The Brandenburgs
2010's Sunday night concert included numbers 4 and 5 of Bach’s six Brandenburg concertos, written while Bach was employed as Kappelmeister to Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen, between 1717 and 1723.
In 1719 Bach visited Berlin on behalf of his employer to buy a harpsichord. Whilst there he met Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg Schwedt, from whom he hoped to gain some patronage. The six concertos were in fact written at varying dates, but Bach presented him with the set on 24th March 1721. As it happened, Christian Ludwig’s nephew, Frederick William I of Prussia, was more interested in military matters than in music, and had dismissed his father’s musicians in 1717, so Christian Ludwig did not have the resources to have the concertos played, and they were not perfomed in Berlin in Bach’s lifetime. The upside of this, however, was that many of these musicians were subsequently employed by Prince Leopold at Anhalt-Köthen, giving Bach some excellent musicians to perform his work there, and to inspire the composition of his finest orchestral and chamber music.
Bach was very happy at Anhalt-Köthen, and wrote to an old school friend “There I had a gracious Prince as master, who knew music as well as he loved it, and I hoped to remain in his service until the end of my life”. However, the Prince married and the new princess was not in favour of her husband’s musical interests. Under constant pressure from the princess to “make the musical inclination of the prince somewhat luke-warm”, Bach moved on to become Cantor of St Thomas’s Church in Leipzig, where he stayed for the rest of his life.
With regard to the Brandenburg Concertos, Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg-Schwedt neither thanked Bach, nor paid him!
Monday night's concert, in addition to a masterpiece by the little known Ferrandini, who’s 300th anniversary we celebrate, and a Suite for 2 horns and orchestra by Telemann, sees Brandenburg concertos numbers 1 and 3.
Rachel Podger writes: Number 3 is in fact all about the number 3; the instrumentation comprises 3 violins, 3 violas, 3 cellos and basso continuo, meaning violone (an early type of double bass) and harpsichord. The musical figures all revolve around the number 3; there are groups of 3 note patterns and sequences bubbling up from all over the score. It has tremendous spirit throughout and leaves you feeling exhilarated.
Number 1 is scored for a completely different set of instruments: we have 2 horns, 3 oboes and piccolo violin, which all add to an interesting mix of sonorities. Character-wise we are dealing with a Suite of dances, a format which allows Bach to highlight the different colours of the various instruments and dance forms.
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