It is tempting to search for musical correlations between the sonatas and certain cantatas, and say with conviction “this instrumental music is talking about … (the crucifixion, the annunciation or whatever)”.
Two articles published in 1949 and 1954, by British Organist and Musicologist Walter Emery completely rubbished the theory proposed by Spitta and Schweitzer (the “Ur” Bach musicologists now somewhat dated) in the late 19th/early 20th c. that all Bach’s music, (including purely instrumental) symbolizes something.
I can see that extreme symbolism is ridiculous, but I find,as a performer, that imagery is actually very helpful in bringing music to life, and there are definitely layers of meaning yet to be unearthed in these sonatas. During rehearsals, we find ourselves agreeing that this one has passion-tide sentiments, another “sounds like Christmas”, etc., even without any particular in-depth study. It seems that simply by playing and listening to a lot a Bach’s music, we get a sense for these things. That leads to the question of how Bach’s audience must have experienced his music. Every week sitting down to at least one cantata, with the words thrust into their hands as they entered the church. I’m sure after a while they hardly needed that piece of paper to understand what the music was “talking” about!
For some very interesting examples of symbolism in Bach´s music, see the lectures of Professor John Bertalot.
In the following blogs I discuss some compositional techniques that Bach uses to convey the message or the symbolism in the music. I believe that an appreciation of these topics is key to unravelling the message of the music in order to perform it meaningfully and passionately.
Further topics:
- Bach’s choice of key in the sonatas for violin and harpsichord
- Bach’s musical language
- Bach and the Lutheran ‘theology’ of music
