Anna Magdalena Wilcke (1701-1760) was a widely known treble that in 1721 wed the epic classic author, Johann Sebastian Bach ( 1685-1750).
However, Anna Magdalena dropped in songs background not as an artist — yet as Bach’s spouse. That can be ready to transform.
It was not till the 1970s that songs scientists in Europe started to concentrate a lot more on ladies from the age that made up or played songs themselves.
“Women who were associated with men, such as Anna Magdalena Bach, were the first to come into focus,” claimed Kerstin Wiese, supervisor of the Bach Museum, which belongs to the Bach Archive Leipzig.
Giving ladies a voice
Maria Hübner, a musicolgist and previous Bach Archive staff member, consisted of the life tales of 33 Bach ladies as component of an exhibit at the Bach Museum, “Voices of Women from the Bach Family.”
Wiese intends to highlight the Bach ladies as independent characters. “After all, women are still overshadowed by men in musical life today,” claimed the gallery supervisor.
The names Anna Carolina Philippina Bach, Maria Salome Bach, Cecilia Bach and Catharina Dorothea Bach are barely understood.
Yet these essential ladies in the life of the Bach music household not just sustained their composing hubbies and dads by handling the household. They additionally created ratings in stunning handwriting, took care of the songs profession and released their hubbies’ jobs posthumously.
Last yet not the very least, a few of them were expert vocalists themselves.
Cecilia Grassi, as an example, was a widely known Italian treble that executed at the Venice Opera to name a few places. As a prima donna at the epic King’s Theatre in London, she fulfilled her fiancé Johann Christian Bach, the youngest boy ofJohann Sebastian After his fatality,
the Bach widow made certain that a person of her spouse’s operas was executed as he had actually advised in ball game.
How ladies came under music oblivion
It was not till the 1970s that songs scientists in Europe started to concentrate a lot more on ladies that made up and played songs themselves.
“Women who were associated with men, such as Anna Magdalena Bach, were the first to come into focus,” claimed Kerstin Wiese, supervisor of the Bach Museum, which belongs to the Bach Archive and Research Institute in Leipzig.
Some of these ladies show up in referral functions from the 18th century.
“In Gottfried Walther’s 1732 music lexicon, you can find a whole series of female composers, musicians and also works that they composed,” clarified Kerstin Wiese
In the 19th century, nonetheless, these ladies went away from the songs literary works of the moment. The Belgian writer August Gathy also refutes Johann Sebastian Bach’s children any type of musicality in his “Musical Conversations Lexicon” of 1835, planned as an “Encyclopaedia for the Entire Science of Music for Artists.”
Only Bach’s boys are pointed out as skilled offspring.
“Gathy probably didn’t bother with the daughters at all, but simply had a preconceived bias,” claimedWiese
The problem of sourcing in Bach study
There are little resources on the life of Johann Sebastian Bach, not to mention on the ladies in his household. Every brand-new exploration or understanding right into the Baroque author is commemorated by Bach followers.
Only one individual transcribed letter by Bach has actually made it through, in which he additionally speaks about the household with whom he can do his very own shows — an attribute of the Bachs’ yearly expanded household get-togethers.
In this letter to a college buddy, Bach additionally clearly states his spouse Anna Magdalena and his oldest little girlCatharina Dorothea He creates that his spouse also sings “a clean soprano,” and points out that his “eldest daughter doesn’t hit badly either” — which was rather favorable for those times.
In an enjoyable tune that Bach created for among these household celebrations, we find out that the equine farmer jabbed and teased his sibling Maria Salome with a fork.
“We know Johann Sebastian Bach’s brothers, but hardly anyone knows Maria Salome,” claimed Kerstin Wiese from theBach Archive Leipzig “I just want it to be known that there was also a sister.”
The Koopman Collection
Anna Carolina Philippina Bach was a granddaughter ofJohann Sebastian Bach She benefited her dad, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714-1788), that was perhaps a lot more popular than his dad Johann Sebastian in the 18th century, the age of symphonic music.
Anna Carolina Philippina arranged the communication and touched with songs authors, artists and copyists. After her dad’s fatality, she proceeded his songs circulation organization.
A shape from 1776 programs her picture. It is among minority existing pictures of the ladies of the Bach household. Further photos of various other ladies artists received the exhibit originated from the visuals art collection of Ton Koopman.
The Dutch conductor and organist is President of the Bach Archive in Leipzig and an enthusiastic collection agency of songs. He has actually given 25 pictures of ladies from his substantial collection of prints for the exhibit.
“I bought everything that had to do with music and then researched it. I was amazed myself at how many interesting portraits of women there were, including those of women making music,” the 79-year-old informed DW.
Anna Magdalena Bach
The instance of Anna Magdalena Bach reveals simply exactly how essential some ladies artists remained in the 18th century. Although there is no straight proof of her popularity, entrances in the wage publications at court recommend that she was popular.
Johann Sebastian Bach and Anna Magdalena fulfilled at the court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt- Köthen, where Bach had actually been used as court songs supervisor because 1717.
Anna Magdalena was provided an irreversible setting as a vocalist there in 1721 and gained the 3rd greatest wage in the court church after Bach.
This alone demonstrates how much her voice was valued.
When Bach used up the message of Thomaskantor in Leipzig in 1723, he was not just in charge of the Thomanerchor, yet additionally for all the songs in Leipzig’s city churches.
Anna Magdalena Bach was not enabled to carry out there, nonetheless, as solo vocal singing by ladies was restricted in the city’s churches.
After Bach’s fatality, she made certain that his popular book “The Art of Fugue” was released posthumously.
Meanwhile, her name has actually made a long lasting impact over the centuries many thanks to the “Anna Magdalena Bach music booklet,” that includes structures by Bach and various other authors.
The brochure stays a job of songs literary works that practically every piano pupil recognizes today.
The exhibit at the Bach Museum Leipzig can be translucented November 10, 2024.
This write-up was initially composed in German.
