Organ Music: Transcriptions
Discussions - Part 1

Organ Music: Transcriptions, Part 1, Sebastian's Concertos, Trios, Sonatas, etc.

William L. Hoffman wrote (January 27, 2019):
Bach was an inveterate borrower and transcriber of his own music and that tradition, which dated to the Middle Ages, was pervasively practiced in the Baroque era with the growing demands for new music but became more selective in succeeding periods. Bach's organ music in particular continued to generate transcriptions from his students and followers as well as 19th century to present day composers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_transcriptions_of_compositions_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach), notably in the area of the use of the B-A-C-H motif https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BACH_motif). Bach's borrowings of his earlier music is particularly evident and varied in his organ works, BWV 525-765 as adaptations and in his vocal works usually as parody or new-text underlay, BWV 1-249 (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach: "Additional information"). The 19th century emphasis on originality often denigrated borrowings self-plagiarism (continuing into the 20th century), despite the vogue of piano fantasies and transcriptions of popular opera melodies to produce income, the original "Hit Parade." Today, some musicologists continue to dismiss the study of vocal music parody as an obsession (see Daniel Melamed, "Parody is overrated," http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Parodies-6.htm: "Parody: Obsession or Transformation," March 20, 2018.

In the Baroque era, because of "the hectic pace of production," "Bach was compelled to take an extremely proactive approach to composition, one that included the recycling of a great deal of earlier material revised to fit new, pressing needs," says George Stauffer in his essay on Baroque music.¹ At least 20 percent of Bach's music stems from older music with many original pieces generating multiple versions as "recycling and revising seem to have been the order of the day," he says. Bach turned "borrowing into a high art," following a long tradition dating to the Medieval Notre Dame school when vocal additions were inserted to enhance polyphony, followed by Renaissance Masses "based on material borrowed from their own music or that of their colleagues," observes Stauffer (Ibid.: 215). Several factors contributed to the pervasive use of borrowings in the Baroque, says Stauffer (Ibid.: 217): the development multi-movement formats and sectional forms (sonatas, concertos), self-sufficient movements which could be substituted, movement sectional designs such as the concerto and the da-capo repeat aria (ABA), and the interchangeability of idioms in vocal, instrumental, and keyboard music in late-Baroque style. On-going revisions in Bach's case involved works such as the four versions of the St. John Passion, three of the St. Matthew Passion, and two of the St. Mark Passion, as well as numerous variants of organ works such as the "Great 18" Chorale Preludes," "freed composers from the urgency to create 'definitive' versions of their music,:" says Stauffer (Ibid.), and enabled them to build a repertory for a variety of uses. Many of Bach's transcriptions and their sources are presumed lost. Meanwhile, Bach's transcriptions of movements from his own and other composers' works (see below) are most prominent in his Weimar concerto arrangements for keyboard, independent trio movements done in Weimar and Leipzig, and in Weimar the Six Trio Sonatas, BWV 525-530, borrowing many movements from his earlier works, original organ concertos, and adaptations of movements from them as sinfonias and arias in the third cycle of church-year cantatas.

Weimar Concerto Transcriptions

Bach's earliest transcriptions are found during his tenure in Weimar (1708-1717) when he was learning the art of extended composition such as the Italian concerto and trio-sonata forms, the extended keyboard prelude and fugue, the ritornello structure or "return" with taut harmonic sequences in all manner of music, and the heterogeneous Italian opera form of the modern cantata including an opening instrumental sinfonia. Bach also produced transcriptions, particularly from Italian music which was in vogue, to present these in a keyboard format for concerts. Initially, about 1709 Bach copied Telemann's Double Concerto in G Major, TVW 52:G2 for himself and Telemann's G minor Violin Concerto, TWV 51:g1 as a keyboard concerto, BWV 985 in 1713, with an isolated movement for organ, BWV 586, says Nicholas Kenyon in his Bach 333 study of Bach's works.² These "copies and reworkings shows that Bach was already involved with concerto form before his main interaction with Vivaldi's works."

Bach's foray into transcriptions of Italian string concertos produced five solo organ concertos, BWV 592-596 three based upon Vivaldi and two from Saxe-Weimar Prince Johann Ernst (1696-1715), and a spurious concerto, BWV 597, after an unknown model, completing a set of six (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_concerto_(Bach)#Weimar_concerto_transcriptions, transcribed amid a local culture favoring Italian style. Also composed were 16 other keyboard solo concertos and trios for harpsichord, BWV 972-987, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_concerto_transcriptions_(Bach) . Between the summers of 1713 and 1714, at the direction of the prince, Bach and his cousin, Johann Walther produced numerous transcriptions mostly from Italian models, for church and court concerts and the development of the keyboard concerto which Bach would pioneer in the fifth Brandenburg Concerto, possibly dating to Weimar. Bach produced a larger number of arrangements, to learn and teach new styles and to present music to larger audiences, says Elsie Pfitzer in her liner notes on Bach transcriptions.³ It was part of a tradition dating to the Renaissance when polyphonic vocal works were transcribed to keyboard music through the process of intabulation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intabulation).

For a long time, Bach's keyboard transcriptions "were surrounded by ignorance and uncertainty in respect of their purpose, genesis, dating, and tradition," says Dr. Manfred Fechner in his liner notes to the Weimar transcriptions.⁴ Originally viewed as Bach compositional studies in Nikolaus Forkel's 1802 biography, more recent scholars found that the music was composed for performance, particularly Arnold Schering and Hans-Joachim Schultze, the latter showing that the concerto transcriptions were done for performance at the instigation of Prince Johann. The young Weimar prince had experienced the long-standing Netherlands tradition of non-liturgical organ playing while acquiring publications of Vivaldi's "L'estro armonico" in Amsterdam and returning in the summer of 1713 to study composition with Walther, Stadtkirche organist, and to commission him and Bach to produce transcriptions of Vivaldi and his works for performance, Bach being the organist at the Weimar Scholßkirche, with Bach producing the more "modern" works" and Walther older pieces of Torelli and Albinoni. Their arrangements were the beginning of "commissioned virtuoso concert literature," says Fechner. Bach's arrangements from orchestra to organ, despite the loss of tonal richness, produced "fine dynamic gradations and differentiated articulations which he achieved through forms of elaboration and ornamentation specific to the keyboard," while sacrificing virtuosity for tonal opulence on the organ as well as the "vast palette of tone colours," with added embellishment in the slow movements.

best known of Bach's organ concerto arrangements is Vivaldi's Double Violin Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op. 3, No. 11, transcribed as BWV 596 (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalWork_work_00000679?lang=en, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjIEHLRUwoI). It is "a work of extraordinary meticulousness and can certainly hold its own as an independent piece of music," says Fechner (Idid. 36), with contrapuntal filling. There is a thematic kinship between the beginning of the final movement (without tempo indication, Allegro, BWV 21/1a) and the opening chorus of Cantata 21, "Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis" (I had much affliction) of 1713 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ln9MBa8lXV4: 2:54), he observes. Concerto BWV 596 is the only organ concerto surviving in autograph (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00001340) and originally was attributed to Friedemann https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_concerto_(Bach)#Concerto_in_D_minor,_BWV_596). In 1911 the Vivaldi source was found in the form of a fast-slow-fast church sonata. "Bach took great care in his work," says Pfitzer (Ibid.: 15), including registration instructions, with "A thoroughly convincing translation of music originally for strings into the language of the organ!," she says.

Bach's Weimar organ concerto transcriptions initially were recognized and received as secondary works in which Bach was simply learning the art of composition involving style, form, and harmony. Eventually, early works attributed to Bach were found to be based on the music of other composers. Recently, with the discovery and reconstruction of variant versions as well as the exploration of secondary and tertiary sources of music attributed to or associated with Bach, the perspective has broadened to realize their inherent performing appeal as well as their use as teaching opportunities for his students. Bach's motive, method and opportunity for transcriptions are now seen as complex, challenging, and rewarding. From a chronological perspective, Bach's concerto arrangements are viewed in the context of the development of the keyboard concerto. Bach assimilated swiftly into his personal style the elements of the Italian concerto style, most notably the ritornello themes, elemental scale- and broken-chord figures, driving rhythms and tonic-dominant harmony, observes Richard D. P. Jones in his study of Bach's early composition development.⁵ To his "decorative writing and keyboard brilliance" Bach adds counterpoint in the textures beyond the original so that the alterations and additions "are better appreciated, as signs of his full creative engagement with Vivaldi's music, he says (Ibid.: 151).

Trio Organ Transcriptions, Others

Other organ transcriptions involve Leipzig trio pieces that survive in copies, probably for teaching purposes, BWV 583-586 (https://imslp.org/wiki/Trios_for_Organ,_BWV_583-586_(Bach,_Johann_Sebastian): the "Trio in G Major," BWV 586" (before 1740, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dt00Y4GMxkA), from an early Telemann harpsichord piece; the "Trio in C minor," BWV 585 (1726-27) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwrtoMwOBHc), based on a church trio sonata for two violins and continuo of Johann Friedrich Fasch (1688-1758); and the "Aria in F Major," BWV 587 (after 1726, https://www.youtube.com/watch/?v=oeKQD-VH3ys), is an excerpt from a suite for two violins and continuo of Francois Couperin. Other Miscellaneous Trios, according to George Stauffer,⁶ are the Concerto in E-flat Major, BWV 597=Anh. 46 (BWV3 App. B); the Sonata in G Major, BWV 1039a (organ version); Trio in C Major, BWV 1014/3a (organ version); Trio in D Minor, BWV 583 (variant version heavily ornamented); "Trio in G minor," BWV 584, from trio aria, "Ich will an den Himmel denken" (I shall think of heaven) from Cantata 166, "Wo gehest du hin?" (Where are you going?, John 16:5), for Cantate Sunday 1724; and "Trio in D Minor," BWV 790a, after Sinfonia 4 in D minor, BWV 790.

Keyboard transcriptions of other composers' pieces, originally listed in Norman Carrell's study,⁷ include Corelli (Fugue, BWV 579), Giovanni Bononcini (previously Legrenzi; Fugue, BWV 574), Johann David Heinichen (?"Alle breve in D," BWV 589; ?"Kleine harmonisches Labyrinth," BWV 591=BWV3 App. B,), and Johann Ludwig Krebs (?"8 Little Preludes & Fugues," BWV 553-560=BWV3 App. B; Fugue, BWV 567). A few Miscellaneous Chorales originally attributed to Bach are now possibly the works of Johann Michael Bach (1648-1694; BWV 720, 723, 751), possibly Krebs (BWV 732, 740, 744), while BWV 743=App. B is possibly J. H. Buttstedt, chorale BWV 760 and 761=App D may be by Georg Böhm, and BWV 749 is variously, possibly by Telemann, Sebastian, or Johann Christoph Bach.

Bach's Copies of Other Composers

An accounting of Bach's copies of the works of other composers is best found in the research of the late Kirsten Beißwenger, who first studied Bach's musical library and produced an updated inventory based upon recent research, found in her updated research essay under "Other Composers."⁸ From Bach's library, some of the earliest works were Italian-style keyboard studies of composers Alessandro and Benedetto Marcello, Giuseppe Torelli, Telemann and Vivaldi in the concerto transcriptions, BWV 592-596 (organ) and BWV 972-987 (clavier), with individual keyboard fugal models of Reincken (BWV 954, 965/2, 966/2), the Corelli's (BWV 579), and models of the trios in A Major, B minor, and B major of Tomaso Albinoni (BWV 946, 950, 951). Some of these were student copies with the Bach originals and their sources presumed lost.

Works of other composers that Bach transcribed that are lost began with the "earliest composite manuscripts with organ works permit inferences to be drawn from the broad circle of music that surrounded the young Bach," says Beißwenger (Ibid.: 247). "The first independently arranged collection copied in 1698 by Bach was the music compiled by his brother, Johann Christoph (Dok 3: 81f ([No. 666); NBR 299 (No. 306), involving works of Pachelbel, Johann Caspar Kerl and Johann Jacob Froberger, but both Christoph's original manuscript and the young Sebastian's Bach's copy are lost. The two extensive anthologies of keyboard music, dating to 1700-1705, the Andreas Bach Book and the Möller manuscript, list composers from German, Italy, and France involving Böhm, Buxtehude, Johann Kaspar Ferdinand Fischer, Peter Heidorn, Johann Kuhnau, Reincken, Albinoni, Agostino Steffani, Nicolas Antoine Le Begue, Jean-Baptiste Lully, and Marin Marais. Buxtehude's "Prelude and Fugue in G minor," BuxWV 148, is found is found the hand of Johann Christoph Bach.

Recent organ discoveries include Sebastian's hand as tablature are Buxtehude's chorale prelude,"Nun freut euch lieben Christen gmein, BuxWV 210), Reincken's "An Wasserflußen Babylon," and Johann Pachelbel's preludes on "An Wasserflußen Babylon" and "Kyrie, Gott Vater in Ewigkeit," and a Fugue.

When Bach resigned in 1708 as organist at Mülhausen (Dok 1:1; NBR 32) he wrote of having "a good store of the choicest church compositions," for performance, suggests Beißwenger, possibly referring to those early works of other composers cited above, some transmitted by his students. "Evidence for the wide-ranging transmission of works of other composers dates from Bach's Weimar Years," she says (Ibid.: 249). These include Bach copies of de Grigny's Premier Livre d'Orgue (1699, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas_de_Grigny), Frescobaldi's Fiori musicali liturgical organ music (1635, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiori_musicali), and Pierre Dumage's Livre d'Orgue (1708, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Dumage). Bach copied a toccata and a passacaglia by Bernardo Pasquini (1691-1708, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernardo_Pasquini), while his students in Weimar, probably from models in his library, copied the Pachelbel transcription and the Toccata in G Major of Buxtehude, as well as Jacques Boyvin's Second Livre d'Orgue (1700, https://imslp.org/wiki/Oeuvres_complètes_d%27orgue_(Boyvin,_Jacques)). A chronological sequence of Bach's fugues on themes of others as well as the concerto settings cannot be dated to autography sources but early copies date to the Weimar period, she observes (Ibid.: 251). The fugue in the "Prelude & Fugue in D Major," BWV 532, traces back not to a sonata but a canzonetta which could have been based on a fugue in D by Pachelbel.

In Weimar, Bach also began to copy Latin church music such as various Kyries, as well as the so-called "Keiser" St. Mark Passion. This work, as well as other Passions and various Mass movements Bach began to copy in earnest in Leipzig as he began his Stile Antico exploration for the "Great" Mass in B Minor, which continued into the 1740s. Bach's library of works of other composers, both for study and performance, shows his particular interests but the specific influence on Bach's works is more difficult to determine, Beißwenger observes (Ibid.: 261f). Organists Böhm, Buxtehude, and Reincken served as personal role models. The Vivaldi concerto form had a profound impact on Bach, as research continues to reveal, beginning with Forkel, as well as the influences of Albinoni, Torelli, and Corelli and these were formative in Bach's development of the keyboard concerto which would become, along with the development of the classical sonata form, string quartet, and symphony, to dominate composition well into the 19th century.

Leipzig Concerto, Trio Sonata Transcriptions

As early as 1725, Bach may have laid the foundations for original keyboard concertos, possibly for organ, which also embraced organ obbligato concerto movements adapted for his third cycle of church-year cantatas, followed by organ trio sonatas and trio movements. Many of Bach's concertos involved various self-transcriptions to other instruments and the debate continues over the precise determination of the original versions and subsequent arrangements. Virtually all of Bach's successive organ revisions and transcriptions were undertaken in Leipzig, although most of the original sources are lost. Bach's efforts were stimulated by the varied demands of cantor, music director, and Kapellmeister for sacred and secular works in many idioms, the accumulation of one-time occasional instrumental and vocal music beginning in Köthen and available for other mediums, as well as the opportunity to teach composition and re-composition to his students, especially sons Friedemann and Emmanuel who also would perform these works at the Collegium musicum concerts.

In the second half of the church year in 1725, Bach temporarily ceased regular composition of church-year cantatas, returning to keyboard music with the following: beginning of his Clavier-Übung (keyboard studies) first published series, venturing to Dresden to do an organ concert in the Sophienkirche in the fall with preludes and the possible premiere of his Concerto in D minor, BWV 1052; the possible composing of similar keyboard concertos with selective movements being adapted as obbligato pieces in church cantatas; and the Six Trio Sonatas, BWV 525-30, assembled "in the late 1720s and contained reworkings of prior compositions by Bach from earlier cantatas, organ works and chamber music as well as some newly composed movements," says Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_Sonatas_(Bach)). Beginning in 1729, Bach had the luxury of directing the Collegium musicum in concerts year-round at Zimmermann's coffeehouse and gardens, which often as probably a family affair, particularly in the keyboard concertos, BWV 1052-1065, the last, "Concerto for 4 Harpsichords in A minor,"⁹ an arrangement of Vivaldi's Concerto for 4 Violins in B Minor, Op. 3, No. 10, RV 580 "The transcription is masterly, resulting in a work admirably suited to the keyboard instruments," says Peter Wollny.¹⁰

"Between May and November 1726 Bach wrote six works — Cantatas 146, 170, 35, 47, 169, and 49 — that display a rich array of sinfonias, choruses, and arias calling for organ solo. Almost all of these movements appear to be derived from pre-existing violin and oboe concertos from Bach’s Cothen years (1717-1723)," says George Stauffer.¹¹ "Bach seems to have created this new type of church setting as part of his intense interest in novel vocal and instrument combinations, a passion that comes to the fore in the third cantata cycle." The organ-obbligato movements from Bach’s cantatas have been arranged in appropriate fast-slow-fast sequences to produce three organ concerto reconstructions: Concerto No. 8 in D minor, BWV 1059; Concerto No. 2 in D Major, BWV 1053; and Concerto No. 1 in D minor, BWV 1051 (from BWV 146/1,2 and BWV 188/1).

While Bach scholars originally thought that Concerto No. 1 in D Minor, BWV 1052, originated as a lost Cothen violin concerto, Christoph Wolff suggests that it began as an organ concerto, possibly in Weimar, and later was performed in Dresden on 21 September 1725.¹² Here he cites a newspaper account of the concert with "preludes and various concertos with supporting soft instrumental music," and suggests that the Concerto No. 2 in E Major, BWV 1053 also was performed then with an ensemble led by Johann Georg Pisendel (1688-1755, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Georg_Pisendel), Saxon Court concertmaster, who in 1717 had arranged for Bach's unrealized, notorious competition with Louis Marchand. The genesis of the D minor concerto may have begun in Weimar as an organ concerto, Wolff suggests (Ibid.: 67), while the harpsichord concertos were assembled in the late 1730s with organ concerto forerunners developed earlier with movements utilized in the third cantata cycle in 1726. "Wolff musters a convincing array of supporting evidence for his conjectures," says David Yearsley in his source studies of Bach's keyboard music.¹³ "Regardless of whether the hypothesis is ever 'proved' — and it seems unlikely that it will be by any juridical standard —we can for the first time imagine fully-fledged organ concertos by the instrument's great master."

Soon after the cantata organ obbligato movements were composed in 1726, Bach composed the Six Trio Sonatas, BWV 525-30 in the late 1720s (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_Sonatas_(Bach)). "These perfect pieces stand apart from both the sequence of preludes and fugues and from the chorale-based settings as the only organ works before Clavier-Übung III that Bach collected for performance," says Kenyon in "Organ Works: 112-113, 6 Trio Sonatas BWV 525-530 (Ibid.: 110f). With "utmost precision and grace," they "would sound well on any keyboard instrument and have been affectively transcribed for various ensembles." Besides the solo organ version (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gu94F7n-co0), and other keyboard versions are arrangements for instrumental ensemble (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fxorVN9tqg. The sonatas were composed for learning purposes, particularly for Friedemann, and recital rather than for church service. "Each of the six is consciously different in style andcontent — perhaps they draw on lost on Weimar or Cothen repertory for their materials, but as usual with Bach it is scrupulously reworked," says Kenyon. Only BWV 530 is entirely newly composed, as well as the slow movement of BWV 525 and the first movement of BWV 529. Four movements have previous versions as organ compositions: the first movement of BWV 525; the first movement of BWV 527; the slow movement of BWV 528; and the slow movement of BWV 529. Two movements are transcriptions of instrumental trios. The first movement of BWV 528 is a transcription of the sinfonia that begins the second part of the 1724 cantata "Die Himmel erzählen die Ehre Gottes," BWV 76, for btheb 1st Sunday after Trinity, scored for oboe d'amore, viola da gamba and continuo. The slow movement of the BWV 527 is a reworking of a lost instrumental work which was also re-used later in the slow movement of the "Triple Concerto for Flute, Violin and Harpsichord," BWV 1044/2.

The 6 Trio Sonatas for Organ, BWV 525-530 "have strong associations with chamber music that Bach was writing around that time [c.1730]," says Richard D. P. Jones in his second study of Bach's later compositions.¹⁴ Following the traditional standard design of six sonatas, the works have the dual character of sonatas as organ and chamber music, as reflected in their prehistory of transcriptions from earlier Bach music, particularly trio and sonata movements, as well as cantata and concerto pieces. A major influence on Bach was the French organ music of Boyvin, Dumage, de Grigny (all three cited above), and Andre Raison, most notably in the virtuoso scoring for two manuals and pedal with obbligato playing simultaneously in all three staves as virtuoso showpieces composed for Friedemann.

There are two forms for the six sonatas, says Jones (Ibid.: 265f): Nos. 1, 3, and 4, were modeled after previously-existing movements of Bach, emphasizing the sonata form, while Nos. 2, 5, and 6, primarily rely on newly-composed movements, emphasizing the concerto form. Sonatas Nos. 1, 3, and 5 all "three employ fugue, canon, and long-range interchange of parts. Sonata No. 1 "might have been adapted from a lost trio sonata for recorder, oboe, and continuo," and Sonata No. 4 "might have originated as a trio sonata for oboe, gamba, and continuo," while Sonata 3, BWV 527, in the Adagio e dolce blends the character of an earlier organ trio with a theme in galant style while the two outer, fast movements are pseudo-fugal entities in da-capo form (ABA). The group of three concerto-style sonatas (Nos. 2, 5, and 6) have opening movements not fugal but concertante in style and ritornello-based in form while the slow movements are quite diverse involving, respectively a concerto aria, a pseudo-fugal construction, and a Siciliana as in Sonata No. 1. The closing concerto-form sonatas are, like the other three, are fugal but now in concertante style, emphasizing, respectfully Scarlattian dynamic contrasts, a blend of ritornello and fugue, and an ABA reprise. Given the diversity of form and style and the melodic appeal, it is not surprising that the music now also is performed idiomatically on the piano as well as with instrumental ensembles.¹⁵

B-A-C-H Motif, Further Transcriptions

Central to Bach arrangements is the "BACH" four-note musical motiv (B-flat, A, C, B-natural) which Bach exploited, followed particularly by various composers in the first Bach Revival, beginning in the 19th century, and continuing unabated today (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BACH_motif, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Arran/L-BACH.htm). "Bach used the motif in a number of works, most famously as a fugue subject in the last Contrapunctus of The Art of Fugue, says Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BACH_motif). <<The motif also appears in the end of the fourth variation of Bach's Canonic Variations on "Vom Himmel hoch da komm' ich her", as well as in other pieces. For example, the first measure of the Sinfonia in F minor, BWV 795, includes a transposed version of the motif (a♭'-g'-b♭'-a') followed by the original in measure 17.>>

Later commentators wrote: "The figure occurs so often in Bach's bass lines that it cannot have been accidental." Hans-Heinrich Eggebrecht¹⁶ goes as far as to reconstruct Bach's putative intentions as an expression of Lutheran thought, imagining Bach to be saying, "I am identified with the tonic and it is my desire to reach it ... Like you I am human. I am in need of salvation; I am certain in the hope of salvation, and have been saved by grace," through his use of the motif rather than a standard changing tone figure (B♭-A-C-B) in the double discant clausula in the fourth fugue of The Art of Fugue.

The motif was used as a fugue subject by Bach's son Johann Christian, and by his pupil Johann Ludwig Krebs. However, the motif's wide popularity came only after the start of the Bach Revival in the first half of the 19th century.[2] Later composers found that the motif could be easily incorporated not only into the advanced harmonic writing of the 19th century, but also into the totally chromatic idiom of the Second Viennese School; so it was used by Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, and their disciples and followers. Today, composers continue writing works using the motif, frequently in homage to Johann Sebastian Bach.>>

FOOTNOTES

¹ George Stauffer, "Bach and the Bounds of Originality," in The World of Baroque Music: New Perspectives, ed. Stauffer (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006: 214; Contents, http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ecip0610/2006008084.html).
² Nicholas Kenyon, Bach 333, "Bach Interactive: 208-210 Concertos at Weimar," p. 188f, in Bach: The Music https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8469462--bach-333-the-new-complete-edition). His current comments on the music are based upon his book, The Faber Pocket Guide to Bach (London: Faber & Faber, 2011; https://www.amazon.com/Faber-Pocket-Guide-Bach-Music/dp/0571233279).
³ Elise Pfitzer, "Transcriptions: Concertos and Trios," Hänssler Edition CD 92.095, 2000: 14; http://www.bach-cantatas.com/NonVocal/Organ-Var-Dijk.htm.
⁴ Manfred Fechner, "Harpsichord and organ arrangements written in Weimar by J. S. Bach and J. G. Walther and their original models, liner notes to "Weimarer Transkription," 1997, 25ff; http://www.bach-cantatas.com/NVP/Knebel-S.htm).
⁵ Richard D. P. Jones, The Creative Development of Johann Sebastian Bach, Vol. 1: 1695-1717, "Music to Delight the Spirit (Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press: 141).
⁶ George Stauffer (editor, commentary), The Complete Organ Works, Volume 7, Six Trio Sonatas and Miscellaneous Trios – Johann Sebastian Bach, (Greensboro NC: Wayne Leopold Editions, 2014 (http://www.wayneleupold.com/the-complete-organ-works-volume-7-six-trio-sonatas-and-miscellaneous-trios.html).
⁷ Norman Carrell, Part II, "Borrowings from Others," Chapter 1, "From Keyboard to Keyboard," and Chapter 4, Table 4, "Chamber Work or Concerto Grosso to Keyboard" Bach the Borrower (London, George Allen & Unwin Ltd. 1967: 227ff, 245ff); since 1967 works attributed to Bach have been confirmed as works of other composers andC vice versa and an update of Bach's borrowings is long overdue.
⁸ Kirsten Beißwenger, Part III, Musical Influences, Chapter 10, "Other Composers," trans. Emerson Mirgan, in The Routledge Research Companion to Johann Sebastian Bach, ed. Robin A. Leaver (London & New York: Routledge, 2017: (https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Research-Companion-to-Johann-Sebastian-Bach-1st-Edition/Leaver/p/book/9781409417903).
⁹ "Concerto for 4 Harpsichords in A Minor, BWV 1065," details (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_concertos_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach#Concerto_in_A_minor_for_four_harpsichords,_BWV_1065, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApgCxwAImCE: details; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QA1L0SsEXxU, https://imslp.org/wiki/Concerto_for_4_Harpsichords_in_A_minor,_BWV_1065_(Bach,_Johann_Sebastian)).
¹⁰ Peter Wollny, "Johann Sebastian Bach: Concertos for Two, Three, and Four Harpsichords," liner notes to Naxos 8.554217, 1998: 3).
¹¹ George Stauffer, "Organ Concertos and Sinfonias by J.S. Bach," program notes, https://www.gothic-catalog.com/Bach_Sinfonia_Organ_Concertos_Lippincott_p/g-49130.htm).
¹² Christoph Wolff, "Did J. S. Bach Write Organ Concertos?: Appropro the Prehistory of Cantata Movements with Obbligato Organ," in Bach and the Organ, Bach Perspectives 10, ed. Matthew Dirst (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2016: 65), in collaboration with American Bach Society (https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/38pfs7fx9780252040191.html). The Clavier Concerto, BWV 1053 may date to 1722-26, suggests Gregory Butler in “The Choir Loft as Chamber: Concerted Movements by Bach from the Mid- to Late 1720s,” Bach Perspectives 10: 77). In all, the organ functions as an obbligato instrument in 27 cantata movements, mostly arias, observes Matthew Cron in "Music from Heaven: An Eighteenth Century Context for Cantatas with Obbligato Organ,” Bach Perspectives 10: 87 (cited in "Secular to Sacred Parody, Contrafaction (1725-27)," Parodies in Bach’s Vocal Works, Discussions - Part 5, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Parodies-5.htm, beginning "Concerto Movements in Cycle 3 Cantatas").
¹³ David Yearsley, Part IV, Genres and Forms, Chapter 12, "Keyboard Music," in The Routledge Research Companion to Johann Sebastian Bach (Ibid.: 305).
¹⁴ 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: 262).
¹⁵ BCW Piano Transcriptions of Bach's Works & Bach-inspired Piano Works, Index by BWV Number - Part 3, Organ Works BWV 525-598 (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/NVD/PT-BWV-3.htm); also see two BCML Discussions of the Six Trio Sonatas, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/NVD/BWV525-530-Gen1.htm, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/NVD/BWV525-530-Gen2.htm, especially Thomas Braatz's "Provenance" article, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Ref/BWV525-530-Ref.htm.
¹⁶ Eggebrecht (1993:8) cited in Cumming, Naomi (2001), The Sonic Self: Musical Subjectivity and Signification, p.256. ISBN 0-253-33754-2.

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To Come: Transcriptions, Part 2: Bach and his circle in transmission and reception, particularly chorale realizations in preludes, trios, partitas, and variations that serve as transcriptions for teaching composition and improvisation with application in the services to introduce congregational hymns, during communion, and as postludes as well as during recitals. Free organ works such as the iconic "Toccata and Fugue in D minor," are also found in copies of student works and composers such as Mozart, perhaps originally based on unknown, transcribed instrumental models, with which Bach had a predilection.

Organ Transcriptions, Part 1a, Trios, Obbligato, Sonatas

William L. Hoffman wrote (February 11, 2019):
Bach's creation of organ works as transcriptions from earlier sources, both himself and other composers, was done for pedagogical purposes, both for self-learning and teaching students, as well as music for performance, rather than for liturgical purposes in the Lutheran services as is the case with his some 200 chorale adaptations which also can be considered as transcriptions of Lutheran chorales. The some 100 free, non-liturgical works have pedagogical as well as performance purposes such as single movements of the Miscellaneous Trios, Short Preludes and Fugues, toccatas, fugues, fantasias as well as the more extended, bi-partite Preludes and Fugues, BWV 532-552 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_organ_compositions_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach), that are appropriate as main service postludes and for occasional special sacred services such as funerals, praise and thanksgiving, allegiance, and Reformation jubilee observances.

Beginning in Weimar, Bach and his cousin Gottfried Walther transcribed violin concertos of Vivaldi, Weimar Prince Johann Ernst and, other Italian composers primarily for performance as well as to perfect new compositional techniques. Bach's students and later his sons began making copies for learning and performing.¹ In Leipzig, Bach after an almost 10-year hiatus took up organ composition again, beginning with Miscellaneous Trio organ transcriptions in 1725, as a "test-run" for his Six Trio Sonatas, BWV 525-530 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_Sonatas_(Bach), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gu94F7n-co0), completed about 1730. In 1725, Bach also began his Clavierübung (Keyboard Study) series (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clavier-Übung) with keyboard partitas, as well as possible composition of an organ concerto transcription, known as Clavier Concerto No. 1 BWV 1052 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qe-S8OdbIIY). In 1726, Bach began composing a series of organ obbligato sinfonia and aria movements for cantatas in the third cycle (see below, "Organ Obbligato Works").

The Miscellaneous Trios and succeeding Six Trio Sonatas "share a common heritage," observes George Stauffer in his commentary of the on-going printed organ works of Bach.² They are instructional pieces and as "kindred spirits stylistically too," he says, with invertible counterpoint, imitative gestures, galant ritornello and da-capo formats, continuo-like bass parts, and "finely nuanced melodic lines" — "arguably the most technically demanding organ music Bach composed." The Six Trio Sonatas "represent the culmination of Bach's interest in using the organ as a chamber instrument." Previously, Bach in Weimar had begun composing extended organ chorale preludes ("Great 18"), some in trio style, BWV 655a, 660a, and 664a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZb3waxdHfc), and in Leipzig notable is the trio setting of "Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr," BWV 676 in the Clavierübung III (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HH2-unrCqYg).

Miscellaneous Organ Trios: Origin, Application

|In Leipzig, Bach's organ trio music turned from vocal chorale elaboration to instrumental realization, based upon instrumental principles that reflected "Bach's concentrated involvement with chamber music in Cöthen and his subsequent reimagining of organ music in light of that experience," says Stauffer. The independent trio works include movements composed for instrumental concertos and sonatas as well as aria movements in serenades. Bach's earliest trio setting is the "The Canonic Trio Sonata F major, BWV 1040 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonic_Trio_Sonata_in_F_major,_BWV_1040), for oboe, violin and continuo (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHqdsK3eAcQ, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzvcYqSfE-I), which was an aria postlude in Hunting Cantata 208 of 1713 and later closing the 4/4 gigue-style soprano aria (No. 2), "Mein gläubiges Herze" (My faithful heart) in the 1725 Pentecost Cantata 68, "Also hat Gott die Welt geliebt (God so loved the world, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV68-D5.htm: 2:40).

One of the best known trio arrangements is Bach's Leipzig adaptation of the second trio in the Brandenburg Concerto No. 1, menuett (no. 4), arranged as the ritornello material in Cantata 207 da-capo soprano bass duet (no. 5), “Den soll mein Lorbeer schützend decken” (My laurels shall cover and protect him, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUbshsiyb_g). Original vocal trios in serenades include the polonaise-style aria, "Glück und Segen sind bereit" (Happiness and blessing are ready), in Cantata 184 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgwXd4DeGAM: 15:07). "We can assume trio sonatas played a central role in the Cöthen court repertory, especially when prince Leopold traveled to Carlsbad in the summers of 1717, 1718, and 1720, taking with him a reduced retinue of players [six] to provide musical entertainment," says Stauffer (Ibid.: xxiii). Most of Bach's Cöthen works are presumed to be lost, says Christoph Wolff,³ who estimates more than 200 pieces were left at the court and eventually destroyed by fire. In Leipzig, Bach arranged instrumental trios as aria trios, notably the Trio 2 from the Brandenburg Concerto No. 1, BWV 1046 ((https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KY-32aOu_k), became the closing ritornello in the (No. 5) soprano-bass da-capo duet, "Den soll mein Lorbeer schützend decken" (My laurels shall cover and protect him, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUbshsiyb_g) of 1726 secular congratulatory Cantata 207, "Vereinigte Zwietracht der wechselnden Saiten" (United division of changing strings).

The other element that Bach discovered and "whole-heartedly embraced" in Cöthen was the dance style idiom in his suites and partitas as well as in his vocal serenades. In the Leipzig organ music these adaptations are particularly found as movements in the Six Trio Sonatas: most notably in the closing movements, Sonatas 3 and 4 in 3/8 passepied as well as dance-like meters "throughout the Six Sonatas that gives the music lightness and grace," says Stauffer (Ibid.: xv). "It is difficult to imagine Bach composing these works before his encounter with dance music in Cöthen." Dance style also is found in Leipzig organ music, besides in the "Great 18" variants and also in the Clavierübung III, chorale fughetta gigue-style 12/8, "Dies sind die heiligen zehn Gebot," BWV 679 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKjlMCCLv9Q), as well as the Canonic Duet No. 3 in G Major, BWV 804, a 12/8 siciliano style simple fugue (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Dc3en1ntpM).

The Italian trio sonata could be adapted to the organ [two manuals, pedal] more readily than the Italian concerto, observes Stauffer (Ibid.: xxiii). Once transcribed "it served as ideal pedagogical material for honing the coordination of hands and feet." The Leipzig organ trios "feature catchy melodies with well-balanced phrases and forms." At the same time, Bach primarily in Leipzig composed 150 cantata trio arias for voice, one obbligato instrument and continuo,⁴ most noteworthy being his organ settings of the Schübler Chorales (six trio aria trio), BWV 645-650 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schübler_Chorales, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-FFEvqYh3I). Bach also composed individual trio organ movements such as the chorale, "Allein Gott in der Höh' (German "Gloria"), BWV 676 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HH2-unrCqYg), and for keyboard in the Well-Tempered Clavier as well as the Contrapunctus XIII Rectus and Inversus in the Art of Fugue (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UeOMM9wJlvc).⁵

Initially in Leipzig Bach turned to composing independent organ trios as well as transcribing his own instrumental music and that of Francois Couperin, Johann Friedrich Fasch and others. Some involve Bach's work, others "seem to be exercises carried out by students or colleagues in his circle," says Stauffer. "As a group, the pieces serve as preparatory studies for the Six Sonatas," sometimes "transmitted in the manuscript sources with early variants oft the Sonata movements." A coherent group produced almost entirely in the mid 1720s, they were motived by Bach's "need for new, updated teaching materials for organ instruction for his sons and his growing group of students from a dozen in Weimar to more than 70 in Leipzig, says Stauffer (Ibid.: xii), see Bach's Pupils (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Other/Pupil-List.htm).

The Leipzig trios offered a wide variety of techniques: invertible counterpoint, Trio in C minor, BWV 585 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsYK5CMRQzU); use of pedal as thematic voice, Trio in F Major, BWV 587 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=359igu28jNs); elaborate cantilena melody over walking bass, Trio in C Minor, BWV 21/1a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcMCJJJweUQ), a transcription of the opening Sinfonia of Cantata 21 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OozOAvrjOI0); concerto idiom, Sonata in G Major, BWV 1039a (https://www.areditions.com/bach-trio-in-g-major-b069y002.html).

The Vol. 7 Six Trio Sonatas and 10 Miscellaneous Trios (Ibid.) in a sense are Pedagogical Works, Part II, says Stauffer. The Miscellaneous Trios include three transcriptions: Trio in C Minor, BWV 585, after Johann Friedrich Fasch's Sonata in C minor for 2 Violins and Continuo (http://www.blockmrecords.org/bach/detail.php?ID=BWV0585); Concerto in E-flat Major, BWV 597, after an unidentified trio sonata or original, lost work; and Sonata in G Major, BWV 1039a, after Sonata in G Major for Two Flutes, BWV 1039 or its lost model. The seven independent trios are: Trio in C minor, after the Sinfonia of Cantata 21; Trio in D minor, BWV 583, variant, heavily ornamented version (http://www.blockmrecords.org/bach/detail.php?ID=BWV0583); Trio in G Minor, BWV 584 (http://www.blockmrecords.org/bach/detail.php?ID=BWV0584), after the trio aria, "Ich will an den Himmel denken, from Cantata 166/2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fobWXUxKaIE); Trio in G Major, BWV 586, after a lost trio sonata movement, perhaps by Georg Philipp Telemann (http://www.blockmrecords.org/bach/detail.php?ID=BWV0586); Trio in F (Aria), BWV 587, after movement of Couperin's Trio Sonata, La Convalescente (http://www.blockmrecords.org/bach/detail.php?ID=BWV0587); Trio in B minor, BWV 790a, after Sinfonia 4 in D minor, BWV 790 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQ2SJplLkFU); and Trio in C Major, BWV 1014/3a, after movement 3 of Sonata 1 in B minor for Violin and Harpsichord, BWV 1014 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9EBEARnN14).

The Trios, BWV 583-587 are organ works, while the remainder are organ works adapted from two Bach cantatas and works of Couperin and possibly Telemann.

While the Bach Six Trio Sonatas are found in Bach's autograph c.1730, the earlier 10 Miscellaneous Trios survive as individually transmitted independent pieces copied by Bach followers, says Stauffer (Ibid.: xviii-xxii). These are found in collections of Johann Peter Kellner (1705-1772), SPK P 804, (after 1730), BWV 1039a/1; Kellner circle students Nicholaus Mempell (1713-1747) and Johann Gottlieb Prellner (1727-1786), Manuscript 7, Leipzig Library, BWV 585, BWV 597 (1743-49), BWV 1039a/4, 1014a/4, BWV 586 (c1730-40); and Leonard Froschmiuth (d.1764), Manuscript 1, Leipzig Library, BWV 790a (1740-60); as well as later generation Gotthilf Wilhelm Körner (1809-1865), printed 1842, BWV 1014/3a, BWV 583, BWV 584; as well as anonymous, SPK P 288, BWV 1039a/2; and anonymous, Mus. 888a, Schwerin Library (before 1750), Trio in C Minor, BWV 21/1a. Bach friend Johann Georg Pissendel (1688-1755) copied BWV 587, Mus. 2162-Q-2, Dresden Library. The work-complex Trio Sonata in G Major, BWV 1027a/1039a (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalWork_work_00001209;jsessionid=1B0B63C4E59D1A30932A2CBEACC652BF?lang=en), https://imslp.org/wiki/File:PMLP05983-Bach_1027a_4_Trio_G.pdf), transcribed from earlier Bach works and resembling the Trio Sonatas, BWV 525-530, the sources are Viola da Gamba Sonata, BWV 1027 movements 1 and 2, Adagio & Allegro ma non tanto; Movement 3, Adagio from lost chamber Sonata in G Major (reconstruction Russell Stinson, https://www.areditions.com/bach-adagio-b069y015.html), source, https://www.areditions.com/keyboard-transcriptions-from-the-bach-circle-b069.html); Movement 4, Allegro moderato, Sonata for Two Flutes, BWV 1039, no source found; Stinson's Keyboard Transcriptions from the Bach Circle (https://www.areditions.com/keyboard-transcriptions-from-the-bach-circle-b069.html); has the Adagio as well as the three versions of the Trio Sonata, BWV 1027/1039 of Kellner (SPK P 804 and SPK 288) and Mempell-Preller, Manuscript 7, and BWV 1027a (BWV3 Appendix D).

Organ Obbligato Works: Sinfonias, Arias, Arrangements

After arranging some independent Trio Sonata Movements for Organ about 1725, beginning in 1726 Bach often took other materials from Cöthen and arranged sinfonia, chorus and aria movements for obbligato organ in his third cycle and later added eight more cantata movements, "forming a sizable repertory of 24 highly idiosyncratic pieces," says Stauffer (Ibid.: xi). The eight cantatas and their 16 organ obbligato movements are BWV 146/1/2, 170/3/5, 35/1/2/5, 47/2, 169/1/5, 49/1/2/6, 194b/3/10, and 27/1. In a few aria cases another obbligato instrument was substituted for the organ. In 1726 for Trinity Sunday, Bach presented another, partial, rearranged version of Cantata 194, "Höchsterwünschtes Freudenfest" (Most greatly longed for feast of joy). In two arias, Bach added a simple obbligato organ part (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00002544) in Movement 3, bass aria, "Was des Höchsten Glanz erfüllt" (What the splendour of the most high God fills), and the closing soprano-bass duet, No. 10, "O wie wohl ist uns geschehn" (O how wonderful it is for us). This simplified version is more personal "viewpoint, interestingly, found in all of Bach's obbligato organ cantatas from 1726, says Matthew Cron.⁶ Bach later added the following movements: Cantata 29/1/5, Cantata 188/1/4, Cantata 70/3, Cantata 194(c)/3, 10, and Cantata 172/1 (1731).

Cantata movements transcribed from previous works are the opening sinfonia and chorus of Cantata 146 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MORa0Y98Z1o) from the Clavier Concerto in D minor, BWV 1052, Movement 1. Allegro, and 2. Adagio https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvsj2J0XnYA), Cantata 188 opening sinfonia (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8lLGc6yYHg) is the movement 3 Allegro of BWV 1052; and the opening sinfonia of Cantata 49 is the third movement Allegro of the Clavier Concerto No. 2 in E Major, BWV 1053, while the opening movement of BWV 1053 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSOe3kAfcdE) is the Cantata 169 opening sinfonia (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ax9uZcDSpk). The three movements from Cantata 35, "Geist und Seele wird verwirret" (Soul and spirit are thrown into confusion), two sinfonias and the opening alto aria in siciliano-style, originated as the keyboard Concerto in D minor, BWV 1059 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApgCxwAImCE). The sources of other, earlier concertos are suggested in Joan Lippincott's transcriptions to solo organ: The two movements from Cantata 169/1, 5, and the opening Sinfonia of Cantata 49 form a keyboard Concerto in D Major.⁷

Cantata 29 opening sinfonia (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDsrw5PRqyU) originated as the Prelude for Partita No. 3 in E Major for Unaccompanied Violin, BWV 1006 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tjl07RmEQg), and was adapted as the sinfonia with organ opening Part 2 of Cantata BWV 120a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iy9KM6Wzv80). In late 1731, Cantata 70, "Wachet! betet! betet! wachet!"
(Watch! Pray! Pray! Watch!) was reperformed with an obbligato organ part (https://www.bach-digital.de/rsc/viewer/BachDigitalSource_derivate_00014597/db_bachst0095_pa073.jpg) in the hand of Johan Ludwig Krebs for the alto aria (No. 3), "Wenn kömmt der Tag, an dem wir ziehen" (When does the day come, when we depart), says Cron (Ibid.: 107).

Bach's earliest use of obbligato organ is in the 1708 bass-soprano duet (No. 2), "Ich bin nun achtzig Jahr" (I am now eighty years old, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-EzWqW7IJQ: 2:32), in the Town Council Cantata 71, "Gott ist mein König" (God is my king from ages past). Bach opens Pentecost Cantata 172, "Erschallet, ihr Lieder, erklinget, ihr Saiten!" (Ring out, you songs, resound, you strings!) in the 1731 version (https://www.baerenreiter.com/en/shop/product/details/BA10172_90/), with an organ obbligato (https://www.bach-digital.de/rsc/viewer/BachDigitalSource_derivate_00006904/db_bachst0023_pa051.jpg), copyist Johann Ludwig Krebs, similar to Cantata 70 1731 version. http://www.blockmrecords.org/bach/detail.php?ID=BWV0021-1a.

"The obbligato parts were performed on the large organs on the three main churches in Leipzig, says Stauffer (Ibid.: xi). Movement features "foreshadow the style of the Six Sonatas:" dance-like chamber meters of 3/8, 6/8 12/8 and 2/4, which are in sharp contrast to the heavy church meters of the Weimar organ works, primarily 2/2, 4/4, and 3/2. A second feature is the "finely nuanced articulation," of the organ part in several arias." For example, the alto trio aria (no. 7), "Halleluja, Stärk und Macht" (Alleluia, power and might, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-rlLWZGGTk: 20:24), in the 1731 Town Council Cantata 29 uses string articulation derived from instrumental music, also found in the Vivace opening movement of Organ Sonata 6, BWV 530 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsU107EUgYU). A third feature is the galant style in several arias, especially with trio texture, notably the opening bass aria (No. 2), "Ich geh und suche mit Verlangen" (I go and seek with longing, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJHtKOYNVkc: 56:35), in 1726 Cantata 49 for the 20th Sunday after Trinity. This progressive aria pointing to early Classical style of the 1740s "foreshadows the closing movements," says Stauffer (Leupold), of Organ Sonatas 3 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAP5fL84sKw) and 4 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnOuekWjYMY), "which display a similarly fashionable idiom."⁷

Six Organ Sonatas: Genesis, Posthumous Fate

"The Six Trio Sonatas represent the culmination of Bach's interest in using the organ as a chamber instrument," says Stauffer (Ibid.: X). Bach's involvement in chamber music in Cöthen was a transition from the Weimar organ chorale trio emphasis on vocal elaboration to re-imagining organ music through instrumental elaboration in Leipzig. Stauffer traces a series of organ works in Leipzig from Miscellaneous trios as a workshop activity in 1725, to the deployment of previously existing instrumental music in organ obbligato sinfonias and arias in cantatas beginning in 1726, to the Six Organ Trios completed c.1730.

The Six Organ Sonatas were part of "a series of pedagogical keyboard collections Bach began assembling in the 1720s," observes Stauffer (Ib id.: xii): Book 1 of the Well-Tempered Clavier, BWV 846-869 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Well-Tempered_Clavier, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlXDJhLeShg), of 24 preludes and fugues in all keys in 1722; the Inventions and Sinfonias, BWV 772-801 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inventions_and_Sinfonias_(Bach), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFeLqgVLxBM, contrapuntal two-part Inventions and three-part Sinfonias in 1723; and the six English Suites, BWV 806-811 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Suites_(Bach), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBULK00aK9Q), and the six French Suites, BWV 812-817 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Suites_(Bach), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6BvUbVFMxU), both assembled in 1725. The equivalent of the Invention and Sinfonias, the forward-looking Six Organ Trios (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsz3TRb0rdQ) "took full advantage of the chamber-music qualities of the progressive Central German organ," teaching "accuracy of performance, nuance of touch" and "coordination of hands and feet."

The collection of Six Organ Sonatas took several years to complete as Bach experimented with various trio settings and produced early variant versions of several movements that survive, says Stauffer (Ibid.: xiii). One movement, the Andante, BWV 528/2a-b, "appears to have been composed as an independent piece" and then inserted into Sonata No. 4, while the other three variant movements — Sonata No. 1/1, Sonata No. 3/1, and Sonata No. 5/2 — were composed for the collection. The three-movement sonatas also include transcriptions from earlier works. The transmission and reception of these works in the last half of the 18th century is impressive, with wide dissemination, including the autograph SPK 271 (to Emmanuel, and the Fridemann/Anna Magdalena copy, SPK 272 (see Organ Sonatas Provenance, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Ref/BWV525-530-Ref.htm), both sons being champions of the music as well as Bach's last student, Johann Christian Kittel (1732-1809, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Christian_Kittel), says Stauffer (Ibid.: xvii). Manuscript copies were broadly disseminated at this time: the Leipzig Breitkopf publisher, Friedemann in Halle, Emmanual in Berlin with Johann Friedrich Agricola and Johann Philipp Kirnberger, Vienna with Gottfried van Swieten and Franz Hauser, and London, probably through Charles Burney. This was the most extensive transmission of organ works across the continent while most of Bach's other organ works were circulated and transcribed by students and followers living in Thuringia during the second half of the 18th century.

FOOTNOTES

¹ Among the earliest teaching materials in Bach's autograph is the incomplete Weimar Orgelbüchlein (https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalWork_work_00011155&prev=search), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orgelbüchlein), which are found in Stauffer's Leupold Edition, Vol.1, along with the Eight Short Preludes and Fugues, BWV 553-60, and the Pedal Exercitium, BWV 598, in the Pedagogical Works, Vol. 1 (http://www.wayneleupold.com/the-complete-organ-works-volume-1a-standard.html).

² George Stauffer (editor, commentary), The Complete Organ Works, Volume 7, Six Trio Sonatas and Miscellaneous Trios – Johann Sebastian Bach, (Greensboro NC: Wayne Leopold Editions, 2014: x (http://www.wayneleupold.com/the-complete-organ-works-volume-7-six-trio-sonatas-and-miscellaneous-trios.html); supplemental materials, variants (http://www.wayneleupold.com/files/bach7.pdf); also see BCML current discussion, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/NVD/Organ-Music-Trans1.htm.
³ Christoph Wolff, Bach: The Learned Musician, updated edition (New York: W. W. Norton, 2013: 200).
⁴ For vocal music transcriptions, see Peter Baekgaard's extensive BCW list of "Arrangements/Transcriptions," http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Arran/OT-Baekgaard.htm.
⁵ A recording of 19 instrumental arrangements of Bach trios settings for organ, keyboard and gamba are found at "Bach Trios," with Yo-Yo Ma, cello; Chris Thile, mandolin; and Edgar Meyer, string bass (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJNbijG2M7OwQaZ2Bv0a9bi0Uvu3-Cz4I) with a narrative of their collaboration (https://www.nonesuch.com/journal/story-behind-yo-yo-ma-chris-thile-edgar-meyers-bach-trios-2017-04-11).
⁶ Matthew Cron, "Music from Heaven: An Eighteenth-Century Context for Cantatas with Obbligato Organ," in Bach and the Organ, ed, Matthew Dirst, Bach Perspectives 12 (Urbana, University of Illinois Press, 2016: 115), in conjunction with American Bach Society.
⁶ George Stauffer, "Organ Concertos and Sinfonias by J.S. Bach," program notes, https://www.gothic-catalog.com/Bach_Sinfonia_Organ_Concertos_Lippincott_p/g-49130.htm).
⁷ See Lippincott BCW discography (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/NVP/Lippincott-J.htm) and list of Bach orchestral sinfonias (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinfonia), as well as two other recordings: E.Power Biggs, "Bach: Sinfonias & Orchestral Movements From Cantatas" (https://www.amazon.com/Bach-Sinfonias-Orchestral-Movements-Essential/dp/B0000029UU), and Helmut Rilling, "Johann S. Bach: Complete Sinfonias" https://www.amazon.com/Johann-Bach-Sinfonias-Bach-Collegium-Stuttgart/dp/B000ICMEN6, mostly Rilling, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iw3eH7YKbjU). Two independent sinfonias are catalogued in the BWV: the Sinfonia in F Major, BWV 1046a may have opened the 1713 Hunting Cantata 208 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrz8LRaL2Qk), and the Sinfonia in D, BWV 1045, see http://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV1045-D2.htm), is a mid-1740s transcription of a movement from an earlier violin concerto (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV1045-D2.htm).

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To Come: Transcriptions, Part 2, organ music transmission and reception of Bach's circle and students in Thuringia (1750-1800), including free and chorale-based materials, as well as the use of the "BACH" four-note musical motif (B-flat, A, C, B-natural) by Sebastian and other members of the Bach Family, the beginning of a tradition continuing to today (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BACH_motif).