Johann Ambrosius Bach
(Born - March 21, 1685 - Died, July 28, 1750)
Bach was born at Eisenach, Germany, the 11th son and youngest child of Johann Ambrosius Bach (1645--95) and Elisabeth Lémmerhirt, the least distinguished members of a remarkable musical family. In 1695, Johann Sebastian was orphaned; he went to live with his older brother, Johann Christoph, in Ohrdruf. As it was difficult to get music in those days, young Bach used to copy his brother's music by moonlight. At the age of eighteen, he often walked for miles, sometimes without food, en route to Hamburg where he could listen to concerts.
The story is told that his great-great grandfather, a very jovial miller, use to sit in the door of his mill and sang and played his zither while the mill-wheel went round and round grinding the grain.
He is considered to be one of the great geniuses of the Baroque period. He is also known as the Father of Music. In his compositions, Bach brought two of his techniques to the
forefront: counterpoint and fugue. Counterpoint is the playing of two or melodie at one time. Fugue is a composition in which different instruments repeat the same melody with slight variations.
A master of several instruments while still in his teens, Johann Sebastian first found employment at the age of 18 as a violinist in a court orchestra in Weimar; soon after, he took the job of organist at a church in Arnstadt.
In 1707, at the age of 22, he married his cousin Maria Barbara Bach. While at Cothen, Bach's wife, Maria Barbara, died. Bach remarried soon after - to Anna Magdalena - and forged
ahead with his work. He also forged ahead in the child-rearing department, producing 13 children with his new wife - six of whom survived childhood - to add to the four children he had raised with Maria Barbara.
After conducting and composing for the court orchestra at Cothen for seven years, Bach was offered the highly prestigious post of cantor (music director) of St. Thomas' Church in Leipzig - after it had been turned down by two other composers. The job was a demanding one; he had to compose cantatas for the St. Thomas and St. Nicholas churches, conduct the choirs, oversee the musical activities of numerous municipal churches, and teach Latin in the St. Thomas choir school. Accordingly, he had to get along with
the Leipzig church authorities, which proved rocky going. But he persisted, polishing the musical component of church services in Leipzig and continuing to write music of various kinds with a level of craft and emotional profundity that was his alone.
Bach remained at his post in Leipzig until his death in 1750. Toward the end of his life, Bach was a great favorite among the princes and kings. Nothing gave him as much pleasure as having his many children and relations assemble in the Bach home and play music. He was creatively active until the very end, even after cataract problems virtually blinded him. His last musical composition, a chorale prelude entitled "Before Thy Throne, My God, I Stand", was dictated to his son-in-law only days before his death.
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