The Little Bach Book: An eclectic Omnibus of Notable Details about the Life and Times of the esteemed and highly respected Johann Sebastian Bach

The Little Bach Book: An eclectic Omnibus of Notable Details about the Life and Times of the esteemed and highly respected Johann Sebastian Bach

After decades of singing the music of J. S. Bach and lecturing about his life in the 18th century, renowned Bach tenor David Gordon has compiled this personal collection of historical anecdotes, scholarly explanations, vintage illustrations, time lines, bits of pathos, gritty descriptions of everyday life, and colorful glimpses of Bach and the world around him. The Little Bach Book is a series of vignettes of Johann Sebastian Bach as a life-long salaried professional musician. These Bach scenes are presented in a rich context of middle-class daily life in Saxony in the early 18th century. What did people eat, drink, and wear, how did they bathe and cook? What fuels heated and illuminated their homes? How many weekly church services were there in Leipzig in 1727, and how many taverns? The central subject of this richly illustrated book is J. S. Bach, but nearly half the pages are devoted to engaging and detailed descriptions of the everyday world that surrounded him. Both elements contain the unexpected. This book is a refreshingly down-to-earth look at Bach's life and times, not an analysis of his music. For the newcomer to Bach, for the experienced listener, and for the general history buff, this book will be entertaining, moving, and sometimes surprising. " A curious and charming book filled with delights . Surely every admirer of Johann Sebastian Bach has wondered about what kind of man could produce such profound music, and this book provides us with a glimpse of daily life in Leipzig in the 18th century. Where else can you find out how Bach did laundry, or how long a goose quill pen would have lasted him? There are marvelous surprises on every page." Andrew Megill Director of Choral Activities University of Illinois J. S. Bach came into my life in 1971. I was a fledgling opera singer thinking about Mozart and Rossini when I was hired to sing the narrator role ("Evangelist") in the two-hour St. John Passion. Bach's amazing music for tenor grabbed me with its "high lonesome" sound and dramatic potential.      Bach became my friend, and as I studied and performed dozens of his compositions over the years I enjoyed learning about the man himself: he's way more interesting than the stern-faced marble bust on the piano.      He wasn't a superstar: in the early 1700s Bach was a salaried employee with a large family living in an apartment in a major city. I was curious about daily life in those days. What did a middle-class German family eat, drink, and wear? How did they cook, or bathe, or illuminate their homes at night? How many churches were inside the city walls, and how many taverns?Answers to these questions often help make Bach more real for us. They also remind us that the "Baroque" era in Europe was the "Colonial" era on this side of the Atlantic and that Bach and we are all part of the continuum of human history.      After years of lecturing about all this, I wrote The Little Bach Book , a collection of my very favorite material. It's 150 pages of historical vignettes, scholarly details, bits of pathos, glimpses of real life, tales of beer, coffee and tobacco, and more.  The Little Bach Book  is not about Bach's music -- it is about his career and the everyday world around him. He had a hard life, like most musicians in the 18th century, and I believe by learning more about their lives we deepen our connections with their music and maybe with our own past.      The scenes from Bach's life include the time he asked to quit his job and was thrown in jail for a month; his Friday night orchestra gig in a fashionable downtown cafe restaurant; and the outdoor torchlit concert where his trumpeter died of smoke inhalation. I also honor the deaths of Bach's first wife and ten of his children, and the sad widowhood of his second wife Anna Magdalena, who outlived him by a decade.          300 years ago Bach wanted to entertain, stir the heart, and enlighten.       In his honor, I hope  The Little Bach Book  will do the same.     ~ David Gordon, 2019 A curious and charming book filled with delights. Surely every admirer of Johann Sebastian Bach has wondered about what kind of man could produce such profound music, and this book provides us with a glimpse of daily life in Leipzig in the 18th century. Where else can you find out how Bach did laundry, or how long a goose quill pen would have lasted him? There are marvelous surprises on every page." Andrew Megill Director of Choral Activities University of Illinois Described by the Washington Post as "a model of style and charm, and an irresistible performer," tenor David Gordon has forged a versatile international career as singer, teacher, lecturer, and recording artist. He has won critical acclaim as guest soloist with virtually every major North American symphony orchestra, and with other prestigious orchestras, operas, and music festivals on four continents.       Hailed by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch as "one of the great interpreters of the Bach evangeli