TOTAL 20 794.307.126 1.5.7.Relaciones con Hacienda
B) Fomentar la actividad emprendedora
“Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, replying in 1775 to a questionnaire submitted to him by Johann Nicolaus Forkel, the first Bach biographer, adds supplementary information by stating that his father became "a pure and strong fugue writer in his youth . . . through his own study and reflection alone."47 Whether this actually reflects Sebastian Bach's own view is hard to tell, but it is obvious that in regard to the development of fugal technique there were no viable models Bach could have turned to. More likely the son's interpretation rather than the father's account seems to have played a role in answering a specific question put to Emanuel Bach by Forkel about influential masters in Sebastian's early years. Here he lists "the Lüneburg organist [Georg] Böhm," but originally he had written "his teacher Böhm." The words "his teacher" are crossed out48, apparently for the simple reason that, in line with the new aesthetic concept of genius now in vogue in German philosophy, the Bach son wanted to stress the autodidactic nature of his father's upbringing. As Carl Philipp Emanuel knew well, a genius is not supposed to have teachers; a genius teaches himself.”49
In previous sections, it has been established that Bach had already crafted well- honed skills in organ playing, principally acquired through a methodical, structured, self-prescribed and self-disciplined approach. Bach’s rapid growth as a musician would not, however, have remained unnoticed in the small provincial town of Lüneburg, and it is here that his well-developed talents as an organist would have been usefully employed by the various town organists:
47
NBR (1999), pp. 398-399.
48
Ibid. p. 395; Source: Bach-Urkunden (ed. Max Schneider, Leipzig, 1917).
49
95
Table 3.2: Lüneburg Town Organists during Bach’s Michaelisschule Period; 1700-c.1702.50
The most significant collegial relationship which Bach formed in Lüneburg was with the organist of the Johanniskirche, Georg Böhm (1661-1733). In 1700, at the time of Bach’s arrival in Lüneburg, Böhm was thirty-nine years of age, and he may well have been approaching the maturity of his playing abilities. The organists of the other town churches, whilst considered distinguished, were all elderly.51
50
Wolff (2000), pp. 53-60.
51
Löwe, organist of the Nicolaikirche, whilst described as, “distinguished but elderly”, died in post in 1703. The same may be observed of the Lambertikirche’s organist, Johann Georg Flor, and Friedrich Christoph Morhardt, who remained in post at the Michaeliskirche until 1707, was described as a “nonentity”. See: Wolff, Christoph, et al. ‘Bach’, Grove Music Online; Oxford Music Online: <http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com.ezproxy.waikato.ac.nz/subscriber/article/grove/music/40023p g10> [Accessed: 10 May 2009]. See also: Petzoldt (1992), p. 95.
Michaeliskirche (attached to the Michaelisschule): Peter Morhardt ( - d.1685); Tenure: 1662-1685 Friedrich Christoph Morhardt (? ); Tenure: 1685-1707 Gottfried Phillip Flor (1682-1723); Tenure: 1707-? Michaeliskirche (attached to the Michaelisschule): Peter Morhardt ( - d.1685); Tenure: 1662-1685 Friedrich Christoph Morhardt (? ); Tenure: 1685-1707 Gottfried Phillip Flor (1682-1723); Tenure: 1707-?
Nicolaikirche / Marienkirche:
Johann Jacob Löwe “von Eisenach” (1629-1703); Tenure: 1683-?
Lambertikirche:
Johann Georg Flor (1679-1728); Tenure: ?
Johanniskirche:
Christian Flor (1626-1697); Tenure: 1676-1697 Georg Böhm (1661-1733); Tenure: 1698-1733 Christian Flor (1626-1697); Tenure: 1676-1697 Georg Böhm (1661-1733); Tenure: 1698-1733
96
Although Böhm is not named in the Obituary as having a direct influence on Bach,52
as we have contrary evidence can be found in a letter to Forkel from Carl Philipp Emanuel (46), in January 1775:
“
Besides Froberger, Kerl, and Pachhelbel (sic), he heard and studied the works of Frescobaldi, the Baden Capellmeister Fischer, [Nicolaus Adam] Strunck, some old and good Frenchmen, Buxtehude, Reincken, Bruhns, and [crossed-out: his teacher Böhm] the Lüneburg organist Böhm.”53Many commentators have discussed Carl Philipp Emanuel’s (46) crossing-out of the
word “teacher” in reference to Georg Böhm, but most agree that the deletion should be seen as more than merely a slip of the pen: “[CPE (46)] can hardly have conjured
the word out of thin air, and it might perhaps hint that Böhm occupied some kind of informal supervisory role. In any case, it is clear from Bach’s early music how much he must have learnt from Böhm, as well as from other North-German composers he encountered around the same time, in particular Reinken, Buxtehude, and Bruhns.”54
On the notion of a Böhm’s informal supervisory role, research over the past two years has identified this as a highly probable, for a number of reasons. Bach and Böhm already had something in common prior to Bach’s arrival in Lüneburg. As Walther pointed out in 1732, both men were Thuringian by birth. Furthermore, Böhm is connected to Johann Christoph Graff whom, it has been suggested, he instructed in composition subsequent to Graff’s organ instruction, which is believed to have
52
Böhm is not referred to by name at all in the Obituary. His name is omitted from the list of organ composers considered to have influenced Bach in earlier years [“… Bruhns, Reinken, Buxtehude, and several good French organists as models.”]. NBR (1999), p. 300.
53
Dok III (1972), no. 803.
54
97
taken place with Pachelbel at precisely the same time as he was instructing Johann Christoph (22).55
Whilst no clear formal link between Böhm and the Michaelisschule has been identified, this does not rule out one existing. Spitta, through his investigation of the Michaelisschule archives, noted that “Böhm seems to have been on friendly relations with the choir of [the Michaelisschule], since we learn that, at the beginning of the year 1705, the prefect of that choir went to him with certain members of the [Johanniskirche] choir, and had with [Böhm] much reasoning concerning music.”56
It may well have been Bach himself who facilitated these good relations between Böhm and the musicians of the Michaelisschule, as personal contact between the two had been made as early as 1703, when Bach served as prefect of the Mettenchor at this time. Given the nature of his close family contacts and his usual curiosity, it is conceivable that Bach deliberately sought out Böhm, if not initially to form a personal bond, then on account of a desire to witness his organ playing.
Georg Böhm was an educated man, having been schooled at the Goldbach- Lateinschule (1675), the Gymnasium in Götha (1678), and the Jena Universität (1684),57 and he possessed a fairly extensive library including musical manuscripts
of which we now know Bach availed himself during this time:58
55
Schulze (1985), pp. 55-81.
56
A document of February 13, 1705, revealed through the archival search by Junghans. See: Spitta (1951), pp. 194-195.
57
Jean-Claude Zehnder, ‘Georg Böhm und Johann Sebastian Bach: Zur Chronologie der Bachshen Stilentwicklung’, Bach-Jahrbuch, Neue Bachgesellschaft. Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, Berlin (1988), pp. 79-82.
58
98
“Social and personal ties are tenuous. For example, Bach’s eldest brother and guardian in Ohrdruf from 1695 to 1700, Johann Christoph Bach, was the brother-in-law of another townsman, Johann Bernhard Vonhoff, who had attended the Gymnasium at Gotha with Böhm. However, as Walter Emery has pointed out, the fact that Bach named Böhm as the northern agent for the sale of his keyboard Partitas nos. two and three implies that they had established a friendship, more likely in Lüneburg than later.”59
In fact, a direct link between Bach and Böhm has been solidly established as occurring in the first year of his tenure in Lüneburg, through an autograph entry which Bach made on his manuscript of the Reinken partita An Wasserflüssen Babylon. Discovered at the Anna Amalia Library in Weimar in May 2005, by Dr Michael Maul and Dr Peter Wollny, the hitherto unknow Reinken manuscript was within four fascicles containing five organ compositions, notated in early keyboard-tablature scoring. They are cited there as follows:60