Concerto Guide: Johann Christian Bach

Johann Christian Bach 1735 - 1782

Johann Christian Bach, often called the "London Bach" because of his residence there, was the youngest son of Johann Sebastian Bach and, measured by success in his life, a more important composer than his father. One indication is the above portrait, painted by the very famous English painter, Thomas Gainsborough. J. C. Bach was an eminent composer in one of the great capitals of Europe, while his father was merely a somewhat obscure Saxon organist. The very young Mozart on tour with his father, was pleased to be able to spend time with the great master in London. So it seems to be the case that we tend to underrate the importance of J. C. Bach, overshadowed as he is by those three composers that overlapped and came immediately after him: Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. Looking on Amazon, there seems to be only one artist devoting much time to J. C. Bach, this is the conductor Anthony Halstead who has done recordings of the complete symphonies, symphonies concertantes and keyboard concertos.

It turns out that J. C. Bach was, in addition to being pretty important in his own right, also a big influence on Mozart. How big? Mozart's first three piano concertos were arrangements of keyboard sonatas by J. C. Bach. Here is the first movement of Mozart's K. 107, arranged from a keyboard sonata in D by J. C. Bach.

When I say "arranged" I don't mean "transcribed". In other words, Mozart did not transfer the notes over to a small ensemble of violin 1, violin 2 and cello without "fixing" the form. The problem, as Charles Rosen relates in his book Sonata Forms, pp. 71 et seq., is that the J. C. Bach original has a sonata exposition and what is needed in the concerto is a ritornello. The mid-18th century was a confusing transition in compositional design, but the basic problem with the opening section for orchestra is that in sonata expositions, there is a modulation to the dominant, but in a concerto ritornello it was preferred to keep this section in the tonic so as to avoid taking away from the dramatic entry of the soloist. As you can hear in the opening exposition, while there is a cadence ON the dominant, the music immediately returns to the tonic and cadences in the tonic before the entry of the keyboard.

In the J. C. Bach original, however, the sonata exposition ends with several emphatic cadences in A major, the dominant:

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For comparison, here is the end of the Mozart arrangement, the end of the opening ritornello, just before the entry of the soloist:

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Solid cadence in D major and Mozart ends the opening phrase of the solo with a half cadence on V of V:

But enough about Mozart, let's have a look at one of J. C. Bach's own keyboard concertos. Here is the energetic and dramatic Concerto in B flat, op XIII, no. 4:

These concertos were published in 1777 when J. C. Bach was at the peak of his maturity. Mozart would have been twenty-one at the time and therefore open to influence. The basic form of the first movement at this time is this (where R stands for orchestral ritornello and S for solo, in this case keyboard solo):

R    S      R     S      R   S   R

I    I--V    V   --vi       I    I    I

The Roman numerals below the sections indicate the harmony as it was largely through harmony that the form was articulated. Sometimes, as in the case of this concerto, the third solo and third ritornello are combined. As is nearly mandatory, the movement ends with the opening theme, forte. The second movement is a lyrical andante with pizzicato strings. The last movement is in the form of variations on a Scottish folksong. Here is the beginning of the first movement:

Listening you will hear the opening ritornelli cadencing in Bb at the end. The first solo modulates to F, the dominant. Eighteenth century music always modulates to the dominant. As far as the form is concerned, the question is when, exactly.

I'm a bit surprised at how good J. C. Bach's keyboard concertos are. We tend to think that the world of the concerto was shrouded in darkness until Mozart came along. But that's not true, is it? The keyboard concertos of J. C. Bach at least are quite good pieces that were probably an inspiration to Mozart.

The "London" Bach

The Bach family was probably the greatest artistic dynasty of all time. From the sixteenth century right into the 19th century they played such a pervasive role in the musical life of Europe that some German communities used the word "Bach" as a generic term for any musician: "We need a new Bach to run the band concerts on Sundays." I previously wrote about musical dynasties and the Bach family in particular in this post.

Tom Service has done an excellent thing in this week's symphony guide by picking a symphony by one of J. S. Bach's sons, Johann Christian Bach, the "London" Bach, to talk about. At this point in music history the symphony is still close to its origins as an overture or entr'acte in an opera so it is a fairly short work in three movements: fast slow fast. Tom picks the excellent Symphony in G minor, op. 6, no. 6:

Nice stormy example of "Sturm und Drang" which, since it was composed in London and before the German literary movement from which the name derives, demonstrates again that the musical phenomenon probably doesn't have much to do with the literary one. As Tom mentions, J. C. Bach was a big influence on the very young Mozart when he (Mozart) visited London in the 1760s. This piece by J. C. Bach could stand up pretty well against a lot of lesser Mozart. It may have even been an influence on the early G minor Symphony, K. 183 by Mozart written a few years later:

But there is a whole lot more going on in the Mozart. There are more melodic, harmonic and rhythmic ideas in the first two minutes than in the whole symphony by J. C. Bach. What we hear in the Bach symphony is the rhythmic stiffness and predictable sequences of Baroque music, without the contrapuntal interest. Listen for example to the development section from about the 1'34 mark to about the 2'15 mark in the first movement of the G minor J. C. Bach symphony. One long sequence in which nothing much happens that isn't predictable.

Apart from his childhood tour of the capitols of Europe, Mozart as an adolescent spent quite a bit of time in Italy and perhaps some of the grace and effervescence of his music in all dimensions, melodic, harmonic and rhythmic, comes from Italian music. Certainly when we listen to the Mozart symphony we hear a harmonic and rhythmic flexibility that makes the phrases much more fluid than the ones in the J. C. Bach symphony.

I hope very much that Tom also gives us a symphony by the older Bach son, C. P. E. Bach, the "Berlin" Bach. He was a much more eccentric composer as we can hear in this symphony in B minor:

Tom Service's series is really about the best and most educational one on music in the mass media these days. Thanks to him for it. The only problem with it is that it tends to present every single piece as an stunning bit of innovative wonderfulness, which is both untrue and a bit dull. He is striving for the utmost diversity in the series, which is good, but one of the reasons for listening to, say, J. C. Bach and C. P. E. Bach, is to notice the ways in which the generation of Haydn and Mozart far exceeded them. A list of the fifty greatest symphonies is likely to be a lot less diverse than Tom's selections as it will probably consist 90% of symphonies by Beethoven, Haydn and Mozart with a few by Schubert, Sibelius, Shostakovich and possibly Mahler, unless I am right about him, in which case, Brahms and maybe Bruckner. And for a token modernist exemplar, Stravinsky, Symphony of Psalms.

Our urge for diversity often ends up conflicting with critical aesthetic judgement. You can't simultaneously ride the horse of diversity and the one of quality. You can't have your horse and eat it too--wait, I think that was a Metaphor Too Far.