Among the pieces of “equipment for living” bequeathed me by my parents, few can have done me more good or been in more steady use than the music of old J. S. Bach. Migraines (back when I had them), insomnia, attacks of unreasonable crankiness, low air pressure, taedium vitae, even the reading of bad manuscripts– all are beaten back, or folded into an envelope of otherness, by a few bars of the music Colette libeled as a “golden sewing machine.”
In the Bach household nothing happened by chance.
Scarlatti’s cat, o.k.,– but count me the milk twenty children could spill!
Every drop worked its way into a counter-subject.
Instruments requiring repair and daily tuning received the impact of rocking-horses,
Of which the largest was called der Russolo.
Catharina Dorothea tore up the Buxtehude rather than let Carl Philipp Emmanuel play it.
And moving day
Gave a new meaning to “walking bass.”
Each child, each parent, had an imaginary friend; Sebastian had three.
“The Forty-Eight” were inseparable.
The eye surgeon came with credentials from London
And blundered through the theme in the minor key
After which Anna Magdalena noticed an anomalous hitch in the rhythm.
In the Bach household nothing happened by chance.
Sheep might safely graze, ranging to pastures ever more distant,
But All Came Home
I’ve just read that there’s new evidence that Leipzig employed a locum tenens during Bach’s last three years as Cantor. Utter speculation as to why, with the ophthalmic argument gaining the most credibility, but still weak. Personally, I think that like every other public employee, Bach simply took all his accumulated sick days at once prior to retirement, so he could work on things he really cared about, like Die Kunst der Fuge.