CCCLI. BACH, J.S.: Sonata #6 in G Major for Organ, BWV 530

CCCLI. BACH, J.S. (1685-1750)

Sonata #6 in G Major for Organ, BWV 530 (1720s)
1. Vivace
2. Lento
3. Allegro
Reitze Smits, organ
(12:52)

Battle rap is not new.

During the Rennaisance and Baroque periods, keyboard masters often had such "battles" and the public would decide who was better.

Charles Burney

In 1788, Burney firmly asserted that Handel was "more progressive" than Bach in his writing for organ.

Bach's son -- Carl Philipp Emanuel -- wasn't going to take that kind of slander against his late dad sitting down. He wrote in a German musical journal:

"Besides other trios for organ, there is a set of 6 such pieces for two manuals and pedal, which are so elegantly composed that they still sound good today and never age, and will survive all revolutions in musical taste."

Actually, Bach had created an entirely new genre with these six sonatas; taking the traditional trio sonata (two solo instruments with continuo) and shaping into a single work for the organ.

It is said that Old Bach thought of these as etudes for his eldest son, Wilhelm Friedemann, who was considered a virtuoso on the instrument.

**

First Movement

A simple theme:

After much episodic development and decoration, look how the theme reappears here in D Minor, before even more complex reworking:

Only in the last few bars, does Bach return to the simple version of the theme which started off the movement:

Second Movement

E Minor; slow 6/8, with a yearning, slightly forlorn theme which appears again in Bar 5 in the lower manual a fourth lower.

Also notice the leading-tones in the pedal.

In the second part of this magnificent slow movement, he again moves to another minor key -- A -- with the upper manual tacet:

before returning to the E Minor tonic in the upper manual:

Third Movement

Back to G Major, and brightness.

The melody is repeated in canon on the dominant six beats apart. Then Bach is off to episodes of modulation, sweeping imitation, and glorious counterpoint ...

It is worth noting that Bach meticulously (and unusually) added specific articulation marks (staccato dots, and legato slurs) -- so as to make clear that the performer would treat the three obbligato voices as carefully differentiated in terms of expression.