San Antonio College Library

A biographical sketch combined with a detailed analysis of each of his major types of composition, including vocal music, organ music, keyboard music, and instrumental music. Many Bach compositions are examined and evaluated in relation to the rest of the composer's work, as well as in relation to the music of his contemporaries. More than seventy musical examples enable the reader to understand how Bach worked and to observe his music in various...

In eighteenth-century Germany the universal harmony of God's creation and the perfection of its proportions still held philosophical, moral and devotional significance. Reproducing proportions close to the unity (1:1) across compositions could render them beautiful, perfect and even eternal. Using the principles of her groundbreaking theory of proportional parallelism and the latest source study research, Ruth Tatlow reveals how Bach used the number...

J. S. Bach's 371 four-part chorales have long been considered a cornerstone for the study of harmony. Now the author, in this monumental study, which utilizes more than twelve hundred quotations from the chorales, breaks new ground by showing that Bach produced his varied harmonies not by random chance but according to a definite system. This totally unique approach to Bach will have far-reaching implications for the modern musician. Not only does...

A light-hearted look at the life of, life with, and life after Johann Sebastian Bach. A lively celebration of the great composer's 300th birthday in 1985. Includes information, anecdotes and quotations of and about Bach - pro and con, point and counterpoint.

After the brief introductory chapter on Bach's life and career, the book is divided into sections on the twin mainstreams of his work: instrumental music and vocal music. Chapter by chapter, the author surveys the organ music, the clavier and cembalo music, the chamber music, and "The Musical Offering" and "The Art of the Fugue." In the vocal music section, he covers both church and secular cantatas, church oratorios, the passion music, the funeral...