Thus, having been in a position to inform myself on all matters relating to Bach's life, genius, and work, I may fairly hold myself competent to communicate to the public what I have learnt and to offer useful reflections upon it. I take advantage [pg xxxii] of my opportunity the more readily because it permits me to draw attention to an enterprise[18] that promises to provide a worthy monument to German art, a gallery of most instructive models to the sincere artist, and to afford music lovers an inexhaustible source of sublimest pleasure.
[pg 1]
CHAPTER I. THE FAMILY OF BACH
If there is such a thing as inherited aptitude for art it certainly showed itself in the family of Bach. For six successive generations scarcely two or three of its members are found whom nature had not endowed with remarkable musical talent, and who did not make music their profession.[19]
Veit Bach,[20] ancestor of this famous family, [pg 2] gained a livelihood as a baker at Pressburg in Hungary. When the religious troubles of the sixteenth century broke out he was driven to seek another place of abode, and having got together as much of his small property as he could, retired with it to Thuringia, hoping to find peace and security there. He settled at Wechmar, a village near Gotha,[21] where he continued to ply his trade as a baker and miller.[22] In his leisure hours he was wont to amuse himself with the lute,[23] playing it amid the noise and clatter of the mill. His taste for music descended to his two sons[24] and their children, and in time the Bachs grew to be a very numerous family of professional musicians, [pg 3] Cantors, Organists, and Town Musicians,[25] throughout Thuringia.
Not all the Bachs, however, were great musicians. But every generation boasted some of them who were more than usually distinguished. In the first quarter of the seventeenth century three of Veit Bach's grandchildren showed such exceptional talent that the Count of Schwarzburg-Arnstadt thought it worth while to send them at his expense to Italy, then the chief school of music, to perfect themselves in the art.[26]
We do not know whether they rewarded the expectations of their patron, for none of their works has survived. The fourth generation[27] of the family produced musicians of exceptional distinction, [pg 4] and several of their compositions, thanks to Johann Sebastian Bach's regard for them, have come down to us. The most notable of these Bachs are: