Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (1710–1784) was the eldest son of Johann Sebastian Bach and was a composer and performing musician. He was acknowledged in his day as an excellent organist, improviser and composer. Includes Sonatas: * No. 1 in G Major * No. 2 in A Major * No. 3 in B-flat Major * No. 4 in D Major * No. 5 in D Major * No. 6 in E-flat Major * No. 7 in C Major * No. 8 in C Major * No. 9 in F Major
Mozart's orchestral-inspired Sonata in D Major, K. 311 contains elaborate pianistic treatment and an exciting sonata-rondo finale with a cadenza worthy of one of Mozart's concertos. The flashy third movement is full of many contrasts involving dynamics, mood and texture. Throughout the sonata, the left hand becomes a true partner in all aspects of the composition, and thematic material is spread over different registers of the keyboard.
Bach has remained a figure of continuous fascination and interest to scholars and readers since the original Master Musicians Bach volume's publication in 1983 - even since its revision in 2000, understanding of Bach and his music's historical and cultural context has shifted substantially. Reflecting new biographical information that has only emerged in recent decades, author David Schulenberg contributes to an ongoing scholarly conversation about Bach with clarity and concision. Bach traces the man's emergence as a startlingly original organist and composer, describing his creative evolution, professional career, and family life from contemporary societal and cultural perspectives in early modern Europe. His experiences as student, music director, and teacher are examined alongside the music he produced in each of these roles, including early compositions for keyboard instruments, the great organ and harpsichord works of later years, vocal music, and other famous instrumental works, including the Brandenburg Concertos. Schulenberg also illuminates how Bach incorporated his contemporary environment into his work: he responded to music by other composers, to his audiences and employment conditions, and to developments in poetry, theology, and even the sciences. The author focuses on Bach's evolution as a composer by ultimately recognizing "Bach's world" in the specific cities, courts, and environments within and for which he composed. Dispensing with biographical minutiae and more closely examining the interplay between his life and his music, Bach presents a unique, grounded, and refreshing new framing of a brilliant composer.
The tercentenary of Henry Purcell's death fell in 1995, and this 1995 volume of specially commissioned essays was collected to celebrate Purcell's music in his tercentenary year. The essays are representative of the best research and deal mainly with the autograph manuscripts, Purcell's compositional technique, the relationship between Purcell and his teacher John Blow, a reassessment of Purcell court odes, performance practice and wordsetting, and eighteenth-century reception history, particularly regarding King Arthur. The volume is well illustrated with music examples and photographs of important manuscripts. It also analyses Purcell's compositional techniques through detailed study of his manuscripts and reports on the discovery of two important autograph manuscripts. The book opens with an assessment of Purcell's illusive personality.
This definitive volume, the second, largest, and most central in Newman's History of the Sonata Idea, covers the period from the first sample Italian sonatas using the new techniques of the Alberti bass about 1735 to the succession of masterpieces by Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven which extended until about 1820. It is one of the few books to deal exclusively with the classical era in music. Originally published in 1963. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.
Based on primary sources, many of which have never been published or examined in detail, this book examines the music of the late seventeenth-century composers, Biber, Schmeltzer and Muffat, and the compositions preserved in the extensive Moravian archives in Kromeriz. These works have never before been fully examined in the cultural and conceptual contexts of their time. Charles E. Brewer sets these composers and their music within a framework that first examines the basic Baroque concepts of instrumental style, and then provides a context for the specific works. The dances of Schmeltzer, for example, functioned both as incidental music in Viennese operas and as music for elaborate court pantomimes and balls. These same cultural practices also account for some of Biber's most programmatic music, which accompanied similar entertainments in Kromeriz and Salzburg. The many sonatas by these composers have also been misunderstood by not being placed in a context where it was normal to be entertained in church and edified in court. Many of the works discussed here remain unpublished but have, in recent years, been recorded. This book enhances our understanding and appreciation of these recordings by providing an analysis of the context in which the works were first performed.
