Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
The second surviving son of J.S. Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel was the most innovative and idiosyncratic member of an extremely talented musical family. His music, unlike that of his father or that of the master he influenced, Haydn, did not define an era so much as reveal a deeply personal response to the musical conventions of his time.
C.P.E. Bach could play his father's technically demanding keyboard pieces at sight by the time he was seven. An exceptional student in areas other than music, he enrolled at the University of Leipzig in 1731 to study law, then transferred to the University of Frankfurt an der Oder. He graduated in 1734 but remained in that town giving keyboard lessons, involving himself in public concerts, and learning the composer's craft.
By 1740, Bach was in Berlin as harpsichordist to Frederick the Great of Prussia. Here, he was first exposed to Italian opera seria, and its dramatic style infiltrated his instrumental music. Little of this was heard at court, where Bach accompanied the flutist-king in one reactionary concerto after another by Quantz. He made several attempts to find a new position, but the stress of the king's disfavor was partially relieved in 1756 when Frederick became distracted by the Seven Years' War and was frequently away from the court. Bach found a select audience for his remarkable and experimental series of keyboard works such as the so-called "Prussian" and "Württemberg" sonatas (composed in the early 1740s) and the Sonatas with Varied Repeats (1760). Bach finally got himself released from Frederick's service in 1768 in order to succeed Telemann as cantor at the Johanneum in Hamburg, also serving as music director for the city's five major churches; he held this post until his death.
Stylistically distant from his father's rigorous polyphony, C.P.E. Bach was something of a proto-Romantic; he was the master of Empfindsamkeit, or "intimate expressiveness." The dark, dramatic, improvisation-like passages that appear in some of Mozart's and Haydn's works are due in part to his influence; in time, his music became known all over Europe. His impulsive works for solo keyboard, which lurch into unexpected keys, change tempo and dynamics abruptly, and fly along with wide-ranging themes, are especially compelling. One account of Bach's after-dinner improvisations described the sweaty, glazed-eyed musician as "possessed," an adjective that would be applied to equally intense and idiosyncratic musicians in the Romantic age. Many of his symphonies are as audacious as his keyboard pieces.
In the area of chamber music, Bach pulled the keyboard out of its subsidiary Baroque role and made it a full partner with, or even leader of, the other instruments. Yet here he fashioned the music to the public's conservative expectations, as he did with his church music. He composed prolifically in many genres, and much of his work awaits public rediscovery.
Bach also produced an important account of performance practice in the second half of the 18th century, translated into English as Essay on the True Art of Playing Keyboard Instruments.
© James Reel /TiVo
Discography
21 album(s) • Sorted by Bestseller
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C.P.E. Bach: Die Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt Jesu, H. 777
Bart Van Reyn, Il Gardellino, Vlaams Radiokoor
Classical - Released by Passacaille on 25/02/2022
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
C.P.E Bach: Concerto pour piano, cordes et basse continue en ré mineur (Live)
Christian Zacharias, Orchestre national Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
Miscellaneous - Released by XXI Music on 17/04/2020
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Jermaine Sprosse: Sonaten für Cembalo und Hammerklavier
Jermaine Sprosse, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Christoph Nichelmann, Carl Friedrich Christian Fasch
Classical - Released by Rondeau Production on 6/10/2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Le clavecin baroque
Lars Ulrik Mortensen, Anne Gallet, Christiane Jaccottet
Classical - Released by Claves Records on 1/01/2000
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Harp Recital
Chamber Music - Released by Claves Records on 1/01/2000
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Classical Piano Favorites
Classical - Released by The Playlist Spot on 14/04/2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Baroque Thanksgiving
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Georg Friedrich Händel
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on 21/11/2020
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Sons and pupils of Johann Sebastian Bach
Classical - Released by Naxos Sweden - Daphne on 3/12/2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
18th Century Harp Music (Digitally Remastered)
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 27/08/2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Nikolai Petrov: Piano Fantasies By C.P.E. Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Mendelssohn and Schumann
Classical - Released by Pipeline Music on 29/11/2006
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
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Bach à la Klezmer
Kevin Spagnolo, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
Classical - Released by EUROPEAN GRAMOPHONE on 2/01/2024
24-Bit 48.0 kHz - Stereo -
The Classical Collection - Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach -Obras maestras del Barroco
Classical - Released by ClassicalPirosDigital on 12/06/2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Serenad till Gryningen
Classical - Released by Naxos Sweden - Mats Bergström Musik AB on 1/01/1997
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Rebecca Troxler Plays Flute Music By the Sons of Bach
Rebecca Troxler, David Schulenberg, Steven Lubin
Chamber Music - Released by Albany Records on 1/05/2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Louis Moyse Plays: Duruflé, C.P.E. Bach, Telemann, Schubert - Volume 5
Chamber Music - Released by Lyrichord on 1/05/2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
La Gabriel, H.97
Vinyl Digital, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
Classical - Released by Pastel Records Canada on 1/04/2024
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Sons and pupils of Johann Sebastian Bach
Classical - Released by Daphne Records on 3/12/2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Serenad till Gryningen
Classical - Released by Mats Bergstrom Musik on 1/01/1997
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bach: Solfeggietto in C Minor
Classical - Released by Pocket Watch Records on 11/12/2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Guitar Lover (Electric guitar version)
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Nologo
Electronic - Released by Electro Roma on 19/01/2022
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo