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In
addition to the Clavier-Büchlein for his wife
Anna Magdalena, Johann Sebastian Bach also prepared a musical notebook
for his son Wilhelm Friedemann. It was compiled in Cöthen,
in the halcyon days of his employment with Prince Leopold, where
he wrote most of his major compositions. As the kapellmeister,
Bach was right at the top of the musical hierarchy: composing, conducting,
teaching and fairly well-paid for it, and from his point of view,
it was surely not a difficult job.
The
Wilhelm Friedemann Büchlein was compiled over a three-year
period, with an almost haphazard approach. A telling point is that
the works assembled presupposes a certain level of performing proficiency
for its intended ten-year-old recipient, even if they do appear
to have been collected in a fairly haphazard manner.
Much
like the Clavier-Büchlein for Anna Magdalena, this scrapbook
of personal pieces gives us a cross-section view into the lifestyle
of the Bach family in the early 18th century. Unlike the
AMB Clavier-Büchlein, the Notebook for Wilhelm Friedemann
was not used for domestic entertainment, but for a relatively advanced
instruction in the rudiments of keyboard technique, including ornamental
practice. An examination of the contents of the Clavier-Büchlein
show:
- tables
of clefs, notes and eludication of ornaments.
-
a set of simple practice pieces for keyboard fingering and technique,
including several preludes and chorales (1-13).
-
a set of eleven preludes, later included in the Well-Tempered
Clavier Book I (14-24).
-
fifteen two-part praeambula, later revised and published as Two-Part
Inventions (32-46).
-
a suite by Telemann and a partia by Stözel (47, 48).
-
fifteen three-part fantasias, later revised and published as Three-Part
Sinfonias (49-63).
Joseph
Payne here has adopted artistic fiat to perform the Clavier-Büchlein
on a selection of three keyboard instruments, choosing to ignore
the polemic over whether the piano or the harpsichord (to say nothing
of the clavier) is the preferrable instrument. He varies his decision
according to the dictates of the music and personal taste.
 It
is worthwhile to mention here that Bach did not compose for
an instrument as much as he assigned his work to an instrument.
Indeed, Art of the Fugue and The Musical Offering
were composed with no explicit indication of the instrument parts
for which they were intended. (The Musical Offering calls
for flute, two violins and keyboard, but it is not clear which part
each instrument is to play.)
One
could even say that the medium of performance was a minor detail
to Bach. His concern was with other things, such as aspects of expressing
his spirituality in music: at the start of the WF Clavier-Büchlein
there is an inscription INJ, In Nomine Jesu.
The
religious considerations behind Bach's music is not always evident,
but that in no way detracts from their attractiveness. An added
advantage of exploring this music is, of course, the insight it
gives us into the compositional methods of the grand master himself.
Of especial interest will be the two early sets of keyboard execises:
The Well-Tempered Clavier and Inventions and Sinfonias.
The
former, here called by their Latinate forms Praeludium (Nos.14-24),
are given a fairly nondescript interpretation. Most of the works
are fairly short - less than two minutes - and there is little which
Payne draws from this music, even though he does play an even earlier
unnumbered Praeambulum (No.8) rather spiritedly.
The
use of different instruments from item to item does relieve the
monotony, but the dynamic level of the clavierchord is very soft
and takes some getting used to - not helped, one could add, by quite
a bit of breathing and sotto voce vocalization from the soloist.
All
the Praeambula (Nos.32-46) - three years later to become
the Inventions in a revised publication - are played on the
clavierchord, to mixed results. A tendency of Payne's is to think
in terms of large phrases rather than short ones - it gives rise
to some nice playing and legato, such as the pointed syncopation
in Praeambulum 12 and a clear distinction between the two
voices in Praeambulum 2.
But
there are some aspects of playing which didn't come off as well
as they ought to: the staccatos on the disjunct quavers of Praeambulum
7 weren't sharp enough to balance the slurs, and the ritard
at the end of Praeambulum 11 is a bad idea, breaking up an
otherwise taut rhythm and pattern.
That
said, Payne generally avoids flashy displays of ornaments and stylism
- the demisemiquaver rubato in Praeambulum 8 is barely perceptible
- although he does play the shake in Praeambulum 15 which,
on a single-manual keyboard, would be impossible to do so. For unavoidable
reasons, the Praeambula are broken up over the two discs,
seven at the end of disc one and eight at the start of disc two.
The
Fantasias (aka Sinfonias, Nos.32-46) are played on
the harpsichord, admittedly an improvement over the softer clavichord.
There are good things on offer: Fantasia 5 has nice falling
quavers, 9 is taken with melisimic cantabile that
sustains the tied notes in full. In Fantasia 10, he does
not overstress the staccatos, which gives this familiar territory
an interesting twist.
As
the bridge between the Praeambula and Fantasias in
the Little Musicbook, Bach inserted a transcription of a Telemann
suite and a Stölzel Partia. These have not been separately
tracked into their constituent movements, but they are short enough
(averaging ten minutes) each to be taken in one auditory bite.
The
three dance movements of the Telemann suite get better as the music
progresses. The Allemande is nothing to write about, but the Courante
is inspiring and the Gigue is bursting with delight. The other items
of miscellany (Nos.1-13) are wholly unmannered, with occasional
moments of sparkle; the sonorous timbre of the organ, used rather
sparingly, is also enjoyable.
The
recording is well-balanced and the sound from the various instruments
is nicely and cleanly captured - even with the allowance made for
the softer (and more "realistic", as an explatory note in the sleeve
booklet adds) volume of the clavichord.
But
overall, the playing is quite unsympathetic, albeit with much technical
fluency. There are moments of perspicacity, but these accounts are
mostly routine and are best recommended only to those interested
in the didactic music of Bach, for which this will be a godsend.
But readers looking just for The Well-Tempered Clavier and
the Inventions and Sinfonias have no shortage of alternatives
to look for elsewhere.
BENJAMIN
CHEE is currently re-reading Rubáiyát of Omar
Khayyám for the umpteenth time. (Good poetry is just
so hard to find these days.)
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11.11.2000 © Benjamin Chee
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