Biography of Famous Composer Johann Sebastian Bach
Biography of Famous Composer Johann Sebastian Bach
Many great composers, theorists, and instrumentalists have left indelible marks and influences that people today look back on to admire and aspire to. No exception to this is Johann Sebastian Bach, whose impact on music is unforgettable to say the least. People today look back to his writings and works to both learn and admire. He truly can be considered one of the few musical geniuses.
Johann Sebastian Bach was born in 1685 in the town of Thuringia, Germany where he was raised and spent most of his life. Due to a shortage of expenses, he was confined to a very limited geographical space, as was his career. This greatly affected him, in that his music was not as widely known as other composers of the time. On traveling he never went farther north than Hamburg or farther south than Carlsbad. Many have referred to him as “one of the greatest and most productive geniuses in the history of Western music,” particularly of the Baroque Era.
Born to a family that produced at least 53 prominent musicians within seven generations, Bach received his first musical instrument from his father. Johann studied music with his father until his father’s death in 1695. At this time Bach moved to Ohrdruf to study with his brother, Johann Christoph. In the early 1700’s Bach began working as a chorister at a church in Luneburg. In 1703, he became a violinist in the chamber orchestra of Prince Johann Ernst of Weimar, however later that year he moved to Arnstadt where he became church organist. Bach took a one-month leave in 1705 to study with the renowned Danish-born German organist and composer Dietrich Buxtehude, who was then staying in Lubeck. Later, Buxtehude’s organ music would be one of Johann Sebastian Bach’s greatest influences. Bach’s stay was so rewarding that he overstayed his leave by two months and was greatly criticized for his breach of contract by the church authorities. Fortunately, Bach was too highly respected to be dismissed from his position.
In 1707, Bach married his second cousin, Maria Barbara Bach. He and his new wife then moved to Mulhausen so he could be the organist for a church there, but 1708 brought him back to Weimer. Bach returned as an...