Bach Keyboard Music
Late Keyboard Music

Late Keyboard Works, Yo Tomita Insights, Spirituality

William L. Hoffman wrote (June 28, 2019):
Bach's complex late keyboard fugal works, composed in his final decade, initially were treated primarily by performers and scholars as "eye music" or simply music to be studied. It is only in the past half-century that these collections have been extensively studied, catalogued and most recently recorded in various instrumental media. The results beyond source-critical evaluation involve other related disciplines of Bach contextual studies such as theology, analysis, parody, and reception history. These approaches often correlate to other Bach works both instrumental and vocal and their interactions. Various inter-disciplinary perspectives can entail the influences on Bach far beyond mere, straight-forward borrowing or parody of new-text underlay into shades and nuances of implications.

In the recent studies of Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier (WTC), Book II, BWV 870-893, Yo Tomita in particular has gone far beyond the music itself to explore the influences of Bach's other works and other composers in his most recent essay which takes six selected WTC II preludes and fugues and finds similarities in key, motif, harmonic progression, and affect with five Passion movements and one "Great 18" extended chorale prelude (see below, "Great 18," Passion Settings in WTC II." Twenty years ago, Tomita also had studied the WTC II from the perspective of Bach scholar's Hans Nissen's mid-century 20th century exploration of hidden meanings in biblical sources,¹ who suggested that seven preludes and fugues were linked to Psalms, while Tomita could find only two, Psalms 22, Suffering Psalm, and Psalm 23, Good Shepherd.

Psalms 22, 23 Settings in WTC II

In his original 1998 essay, "Hitherto unknown musical transcription of Psalms in Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II? The old question revisited" (http://www.music.qub.ac.uk/tomita/WTC2Psalm/index.html), Tomita pointed out that "Following the traditional approaches of Spitta, Schweitzer, Blume and Schering, he [Nissen] made attempts to read Bach's 'hidden message' from the aspects of Bach's 'tone-painting' technique, supplemented by the idea of number symbolism that he found in the number of notes in the fugue subjects as well as in the number of bars in each movement." Tomita found that "Prelude no.22 in Bb minor [BWV 891], which can seriously be considered to be related to Psalm 22" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8i-xqVEvA) and Prelude no.23 in B major which "I am going to suggest that Bach was inspired by Psalm 23 and transcribed it verse by verse" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCnENbenhzw). Tomita goes on with Psalm 23 to suggest that the implicit melody, the "German Gloria 'Allein Gott in der Hoh sei Ehr' ('Alone God on high be honoured', BWV 260)" also is found in the "Shepherd" Cantatas 85, 104, and 112 for Misericordias Domini (2nd Sunday after Easter). In his succeeding 2001 article, "Psalm and the Well-Tempered Clavier II," Tomita points out that the Prelude No. 22 key of B-flat minor is the same as the Recitative, No. 61a, "Eli, Eli, lama sabachtani," the beginning of Psalm 22 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdtiy4bHz0c: :50) in the St. Matthew Passion, which in 1736 became the definitive version, "only a few years before he started completing the WTC," says Tomita (Ibid.: 27; 475 in Bach). In this essay, "the core idea actually came in 1986 when I was still dreaming of becoming a pianist. So a quite nostalgic piece for me," says Tomita in a personal correspondence (June 25, 2019).

"Great 18," Passion Settings in WTC II

Almost 20 years later, while working on more WTC II studies, Tomita now pursues the concept of contextual studies in his latest article,² while also working on his talk, "The Latest on Well-Tempered Clavier II," July 12 at the Bach Network Dialogue Meeting in Cambridge (https://www.bachnetwork.org/dialogue/DM9Programme.pdf).³ Tomita in his contextual studies article finds connections between six WTC II preludes and fugues and a passage from the "Great 18" organ chorale prelude as well as five passages from the narratives of the St. John and St. Matthew Passions. The subject of the WTC II "A Major Fugue," BWV 888/2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RjebdVKIAM: 1:23) "is based on the opening phrase of the chorale melody [of the German Gloria] 'Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr'," which also has the same key and Affekt" as the "Great 18" Prelude, BWV 664 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gq--dCq1c0A). That Bach "was making a fair copy of this collection" when also making a fair copy of this WTC 2 fugue "lends some weight to this suggested relationship," says Tomita (Ibid. 230f).

The opening chorus of the St. John Passion, "Herr, unser Herrscher" (Lord, our ruler, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMf9XDQBAaI), has the same key, motif and harmonic and textural devices as the WTC II Prelude No. 16 in G minor, BWV 885/1 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJjUFmOOu8o). The topic also is the same, the crucifixion. The motif in both is called the "cross motif" or chiasums (from the Greek letter chi (χ),⁴ discussed at length by Philipp Spitta and Friedrich Smend, which is a variant of the B-A-C-H motif, observes Tomita (Ibid.: Footnote 25: 239). The fundamental compositional tools Bach uses in the WTC involve the choice of key and the use of the cross motif as well as "various harmonic, rhythmic, textural devices and proportional parallelism [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtjHD9zB6bg] [that] may be some of them," says Tomita (Ibid.: 232). Further in the St. John Passion, the turba chorus, No. 21d, "Kreuzige, Kreuzige" (Crucify, crucify, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3RwZ9WpN10) shares two musical passages with the WTC II Fugue No. 16 in G minor," BWV 885/2. In 1739, Bach began to make a fair copy of the score of the St. John Passion but creased when he apparently was required to submit the text for approval of the Leipzig Town Council and refused because he had submitted the text several times previously. A similar turba chorus, "Laß ihn kreuzigen" (Let him be crucified, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plWZXWTbej0), No. 45b, in the St Matthew Passion is a choral fughetta in A minor, similar to the WTC II Fugue No. 20 in A minor, BWV 889/2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcMHwNrrRyM), both having cross motifs and tritones emphasizing the crucifixion. The later St. Matthew Passion cry, "Eli, Eli, lama sabachtani," is discussed above in the paragraph with subtitle, "Psalms 22, 23 Settings in WTC II." The definitive version of the St. Matthew Passion was completed in Bach's calligraphic autograph in 1736 when he also was working on individual preludes and fugues in the WTC II.

Motivations for WTC II, Goldberg Variations

Also recently, Tomita has argued that in "WTC II Bach was actively exploring new contrapuntal techniques and procedures in response to Johann Mattheson's challenge"⁵ (Ibid.: 228). In the WTC II, "One of the most significant differences is the stylistic diversity, the coexistence of old and new styles, of the Well-Tempered Clavier Book II," says Tomita in another essay.⁶ There are three sections in this essay: "Bach’s new fugal techniques and procedures" with chiastic examples (P. 42), "The ‘metamorphosis’ fugues," and "Bach and rhetoric." Bach was subject to tinfluences of the Dresden Court composers, says Tomita, and also may have been motivated in WTC II to further explorations of equal temperament in the 24 preludes and fugues in different keys.

"A similar case of Bach being influenced by an external factor is also found in the Goldberg Variations, published in 1741, in which the idea to explore interval canons in the collection most likely came from Jan Dismas Zalenka," says Tomita (Ibid.: 228), citing another more recent essay in the Robin Leaver Festschrift.⁷ Zalenka (1679-1745, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Dismas_Zelenka), Dresden Court church composer and theorist, was a friend of Sebastian and knew son Friedemann, who was organist at St. Sophia's Church at Dresden (1733-46). "Bach attempted to show in the Goldberg Variations various ideas that he had encountered in Dresden," says Tomita (Ibid.: 172). He had "an encyclopaedic knowledge" of Dresden musical styles in order "to digest and construct them in a unified composition." In the Goldberg Variations, Tomita suggests that Bach's melodies were strongly influenced by unidentified Dresden composers. However, the "beautiful decorated, saraband-like Aria, written in Bach's most progressive, galant style," says Richard D. P. Jones (Ibid.: 347),⁸ is a frame in which "Bach systematically explores the principles of 1. stylistic diversity; 2. keyboard virtuosity; and 3. strict counterpoint" involving canons. The use of canons "in a three-part texture, strongly suggests that Bach took the idea from Zalenka," says Tomita (Ibid.: 177).

Traces of an early version of the Goldberg Variations are found in sketches of preludes of Goldberg variation No. 5 and Preludes 6 and 15 of the WTC Book II suggest that the Goldberg Variations "once existed in an earlier form, possibly in a smaller cycle," says Tomita (Ibid.: 186). Jones dates the Goldberg Variations to 1740, "thus during the compilation. of the WTC II," he says (Ibid.: 346) The Goldberg dedicatee was not Johann Gottlieb Goldberg but Friedemann, suggests Peter Williams.⁹ Although compiled at the same time, the WTC II was "part of a retrospective of some of the finest keyboard and organ music of the Weimar and Cöthen periods," along with revisions of the "Great Eighteen" organ chorales, says Jones (Ibid.: 335). Eleven of the WTC 48 survive in early versions dating to the late 1720s and 1730s, says Jones, while the preludes and fugues are more highly developed than in the WTC I.

Canons, Art of Fugue, Musical Offering Sacred Connections

Two of Bach's late organ works have overt sacred connections, the Six Schubler Chorales, BWV 645-650, transcribed from trio-arias in chorale cantatas, and the Canonic Variations on "Vom Himmel hoch," BWV 769, Liuther's Christmas hymn. Meanwhile, Bach continued to systematically explore the composition of strictest instrumental imitation canons" (http://bach-cantatas.com/NVD/Keyboard-Music-Mature.htm),¹⁰ says Nicholas Kenyon,¹¹ a subject Bach had pursued beginning in Weimar with the Canon á 4. Voc: perpetuus, BWV 1073 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEax-B9QbR0). Only in recent years have the Canons been researched, collected, published, and recorded. The final group of five, BWV 1076-78 and 1086-87, were composed in the last half of the 1740s when Bach joined the Lorenz Christoph Mizler Korrespondierenden Sozietät der Musicalischen Wissenschaften (Corresponding Society of the Musical Sciences, https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Mizler-Lorenz-Christoph.htm.

Of special spiritual note is the Canon Triplex, BWV 1076, which is Bach's initial submission to the Society and appears in Haußmann's portrait of Bach (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/thefaceofbach/QCL08.htm) and which seems to be Bach's "musical expression to the doxology," says Albert Clement.¹² Various connections are found to the six-part Sanctus Pleni sunt coeli in Bach's B-Minor Mass and the textual similarity of Stanza 15 of, "Vom Himmel hoch," the closing doxology, "Lob, Ehr sei Gott im höchsten Thron" (Glory to God in highest heaven, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Texts/Chorale171-Eng3.htm). This is a praise to the triune God, which "corresponds with the motto preceding the Society's statute in 1746," says Clement (Ibid.: 157). Also important is the number 14, which is represented in the B-A-C-H motto (14=2+1+3+8), Bach the 14th member of the society, and the 14 Canons addendum to the Goldberg Variations (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6h6AabkLvEE), which includes as No. 13, the Canon Triplex. In 1748, Bach published the Canonic Variations on "Vom Himmel hoch," possibly in lieu of the 14 Canons, and possibly planned to publish the Art of Fugue in 1749 as part of his annual Society publication.

Recent Bach scholarship has found spiritual connections in his later works, notably the Musical Offering, BWV 1079, by Michael Marissen, and The Art of Fugue, by Zoltán Göncz. Theological influences in the Musical Offering are found in Marissen's essay,¹³ cited in Wikipedia:¹⁴ <<Among the theories about external sources of influence, Michael Marissen’s draws attention to the possibility of theological connotations. Marissen sees an incongruity between the official dedication to Frederick the Great and the effect of the music, which is often melancholy, even mournful. The trio sonata is a contrapuntal sonata da chiesa, whose style was at odds with Frederick’s secular tastes. The inscription Quaerendo invenietis, found over Canon No. 9, alludes to the Sermon on the Mount (“Seek and ye shall find”, Matthew 7:7, Luke 11:9). The main title, Opfer (“offering”), makes it possible for the cycle to be viewed as an Offertory in the religious sense of the word. Marissen also points out that, canonic procedures often evoking the rigorous demands of the Mosaic Law, the ten canons likely allude to the Ten Commandments. Marissen believes that Bach was trying to evangelize Frederick the Great, pointing him to the demands of the Mosaic Law.>>

In The Art of Fugue, in Göncz's study, says Book Depository:¹⁵ <<Göncz probes the philosophic-theological background of The Art of Fugue, revealing the special structures that supported the 1993 reconstruction. Bach's Testament investigates the reconstruction's metaphysical dimensions, focusing on the quadruple fugue. As a summary of Zoltan Göncz's extensive research over many years, which resulted in the completion of the fugue, this work explores the complex combinatorial, philosophical and theological considerations that inform its structure.>> "The fullest way we can associate ourselves with the dilemmas of Bach's sons and heirs is to include in performance the incomplete fugue which introduces the theme B-A-C-H," says Nicholas Kenyon (Ibid.: 180).

FOOTNOTES

¹ Hans Nissen, "Der Sinn des "Wohltemperierten Klaviers II.Teil" (The Meaning of the WTC Book II), in Bach-Jahrbuch, Vol. 39 (1951-52: 54-80), cited in Yo Tomita, "Psalm and the Well-Tempered Clavier II: Revisiting the Old Question of Bach's Source of Inspiration," in BACH, 32/1, Journal of the Riemenschneider Bach Institute (Berea OH, 2001: 17-43); republished as Chapter 27, Bach, Yo Tomita ed. (Farnham GB & Burlington VT: Ashgate, 2011: 465ff).
² Yo Tomita, "The Passions as a Source of Inspiration? A Hypothesis on the Origin and Musical Aim of Well-Tempered Clavier II," III: Bach's Self-Modeling: Parody as Compositional Impetus, in Compositional Choices and Meaning in the Vocal Music of J. S. Bach, ed. Mark A Peters & Reginald L. Saunders, Contextual Bach Studies No. 8, ed. Robin A. Leaver (Lanham MD: Lexington Books, 2018: 228).
³ Tomita's latest publication is The Genesis and Early History of Bach's Well-tempered Clavier, Book II: a composer and his editions, c.1738-1850 (https://www.adlibris.com/se/bok/the-genesis-and-early-history-of-bachs-well-tempered-clavier-book-ii-9780754604990), with Richard Rastall to be published by Ashgate in October this year.
⁴ Chiastic passages and palindrome form are discussed in the Bach Cantata Website, "Chiasm in Bach's Vocal Works," http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Chiasm.htm, as well as Friedrich Smend's studies in the Cambridge Companion to J. S. Bach (https://books.google.com/books?id=YiJKHGxrYzsC&pg=PA101&lpg=PA101&dq=Friedrich+Smend+chiastic+Bach&source=bl&ots=CDokVIxt2B&sig=ACfU3U06iCsw7rk-t9vUVi10-0O_6JMdEQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwit-orqhYjjAhUTVs0KHRhKAl0Q6AEwBXoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=Friedrich%20Smend%20chiastic%20Bach&f=false.
⁵ Johann Mattheson, Der vollkommene Capellmeister (1739, https://www.jstor.org/stable/41639822?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents),
⁶ Yo Tomita, "The Implications of Bach's Introduction of New Fugal Techniques and Procedures in the Well-Tempered Clavier, Book Two," in Understanding Bach, 6, 35–50 © Bach Network UK 2011, on-line https://www.bachnetwork.co.uk/ub6/Tomita%20UB6.pdf); Tomita also published in Understanding Bach: "Veiled Aspects of Bach Reception in the Long Nineteenth Century Exposed through a Macro-examination of Printed Music: with Particular Focus on The Well-Tempered Clavier" (https://www.bachnetwork.co.uk/ub7/UB7_Tomita.pdf), and "Anna Magdalena as Bach’s Copyist" (https://www.bachnetwork.co.uk/ub2/tomita.pdf).
⁷ Yo Tomita, "Bach and Dresden: A New Hypothesis on the Origin of the Goldberg Variations (BWV 988)," in Music and Theology: Essays in Honor of Robin A. Leaver, ed. Daniel Zager (Lanham MDF: Scarecrow Press, 2007, 169-191).
⁸ Richard D. P. Jones, The Creative Development of Johann Sebastian Bach: Volume 2,, 1717-1750, Music to Delight the Spirit (London: Oxford University Press: 2013: 347).
⁹ Peter Williams, Bach: The Goldberg Variations, Cambridge Music Handbooks (Cambridge University Press, 2001: 3).
¹⁰ Bach's Canons, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach#BWV_Chapter_12
¹¹ Nicholas Kenyon, "Canons and Counterpoint," Bach 333, Bach: The Music (Berlin: Deutsche Grammophon, 2018: 138; https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8469462--bach-333-the-new-complete-edition); also more details from Kenyon's "Canons" in The Faber Pocket Guide to Bach (London: Faber & Faber, 2011: 424ff).
¹² Albert Clement, "Johann Sebastian Bach and the Praise of God: Some Thoughts on the Canon Triplex (BWV 1076), in Robin Leaver Festschrift (Ibid.: See Footnote No. 7 above).
¹³ Michael Marissen, "The theological character of J. S. Bach’s Musical Offering," in Bach Studies 2, ed. Daniel R. Melamed (Cambridge University Press, 1995: 85ff).
¹⁴ Wikipedia, The Musical Offering, "Theological character," https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Musical_Offering.
¹⁵ Zoltán Göncz, Bach's Testament: On the Philosophical and Theological Background of The Art of Fugue, Contextual Bach Studies, No. 4, ed. Robin A. Leaver. (Lanham MD: Scarecrow Press, 2013), https://www.bookdepository.com/Bachs-Testament-Zoltan-Goncz/9780810884472; Göncz has written extensively on Bach and theological matters, as well as completing Bach's final, unfinished fugue https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GO3ewYOD4zE.

—————To come: For the next two weeks, I will be working on Bach's lost Pentecost Oratorio, to be discussed at the coming Bach Network (UK) Dialogue Meeting (https://www.bachnetwork.org/dialogue/DM9Programme.pdf), where information on Bach's keyboard works and other related matters will be conveyed.