Godfather and godchild during the transition between between two eras.
In the eighteenth century, Baroque music gave way to the classical style. If you only look at the big names, you sometimes get the impression that the transition happened suddenly, out of the blue. Bach died in 1750, the same year Haydn began to compose. There is a huge gap between Bach’s last pieces and Haydn’s first. How is that even possible?
The secret is that the transition already started during Bach’s life, but mainly with other composers. For example, we should look at Bach’s contemporary Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767). He is often depicted as a prolific writer, a composer of superficial, popular music. In reality, he was a close friend of Bach – such a close friend that Telemann became the godfather of Bach’s second son Carl Philipp (!) Emanuel (1714-1788). And where Telemann was a baroque composer who was already looking ahead to the classical style, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was a classical pioneer who still often looked back to the Baroque period.
In this episode of Concertzender Live Archive we will hear two concerts, one with music by Telemann, the other with music by C.Ph.E. Bach. They are both from 1988, and both took place in the English church on Amsterdam’s Bagijnhof. Probably a sign of the times: with the arrival of the Early Music movement, there was increasing attention for this type of music from between the two eras.
In the first concert we will hear vocal music. Telemann brings us the worldly cantata Die Tageszeiten. In fifty minutes, he paints the morning, afternoon, evening and night in a way that is already reminiscent of Haydn (symphonies Matin, Midi, Soir, or Die Jahreszeiten!). The idiom might be a bit different, but a few very important steps have been made.
In the second concert, we will hear Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach with the two instruments with which he is most often associated. Firstly, his favourite instrument, the clavichord, a keyboard instrument with a low volume but much greater expressive potential than the harpsichord or even the piano. Bach’s whimsical compositions come best to their full potential on this instrument. The other instrument we will hear is the traverso, the 18th-century transverse flute. This was the favourite instrument of his boss, king Frederick the Great of Prussia. A great music lover and connoisseur, who knew exactly what he expected from Bach. Even though it led to friction sometimes, the latter still could count himself lucky to have served one of the richest, most powerful and most musical rulers of Germany of the period.
Playlist
1. Georg Philipp Telemann – Die Tageszeiten
2. Georg Philipp Telemann – Psalm 117
3. Fantasy in F sharp, Wq. 67
4. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach – Sonata for flute solo, Wq. 132
5. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach – Sonate in D minor, Wq. 50.4
6. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach – Abschied vom Silbermann’schen Clavier, Wq. 66
7. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach – Sonata for flute Wq. 134
8. Johann Sebastian Bach – Siciliano from sonata for flute BWV 1031
Performed by:
Dutch Brixi Association Foundation and Amsterdam Accompaniment Orchestra conducted by Frans Bleekemolen (1, 2)
Wiebke Göetjes (soprano), Bernadette Bouthoorn (alt), Henry Muldrow (tenor), Tom Sol (bariton) (1)
Steve Barrell (clavichord) (3, 5, 6, 7, 8)
Charles Zebley (traverso) (4, 6, 7, 8)
