On this day in 1750, Johann Sebastian Bach passed away. Profoundly versatile in its core, the great German composer’s immense catalogue of timeless works continues to inspire and invite new interpretations.
Enjoy one of his most amazing and quite revolutionary at a time works for piano - The Well-Tempered Clavier, BWV 846–893 - masterly interpreted by Sviatoslav Richter: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7zh4yNgeRTgaacEdQlfUMS
Autograph manuscript of the 1st prelude in C major from Book I of 'The Well-Tempered Clavier'
"When Bach wrote “Das Wohltemperirte Clavier,” he meant “clavier” to signify any musical keyboard - harpsichord, clavichord, organ.
“The Well-Tempered Clavier” is a set of preludes and fugues, that is, forty-eight short pieces in all twenty-four keys, major and minor. Although these pieces are regularly performed in professional settings, Bach originally presented his collection as a pedagogical work for advanced students, “for the profit and use of musical youth desirous of learning, and especially for the pastime of those already skilled in this study,” as he wrote on the title page for Book One, which he completed in 1722.
Twenty years later, he wrote a second complete set of preludes and fugues in all keys, Book Two.
Both volumes were hand-written, hand-copied, and widely circulated during Bach’s lifetime, but they weren’t published in printed form until fifty years after his death.
As they work their way through the book, students were supposed to practice all the key signatures sequentially. Indeed, that’s how the book functions today for contemporary concert pianists and students of piano."
~ JSTOR Daily
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