Aux racines musicales de J.S. Bach

All great composers have their roots in a specific humus, enriched by the experience of their predecessors. Bach is certainly one of them, who sharpens his writing in the light of the works of his family musicians but also of a revered great master: Dietrich Buxtehude....

While Dietrich Buxtehude is best known for his organ pieces and cantatas, as well as for the long journey the young J. S. Bach took to meet him, his chamber music remains almost unknown: in the mid-1690s, at the height of his fame, he published two collections one after the other, each containing seven sonatas for violin, viola da gamba and continuo. These are the works from the first collection (1694) - designated as opus 1 - that Friederike Heumann, Pablo Valetti (Café Zimmermann), and Dirk Börner will populate us here

With its unique blend of well-established forms such as the ostinato, its dazzling mastery of composition techniques and its assertive taste for experimentation, Buxtehude's Opus 1 stands out as a collection of the utmost importance in the musical landscape of the last quarter of the 17th century and one can easily understand the admiration that its author felt for not only his contemporaries, but also for the younger generation, Johann Sebastian Bach in the lead.

Works by Dietrich Buxtehude, Johann Philipp Krieger, Dirk Börner, Johann Sebastian Bach