[78] P. viii, 1-4. Vivaldi was born toward the end of the seventeenth century; in 1713 he was appointed maestro di cappella at l'Ospitale della Pietà, at Venice; later he was for some time in the service of the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt. He died in 1743.
[79] The title of this last transcription gives us a clue to its date; it reads as follows: "Concerto dell'illustrissimo Principe Giovanni Ernesto Duca di Sassonia appropriato all'Organo a 2 clav. e pedale da Giovanni Sebastiano Bach." So it must have been written before 1715, the date of the Duke's death. Bach was not the only one to make these transcriptions; Mattheson tells us (Das beschützte Orchester): "Compositions of this order (concerti grossi, sinfonie in specie, overtures) may also be played upon a polyphonic instrument, for instance upon the organ or harpsichord; a few years ago the celebrated S. de Graue, the blind organist of the new Dunes Church in Amsterdam, played from memory and with remarkable clearness in my presence, upon the excellent organ in his church, the latest Italian sonatas and concertos in three and four parts."
[80] P. iii, 8. B.-G. xv, p. 253.
[81] This work, perhaps, dates from the journey which Bach made to Cassel in 1714 to examine a recently restored organ. At least the pedal passage in the prelude reminds us of that pedal solo executed during this tour before the Hereditary Prince of Hesse with such virtuosity that the latter drew from his finger a valuable ring and presented it to Bach. "One might have believed," says Adlung (Anleitung an der Musikgelahrtheit), "that his feet were winged, with such agility did they move over the keys which caused the powerful basses to resound. If the dexterity of his feet drew from the Prince so rich a present, what should he have given him in recognition of the genius of his hands?"
[82] It will be interesting to compare one of these themes with the following from the counterpoint of a fugue in A major by Albinoni:
especially if we remember this first transformation which it underwent at the hands of Bach in a fugue for harpsichord:
