipzig.

C.P.E. Bach also spent much of his life at the court of King Frederick II of Prussia. This is where J.S. Bach visited his son in Potsdam and the theme for The Musical Offering, BWV 1079, was born. It is speculated that C.P.E. Bach rather than the king challenged J.S. Bach with the theme of the work.

J.C.F. Bach was, like his father J.S. Bach and brothers, a gifted keyboard player. Initially, he set out to study law (like older brother C.P.E. Bach) but the lure of better employment prospects as a musician was too strong to resist. He served as his father’s copyist for several years. Although he was a gifted composer and musician, his father and older brothers’ fame overshadowed him.

C.P.E. Bach succeeded Telemann as musical director in 1767, yet J.C.F. Bach also applied for the position. Luckily, this did not damage their fraternal relationship, and they frequently exchanged compositions and ideas.

J.C.F. Bach was first mentioned in the Bückeburg registers on January 2, 1750. He traveled to Leipzig in August 1750 following his father’s passing. Upon his return, he was appointed as Cammer-Musicus (chamber musician) at the court of the Count of Schaumburg-Lippe. Rather than being appointed as a composer, he was a harpsichordist for a few years. The Italians Angelo Colonna (concertmaster) and Giovanni Battista Serini dictated the court’s musical life (composer and kapellmeister). J.C.F. learned a lot from them about operas and cantatas in the Italian style. Like his father, he absorbed these influences and adapted them to his needs.

J.C.F. Bach took three months’ leave and traveled to London with his son, Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst, who was about to start his musical studies in England. Inspired by his brother’s music, he incorporated Italian opera buffa elements into his compositions. While attending his brother’s concerts, he also came to know the compositions of Gluck and Mozart.

J.C.F.’s compositions were highly esteemed, but he never gained the same level of success as his father and his older brother C.P.E. Bach. The young Bohemian musician Franz Christoph Neubauer (1760–1795) also overshadowed his compositions. The latter gained the favor of Princess Julianne (acting as regent for her son Georg Wilhelm). The princess gave Neubauer free rein at the court and J.C.F. Bach regarded him as a rival because Neubauer became the talk of the town. J.C.F. Bach died on January 26, 1795. He was buried at Jetenburg Cemetery in Bückeburg.

Johann Christian Bach, the youngest of J.S. Bach’s sons, is perhaps one of the most controversial. While he did nothing bad, his conversion to Catholicism away from Lutheranism strained his relationship with his older brother C.P.E. Bach.

He moved to Italy in 1755 to work for his influential patron, Count Agostino Litta. Through the Count’s influence, he also could study with Padre Martini in Bologna. During his seven years in Italy, he traveled to study, and the period was dominated by Latin church music. His operas, like Artaserse, W G1 (debuted in Turin, 1760) and Catone in Utica, W G2 (premiered in Naples, 1761) became his most important and well-known works rather than his sacred works.

In 1762, he was commissioned to compose music for the King’s Theatre in London. Although he only requested a one-year sabbatical from Milan Cathedral he decided in 1763 that he would not be returning to his previous post as deputy organist. Although his contract was not immediately renewed, he gained a healthy reputation thanks to his involvement in the London concert scene. Being the music tutor to Queen Charlotte also boosted his reputation further (he dedicated Piano Concerto No. 1, Op. 1—video below—to the queen).

While he lived in London, J.C. Bach met Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1765 and taught him composition for a few months. They later met again in Paris and had mutual admiration and great respect for one another. In the same year, he embarked on a concert series with friend and composer Karl Friedrich Abel performing and conducting their works alternately. Mostly, J.C. Bach conducted his own symphonies.

J.C. Bach also staged benefit concerts for former musicians and their families. Many songs flowed from his pen for summer concerts at Vauxhall Gardens and he wrote operas for the King’s Theatre, but these did not achieve the same success as his initial commission.

He later died in poverty due to embezzlement by his steward. He was seriously ill in 1781 and died on January 1, 1782. His widow, Cecilia Grassi whom he married in the 1770s was probably left with his considerable debts.

P.D.Q. Bach (1807-1742) is the creation of the late Professor Peter Shickele (1935-2004). What follows is not factual but the creation of Peter Schickele. It is included to show how far Bach’s legacy reached into our own time. And, to show how one man taught the world that laughter is indeed the best medicine.

Peter Schickele wrote the fictional biography of the fictional composer. P.D.Q. Bach, the last of J.S. Bach’s children. His father largely ignored him and did not provide him with any musical training.

His career can be divided into three phases: The Initial Plunge, the Soused (or, “Brown Bag Period”), and the Contrition period. His Initial plunge lasted about six days and was his only form of musical training. The Soused, or Brown Bag Period, was his longest. He plagiarized extensively, especially the works of Mozart (e.g. Eine Kleine Nichtmusik) and Haydn. His final period, Contrition, was spent trying to work off a major hangover. A prime example is the parody of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis—here changed to Missa Hilarious—a mock religious work.

One of JS Bach’s most famous compositions, Prelude No. 1 in C major, BWV 846 from his Well-Tempered Clavier Book 1 forms the base of PDQ Bach’s composition Prelude to Einstein on the Fritz. 

The prelude offers a unique blend of musical styles — in postmodern terms, one would describe it as a pastiche where disparate elements are used to deliver, usually, a tongue-in-cheek, biting, or ironic commentary on the work(s) referenced. P.D.Q. Bach’s Prelude, parodies Philip Glass’ Einstein on the Beach and the minimalist music movement. On the other hand, we can also view the work as a metamodernist creative pastiche.

It brings together multifaceted perspectives and types of music, juxtaposing the “high art” of J.S. Bach that is filled with carefully constructed harmonies and the stripped-down innocence and meditative quality of minimalist music, and even children’s songs (this is the meta-cute, according to Greg Dember). It oscillates, in a metamodern sense, among numerous points, but never settles on a single point.

Bach’s legacy continued through his sons and all music points back to J.S. Bach. However, after his death, he was regarded more as a performer and teacher rather than a composer. Some also went so far as to say that Bach did not understand being human. But, after you have watched John Elliot Gardiner’s documentary on Bach, you will see that a unique pattern emerges.

The statues and paintings of J.S. Bach show a stern, older man. Yet, J.S. Bach understood the human condition far better than we think. He suffered the trauma of losing his parents at a young age and losing ten of his children with his first wife. J.S. Bach understood being human comes with loss and gains. As a devout Lutheran, his highs and lows (and sometimes difficult working conditions) inspired him to continue his work to honor the glory of God.

His legacy is still a monumental force today because he worked hard at his craft and constantly sought ways to amalgamate and improve on existing models. Through his sons, J.S. Bach’s legacy continued to inspire countless generations of musicians — almost 300 years later we still think of him as the alpha and omega standard for music.