Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach is regarded as the most distinguished musician of the most distinguished family in the history of music. After musical training at Ohrdurf and LŸne-burg, he served briefly at Arnstadt and MŸhlhausen. His three main posts for which he composed music were as organist-cappellmeister at Weimar (1708-17), director of the court orchestra at Cšthen (1717-23), and cantor, organist, and teacher at Leipzig (1723-50). Bach was little known during his day outside of Germany, and there primarily as a fine organist and teacher. His music came to be recognized for its greatness in the past century, due to the efforts of distinguished musicians, such as Felix Mendelssohn in Germany and England and Samuel S. Wesley in England.

Bach was primarily a church musician and composer. His faith commitment is reflected in the words which he wrote at the close of nearly all of his works: Soli Deo Gloria ("To God alone be praise"). In his choral works, especially his cantatas (over 200 survive), Bach harmonized with unsurpassed genius the older chorale melodies to be sung by choirs. His chorale harmonizations, known as the ÒBach chorales,Ó are used as models for harmony classes today. Although he composed few if any chorale melodies, he edited the tunes for SchmelliÕs 'Musicalisches Gesangbuch' (1736), to which he contributed 16 original tunes. A collected edition of BachÕs chorale harmonizations was brought out by his son Carl Philipp Emanuel (1765-69) titled '371 Vierstimmige Choral Gesþnge.' These congregational song melodies were a significant influence on BachÕs surviving organ works, 173 of them which are based on chorales.

Bach is important in the history of hymnody because his harmonizations of Chorale tunes are some of the most well-known hymn settings in all of Western Christendom, particularly those for the PASSION CHORALE ("O sacred head, now wounded"), which he used in both his Christmas Oratorio and St. Matthew Passion. Other Bach chorale harmonizations in current American hymnals include:

The style of harmonization used by Bach is called ISORHYTHMIC, or same-rhythm and is characterized by mostly quarter notes with some long notes, particularly at cadences. This is in contrast to the RHYTHMIC style which characterized the early Reformation and which consisted of more irregularly rhythms and syncopations.

Listen to Luther's, Ein feste burg in both musical styles:

Read some articles about Bach, Luther, and the chorale