Visit to Sans-Souci

In May 1747 Johann Sebastian Bach was 62 years old. In three years he would be dead, closing one of the most significant—arguably the most significant—chapter in music history. The breadth and technical mastery of Bach’s output is unparalleled, though he never achieved the international fame during his lifetime that posterity would gradually accord to him. For instance, the complete catalog of his works produced posthumously under his son’s guidance, the far-reaching Baroque revival inspired by Felix Mendelssohn in the mid 19th century, the virtuoso transcriptions of Bach’s works for all kinds of instruments and ensembles, the global name recognition—all this could not have been foreseen when the aged Kapellmeister rumbled down the royal road outside Potsdam, heading for an historic meeting with Frederick the Great at his summer palace, Sans-Souci.

King Frederick was fond of music and, as we will see, had musical aspirations and talents of his own. Those interests didn’t always sit well with his militaristic father. Young Frederick’s life included many confrontations between father and son, and it was only after several drastic, debilitating actions by his father that Frederick acquiesced to parental control over his future. [At one point Frederick rebelled and planned to flee to England with his most intimate friend. But their plan was leaked to the king who had both young men arrested and imprisoned. To teach his son a lesson, the elder Frederick forced him to watch as his companion was beheaded.] He was sent to military school for formal training, but he never left music behind. Evening concerts, with Frederick himself playing flute, were a regular feature of life at court. And upon ascending to the throne in 1740 and establishing his alternate residence at Sans-souci, he retained most of his musicians, including his long-time flute teacher Johann Joachim Quantz and the young Carl Philip Emanuel Bach, Sebastian Bach’s second son.
We will discuss Emanuel Bach in more detail later, but it was his presence at Sans-souci that helped elicit Sebastian Bach’s invitation to court. Frederick was certainly not enamored of the old master’s brand of intellectually difficult music, but young Emanuel Bach had just become a father and the sympathetic monarch likely thought the timing fortuitous to bring father and son together. Frederick had also recently received a shipment of the new fortepianos, direct ancestors of our modern piano, and he wanted Sebastian Bach’s assessment of these novelties. Thus almost immediately upon his arrival Old Bach was summoned to the King’s music rooms to test the new fortepianos. By all accounts he dazzled the attendees, including the King, with his improvisations at each keyboard. But Frederick had another surprise in store.

Bach’s reputation for improvisation clearly preceded him and Frederick was armed and ready with a fugue subject that would stump the master. Bach, of course, was not to be stumped and exceeded all expectations when he improvised fugues on the royal theme and subsequently completed and published a whole series of movements based on that one melody. Before we look at the theme, let us survey the Musical Offering as a whole.

(c) Jason Stell