bach, telemann, and the process of transformative imitation in … · bach, telemann, and the...

546

Bach, Telemann, and the Process of Transformative Imitation in BWV 1056/2 (156/1)*

STEVEN ZOHN with IAN PAYNE

The middle movement of Bach's F-minor harpsichord concerto BWV 1056, easily among the composer's best known slow concerto movements, has in recent decades engendered much

scholarly discussion as to its origins. In his Tiibingen dissertation, Ul- rich Siegele partially overturned the notion that the concerto was originally conceived in G minor for violin and strings, demonstrating that

only the outer movements can have derived from this lost work.' Joshua Rifkin subsequently showed that the slow movement is not an arrangement of the introductory sinfonia to the 1729 cantata "Ich steh mit einem FuB im Grabe" BWV 156, as had been proposed by Wilfried

Volume XVII - Number 4 - Fall 1999 The Journal of Musicology @ 1999 by the Regents of the University of California

* A shorter version of this essay was read at the Sixty-fifth Annual Meeting of the American Musicological Society, Kansas City, November 1999. Portions of it expand upon observations made in Ian Payne, "New Light on Telemann and Bach: Double Measures," The Musical Times (CXXXIX (1998); 44-45; "Tele- mann's Musical Style c.1709o-c. 1730 andJ. S. Bach: The Evidence of Borrowing," Bach: TheJournal of the Riemenschneider Bach Insti- tute XXX/1 (1999), 42-64, at 57-59; and Steven Zohn, "Bach's Borrowings from Telemann," in Telemann und Bach. Studien- Darstellungen-Uberlegungen. Hans-Joachim Schulze zum 60. Geburtstag, Magdeburger Telemann-Studien, vol. 18 (forthcoming). We gratefully acknowledge the helpful comments made on early drafts by Gregory Butler, Michael Marissen, andJoshua Rifkin.

1 Ulrich Siegele, "Kompositionsweise und Bearbeitungstechnik in der Instrumental- musik Johann Sebastian Bachs" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Tiibingen, 1957); published as Tfibinger Beitriige zur Musikwissenschaft, vol. 3 (Neuhausen-Stuttgart: Hinssler- Verlag, 1975), 129-30.

Dow

nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/jm

/article-pdf/17/4/546/193185/763932.pdf by guest on 14 May 2020

ZOHN sc PAYNE

Fischer, but that both the concerto movement and the sinfonia are de-

pendent upon an earlier movement in F major, scored like the sinfonia for oboe and strings. This F-major movement, in his view, belonged originally to a lost D-minor oboe concerto whose outer movements survive in arranged form as the sinfonias in the 1726 cantata "Geist und Seele wird verwirret" BWV 35.2 Most recently, Werner Breig has clari- fied the multi-stage process by which Bach revised the ripieno string parts and embellished the solo part in the slow movement of BWV 1056. He proposes that Bach replaced the slow movement of the G- minor violin concerto with that of the D-minor oboe concerto because the relatively circumscribed, vocally-conceived line of the latter was better suited to a transformation from "cantilena to coloratura" through the gradual accretion of ornaments.3

Thanks to such source-critical investigations and informed specula- tion, Bach's reuse, revision, and recontextualization of BWV 1056/2 (156/1) have come more sharply into focus. Still obscure, however, are answers to the questions of where, when, and why he composed the movement's original version. The present essay attempts answers from a new perspective by revealing that BWV 1056/2 (156/1) is substantially based upon a slow concerto movement by Georg Philipp Telemann. Bach's model, the first movement of a G-major concerto for solo oboe or flute and strings, is classified as TWV 51 :G2 in the Telemann- Werkverzeichnis. That the close connection between the movements went unnoticed for so long is attributable in part to misleading published de-

scriptions of the work's fragmentary state, descriptions which have no doubt discouraged the appearance of a modern edition.4 As we shall

2 Wilfried Fischer, Kritischer Bericht to Johann Sebastian Bach, Neue Ausgabe sdmtlicher Werke (henceforth NBA), series VII, vol. 7 (Kassel: Bairenreiter, 1971), 84-86 and 92;

Joshua Rifkin, "Ein langsamer Konzertsatz Johann Sebastian Bachs," Bach-Jahrbuch LXIV (1978), 140-47. See also Rifkin's liner notes to Pro Arte PAD 153 (1983) and Ulrich Leisinger, Kritischer Bericht to NBA I/6 (Kassel: Bairenreiter, 1996), 88. The advisability of reconstructing BWV 35/1 and 5 as fast concerto movements for solo oboe is questioned in Bruce Haynes, 'Johann Sebastian Bachs Oboenkonzerte," Bach-Jahrbuch LXXVIII (1992), 23-43, at 38-39. Rifkin's explanation of why Bach abandoned his transcription of the D-minor oboe concerto BWV 1059 after only nine measures is challenged in Werner Breig, "Bachs Cembalokonzert-Fragment in d-Moll (BWV 1059)," Bach-Jahrbuch LXV (1979), 29-36, at 30.

3 Werner Breig, "Zur Werkgeschichte von Bachs Cembalokonzert BWV 1056," in Bachs Orchesterwerke, Bericht fiber das 1. Dortmunder Bach-Symposium 1996, Dort- munder Bach-Forschungen, vol. 1, ed. Martin Geck and Werner Breig (Witten: Klangfar- ben, 1997), 265-82. In a forthcoming study, Gregory Butler further discredits the notion of a lost G-minor violin concerto by arguing that the outer movements of BWV 1056 cannot originally have belonged to the same work, and that the third movement was initially conceived for solo oboe, not violin. We are indebted to Professor Butler for informing us of his research.

4 The concerto is described as lacking a bass part in Martin Ruhnke, ed., Georg Philipp Telemann: Thematisch-Systematisches Verzeichnis seiner Werke: Telemann-Werkverzeichnis:

547

Dow



548

THE JOURNAL OF MUSICOLOGY

see, the missing portions of Telemann's concerto do not significantly hinder an assessment of the music, and scarcely affect the first movement at all.5

The revelation of Bach's modelling is significant on several counts. Besides adding to the relatively small number of Bach's known borrow-

ings of music by other composers, it considerably broadens our knowl-

edge of his contact with and admiration for Telemann's music. It also demonstrates that the stylistic influences on Bach's concertos were not limited to the Italian works of Vivaldi, Albinoni, and Torelli, but included -at least in one instance-a concerto by a German contemporary.6 But

perhaps most important, the identification of Bach's model allows us

deeper insight into a relatively unfamiliar side of his working method: the use of transformative imitation to turn preexistent music by another

composer into a distinctive expression of his own compositional voice. Our study commences with a consideration of the musical and chrono-

logical relationship between Bach's and Telemann's movements, then

explores the contemporary aesthetic context for Bach's borrowing and the reasons he may have turned to Telemann's music for inspiration.

I

Although a precise chronology for the two movements is likely to remain elusive, the notion that the lost original version of BWV 1056/2 (156/1) was written in response to TWV 51:G2, and not the other way around, is strongly supported by musical and

Instrumentalwerke (= Georg Philipp Telemann: Musikalische Werke, Supplement), vol. 3 (Kassel: Birenreiter, 1999), 28 (TWV 51:G2); Siegfried Kross, Das Instrumentalkonzert bei Georg Philipp Telemann (Tutzing: Hans Schneider, 1969), 127 (Fl.G[1]); and Ingo Gronefeld, Die F16tenkonzerte bis i850: Ein thematisches Verzeichnis, 3 vols. (Tutzing: Hans Schneider, 1994), 3:226 (item 152).

5 For a critical edition and reconstruction of the concerto, see Ian Payne, ed., Georg Philipp Telemann: Concerto in G major for Oboe (Flute), Strings and Basso Continuo, Severinus Urtext Telemann Edition, vol. 95 (Hereford: Severinus Press, 1998).

6 While Vivaldi's influence on Bach's ritornello forms has been treated extensively in the Bach literature, only recently has the influence of Torelli and Albinoni been recognized. See in particular Jean-Claude Zehnder, "Giuseppe Torelli und Johann Sebastian Bach: Zu Bachs Weimarer Konzertform," Bach-Jahrbuch LXXVII (1991), 33-95; Gregory G. Butler, "J. S. Bach's reception of Tomaso Albinoni's Mature Concertos," in Bach Studies 2, ed. Daniel R. Melamed (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 20-46; and Robert Hill, 'Johann Sebastian Bach's Toccata in G major BWV 916/I: A Reception of Giuseppe Torelli's Ritornello Concerto Form," in Das Friihwerk Johann Sebastian Bachs, Kollo- quium veranstaltet vom Institut ffir Musikwissenschaft der Universitfit Rostock 11.-13. Sep- tember 1990, ed. Karl Heller and Hans-Joachim Schulze (Cologne: Studio, 1995), 162-75. Discussions of the stylistic parallels between Bach's and Telemann's concertos include Wolf- gang Hirschmann, "Eklektischer Imitationsbegriff und konzertantes Gestalten bei Tele- mann und Bach," in Bachs Orchesterwerke, 305-19; and Payne, "Telemann's Musical Style," 51-59-

Dow



ZOHN &c PAYNE

documentary evidence. First, it is significant, and perhaps not entirely unexpected, that Bach's elaboration and exploration of the musical material common to both movements is on the whole more sophisticated than Telemann's. This is not necessarily to denigrate Telemann's movement, but rather to suggest that Bach was able to benefit from a critical reading of it, in much the same way as Handel often realized-

through various processes of imitation-the full potential of the material he himself borrowed from Telemann.7 Had Telemann's movement been modeled upon Bach's, we would reasonably expect it to reveal some evidence of a critical reading, which it does not. Further suggest- ing a Telemann-Bach direction of influence is Bach's well-documented contact with his friend's concertos at Weimar. Around 17o09 he produced a set of parts to Telemann's G-major double violin concerto TWV 52:G2, possibly presenting them to the violinistJohann Georg Pisendel in that year, and in 1713-14 or thereabouts he arranged Telemann's G- minor violin concerto TWV 51:G1 for harpsichord (BWV 985). Also cir-

culating in Weimar during the 171os, and therefore likely to have been known to Bach, were the D-major double violin concerto TWV 52:D4 (transmitted in a Rostock set of parts apparently originating at the Weimar court ca. 1713-14) and three concertos arranged for solo keyboard by Johann Gottfried Walther, organist at the Church of St. Peter and St. Paul and a cousin of Bach's: the C-minor double concerto for oboe and violin TWV 52:cl (= TWV Anh. 33:2), the B-minor violin (?) concerto TWV 51:h3 (= TWV Anh. 33:1), and the B-flat violin concerto TWV 51:B2 (= TWV Anh. 43:B1 and Anh. 33:6).8 Bach's close relation-

ship to Telemann during the early Weimar years, when the latter was

7 The literature on Handel's borrowings from Telemann includes Max Seiffert, "G. Ph. Telemann's 'Musique de table' als Quelle ffir Handel," in Bulletin de la sociiti "Union Musicologique" IV (1924), 1-28; revised in Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767): Musique de table. Ausfiihrungen zu Band LXI und LXII der Denkmiler deutscher Tonkunst, Erste Folge, Bei- hefte zu den Denkmilern deutscher Tonkunst, vol. 2 (Leipzig: Breitkopf & Hirtel, 1927; repr. Graz: Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt, 1960); Bernd Baselt, "Sch6pferische Beziehungen zwischen G.Ph. Telemann und G. F. Hindel-G.Ph. Telemanns 'Harmoni- scher Gottesdienst' als Quelle ffir HWindel," in Die Bedeutung Georg Philipp Telemanns fir die Entwicklung der europiiischen Musikkultur im i8. Jahrhundert, Bericht fiber die Interna- tionale Wissenschaftliche Konferenz anfilich der Georg-Philipp-Telemann-Ehrung der DDR, Magdeburg 12. bis 18. Marz 1981, 3 vols. (Magdeburg: Zentrum ffir Telemann- Pflege und -Forschung, 1983), 2:4-14; Ellwood Derr, "Handel's Procedures for Compos- ing with Materials from Telemann's 'Harmonischer Gottes-Dienst' in 'Solomon,' " and John H. Roberts, "Handel's Borrowings from Telemann: An Inventory," in Gittinger Hdn- del Beitrdge, vol. 1, ed. Hans Joachim Marx (Kassel: Birenreiter, 1984), 116-46 and 147- 71, respectively; and Chanan Willner, "Handel's Borrowings from Telemann: An Analyti- cal View," in Trends in Schenkerian Research, ed. Allen Cadwallader (New York: Schirmer, 1990), 145-68.

8 On Bach's copy of TWV 52:G2, see Hans-Joachim Schulze, "Telemann-Pisendel- Bach: Zu einem unbekannten Bach-Autograph," in Die Bedeutung Georg Philipp Telemanns, 2:73-77. Concerning the dating of Bach's and Walther's keyboard arrangements, and of

549

Dow



550


Konzertmeister and Kapellmeister at the nearby Eisenach court, is at- tested to by C.P.E. Bach in a 1775 letter to Johann Nikolaus Forkel: "In his younger days he saw a good deal of Telemann, who also stood god- father to me. [crossed out:] He esteemed him, particularly in his instrumental things, very highly."9 Another opportunity for Bach to examine Telemann's early concertos may have come in March 1714, when Tele- mann apparently traveled between Frankfurt and Weimar to stand god- father to Emanuel.'o

TWV 52:D4, see Schulze, 'J. S. Bach's Concerto-Arrangements for Organ: Studies or Com- missioned Works?," Organ Yearbook III (1972), 4-13; and Studien zur Bach-Uberlieferung im i8. Jahrhundert (Leipzig: Peters, 1984), 146-73. It should be noted, however, that the decid- edly inferior quality of TWV 52:D4 casts considerable doubt on its authenticity as a work of Telemann. For details, see Ian Payne, "Doubtfully Bred: Another Telemann Misattribu- tion," The Musical Times CXL (1999), 37-42. Although only the transcriptions of TWV 52:c1 and 51:h3 survive in Walther's autograph, the transcription of TWV 51:B2 appears to have stemmed from his pen as well. See Russell Stinson, Keyboard Transcriptions from the Bach Circle, Recent Researches in the Music of the Baroque Era, vol. 69 (Madison, WI: A-R Editions, 1992), x. The style of these last three concertos is consistent with a terminus ante quem of 1713-14, and indeed Wolfgang Hirschmann assigns them to 1708-14 in Studien zum Konzertschaffen von Georg Philipp Telemann, 2 vols. (Kassel: Barenreiter, 1986), 1:111-14 and 187-91; and "Telemanns Frankfurter Konzertschaffen: Quellen- und stilkritische Be- merkungen zur Datierungsproblematik" (forthcoming). We are grateful to Dr. Hirschmann for sharing with us this and another forthcoming article cited below in note 43. As Kirsten BeiBwenger reports in Johann Sebastian Bachs Notenbibliothek (Kassel: Biren- reiter, 1992), 69 and 378-79, Bach may have arranged another Telemann concerto for keyboard, for an Erfurt auction catalog from 1810 includes the following entry: "Tele- mann, Concerto appropriato all'organo di J. S. Bach, f-dur, geschr." It is possible, however, that the transcription was Walther's, since the wording "appropriato all'organo" is precisely that used by Walther in the thirteen concerto transcriptions of D-Bds, Mus. ms. 22541/4, minus the following attribution "daJ.G.W."

9 Hans-Joachim Schulze, ed., Bach-Dokumente, vol. 3: Dokumente zum Nachwirken Jo- hann Sebastian Bachs (Leipzig and Kassel: Barenreiter, 1972), No. 803; translation from The New Bach Reader: A Life ofJohann Sebastian Bach in Letters and Documents, ed. Hans T. David and Arthur Mendel, rev. and enlarged by Christoph Wolff (New York: W. W. Nor- ton, 1998), No. 395. See also Stephen L. Clark, The Letters of C.RE. Bach (Oxford: Claren- don Press, 1997), 74; and the facsimile of the letter in Max Schneider, ed., Bach-Urkunden: Ursprung der musikalisch-Bachischen Familie: Nachrichten iiberJohann Sebastian Bach von Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Ver6ffentlichungen der Neuen Bachgesellschaft, vol. 17/3 (Leipzig: Breitkopf & Hirtel, [1917]), [28-31]. Although Emanuel's reason for deleting the second sentence remains obscure, one might speculate that on second thought he found this information irrelevant for Forkel's purposes, rather than an inaccurate characteriza- tion of his father's musical tastes.

11 Though, as Hans-Joachim Schulze cautions, there is insufficient documentary evidence to confirm Telemann's visit. See his "'FlieBende Leichtigkeit' und 'arbeitsame Vollstimmigkeit': Georg Philipp Telemann und die Musikerfamilie Bach," in Telemann und seine Freunde: Kontakte, Einfliife, Auswirkungen, Bericht fiber die Internationale Wissen- schaftliche Konferenz anlBl3ich der 8. Telemann-Festtage der DDR, Magdeburg 15. und 16. Marz 1984, 2 vols. (Magdeburg: Zentrum fiir Telemann-Pflege und -Forschung, 1986), 1:34-40, at 34. For the text of Telemann's listing in the Leipzig Town Church records, see Werner Neumann and Hans-Joachim Schulze, eds., Bach-Dokumente, vol. 2: Fremdschriftliche und gedruckte Dokumente zur Lebensgeschichte Johann Sebastian Bachs 1685- 1750 (Leipzig and Kassel: Birenreiter, 1969), No. 67; The New Bach Reader, No. 55-

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

Our discussion of the two movements proceeds from Rifkin's con- clusion that the musical text of BWV 156/1 differs only in minor details from the lost original version of Bach's movement.11 Example 1 gives the complete sinfonia and opening movement of TWV 51:G2.12 Not without significance is the fact that at twenty-four measures in common time, Telemann's Andante is only four measures longer than Bach's

Adagio. For while such modest dimensions are common for Telemann's slow concerto movements composed at Eisenach (1708-12) and Frank- furt (1712-21), they are most unusual for Bach at any period. In fact, with the exception of the middle "movement" of the Third Branden-

burg Concerto BWV 1048, Bach's Adagio probably takes less time to

perform, on average, than any of his other slow concerto movements.13

Surely the most striking musical parallel between Telemann's and Bach's movements occurs in the first two-and-a-half measures, where the two soloists play virtually the same melody. Bach's version, however, includes several substantive differences that could be regarded as im-

provements to an already distinctive melodic line: the elimination of Telemann's static melodic motion across the barline in measures 1-2

by reproducing the upward sweep of measure 12 in 14, and by leaping up an octave in measure 21 to provide a registral link to 2 on the third beat of the same measure. Equally striking is the fact that the two passages share a descending bass line, offbeat chordal string accompaniment, and initial harmonic progression (I-V6-IV -V7-I). Although

I Bach's original, if it was indeed the second movement of a D-minor concerto, would presumably have included the ending of BWV 1056/2, which closes with a half cadence on the dominant of the relative minor. Both BWV 156/1 and Telemann's movement close on the home dominant in anticipation of the following movement in the tonic.

1 In this and following examples drawn from Telemann's concerto, editorial additions appear in small type, brackets, or as dashed curves; obvious errors have been tacitly corrected. For a full critical report of the concerto, see the edition cited in note 5. The text of the Bach movement follows that of NBA 1/6.

'3 Closest in length to BWV 1056/2 (156/1) are the "Andante" movements of the Second and Fourth Brandenburg Concertos BWV 1047 and 1049. We exclude from consideration the middle movement of BWV 1065, arranged from Vivaldi's Op. 3, No. to. It would be unwise to make much of a practical distinction between Bach's "Adagio" ("Largo" in BWV 1056) and Telemann's "Andante," for these indications could have been understood during the early eighteenth century as conveying the same general tempo and affect. For Johann Joachim Quantz, this tempo and affect was expressed as "Adagio cantabile" (as opposed to "Adagio assai"), a broad category that included "Poco Andante," "Cantabile," "Arioso," "Soave," "Dolce," "Affettuoso," and the like. See Johann Joachim Quantz, Versuch einer Anweisung die Fl1te traversiere zu Spielen (Berlin, Johann Friedrich Vo13, 1752; repr. Kassel: Birenreiter, 1992), 262; trans. as Edward R. Reilly, Jo- hann Joachim Quantz: On Playing the Flute, 2nd ed. (New York: Schirmer, 1985), 284. As Robert Marshall has shown ("Tempo and Dynamics: The Original Terminology," in The Music ofJohann Sebastian Bach: The Sources, The Style, The Significance [New York: Schirmer, 1989], 255-69, at 266), Bach seems to have regarded "Largo" as somewhat faster than "Adagio," and somewhat slower than "Andante." For the sake of convenience, we shall henceforth refer to BWV 1056/2 (156/1) as an Adagio.

551

Dow



552


EXAMPLE la. Bach, sinfonia to "Ich steh mit einem FuB im Grabe" BWV 156.

AdagioSINFONIA Adagio tr 24L tz I i _ - ivo OP OP- _ .-. , - s " . .. • # _ •

OboePM

Violins I. II. m,

"

ViolaMR9

B.C.1F

Amtri 4 fbI

In 0

7 A

10 _.d[

r

10 Ufri A~ 1: j41"1.1, ,.

2f

. tz. .

1 F

-"PE . P , ; ,:.r ,. • c • A, , m.,

,.:;& M - I"p

I

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

EXAMPLE la. (continued)

13 , " - 3 3 3

3.,

16 [tr] (tr.]

"•" -10 -.--J

' k " " -•0 • •

c- ' • ["' 3

"-

VlnI

16 ItrV n I

A

!f --

1 F

Emm a I do I " - l--------

, I %

,,

jVin I

o, A "*-Ir?BC

553

Dow



554


EXAMPLE lb. Telemann, Concerto in G major TWV 51:G2, movement 1.

Andanteri Oboe or

afuSOP. 99q 49 dd-- I L

Flute

Violins I, II,=i i: m;" Viola

rotr

4 Ilrl [Itl

OR. . ' 0

, , , o. . . . IN ft' l.w. b- 1, _WIN

,

-O #

I!.:.. , 1- do IN F 1

, , i , 1, •

[:~ ~~~ I,

I I I I,' , . .

11 .[trl ,2_;:

1 , So 0

1- 1i o

.--., l•-ad

71 LMI i gf Z -

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

EXAMPLE lb. (continued)

14

gm.I... I A - ~ I I

II. , -,.

17

A

tto

21 A

Itri Itri fl-? I trq

--. zi..p.+ . 1w.+ ' + r .i• + ....

2/ + [1_ _

[+ ,} . .. . . .. . .

..-.--- - -- -.-- ., [

M"

[4•+ "T• t r"'40

555

Dow



556


here Bach injects Telemann's bass line with an element of rhythmic variety, in BWV 1056/2 he reintroduces the steady eighth-note octave

leaps (off rather than on the beat) in the harpsichord's left hand. With these parallels in mind, Telemann's "arco" string parts might be taken as further evidence that Bach added pizzicato indications to the string parts in BWV 1056/2 only to avoid obscuring the rapidly decaying tone of the harpsichord.'4

Even though the two movements appear to diverge beginning in the second half of measure 3, there remain significant points of contact between them. In a procedure commonly encountered in his sonatas, especially those in solo scoring, Telemann adopts a modular organization for the remainder of his movement, introducing a variety of con-

trasting figures that return at different pitch levels and are occasionally extended or altered.'5 Thus a chromatically inflected sighing figure (measures 3-4) gives way to a passage that initially reverses the rhythm of the sighing figure and elegantly outlines V7/V on the way to the dominant cadence in measure 7; slurred pairs of sixteenth notes treated se-

quentially are followed by a return of the sighing figure, now extended in order to effect a cadence in the mediant (measure 12); and a restate- ment of the slurred sixteenths leads to a variation of the sighing figure (measures 17-18) and the earlier dominant-seventh figure, which now leads back to the tonic (measure 21). Virtually lost in the manipulation of these modules is the distinctive opening phrase, of which little trace is to be found later in the movement (but see measure 13). Through- out, the bass line descends relentlessly, breaking its melodic-rhythmic pattern only at cadences.

Bach, by contrast, rarely loses sight of the opening phrase's rhythmic profile, departing from it only for the rather galant sixteenth-note

triplets in measures 13-14 (a gesture perhaps more typical of Tele- mann than of Bach), and providing a literal repeat of the phrase near the movement's end. But he does seem to retain an element of Tele- mann's modular conception in the abrupt tonal shifts between some

14 However, Leisinger (Kritischer Bericht to NBA 1/6, 95), following Christoph Wolff, suggests the possibility that the lost performing materials to BWV 156 indicated a pizzicato string accompaniment in the sinfonia, perhaps as a musical depiction of funeral bells (cf. BWV 198/4). That Telemann might have countenanced a pizzicato accompaniment to his movement is suggested by a similar chordal accompaniment, marked "pizzicato," in the slow third movement of his E-minor concerto for flute and recorder TWV 52:el.

15 On the modular organization of Telemann's solo sonata movements, see Jeanne R. Swack, "The Solo Sonatas of Georg Philipp Telemann: A Study of the Sources and Musical Style" (Ph.D. dissertation, Yale University, 1988), 103-22 and 155-60. Regarding similar structures in the trios and quartets, see Steven D. Zohn, '"The Ensemble Sonatas of Georg Philipp Telemann: Studies in Style, Genre, and Chronology" (Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, 1995), 223-25, 337-38, 358-62, 405, and 421.

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

phrases, especially that occurring at measure 7, where the sudden movement from C major to G minor is underscored by the cross-relation between E-natural (3 in C major) and E-flat (6 in G minor); similarly abrupt, if less dramatic, is Telemann's shift from B minor to G major at his measure 12.16 We might also note the identical length of Bach's and Telemann's second phrases, both of which cadence in the dominant on the downbeat of measure 7. Moreover, Bach's series of arpeggiated seventh chords leading up to this cadence not only recalls his own measure 23, but is also redolent of the filled-in arpeggiation of V7/V in the

analogous passage from Telemann's movement. Unlike Telemann, Bach frequently interrupts the descending motion of his bass line, re-

taining only the rhythm established at the outset. Yet on the few occa- sions when he breaks the bass's rhythmic pattern, it is, as in Telemann's movement, to introduce steady eighth notes at each of four intermedi- ate cadences. Notice as well that at Bach's modulation to the supertonic he adopts Telemann's solo cadential rhythm (compare Bach's measure 10 to Telemann's measures 6, 12, and 21). Even the final cadences are

very similar. True, the two composers handle the soloist's cadential role somewhat differently: Telemann provides a V-vi deceptive cadence, Bach a melodic extension leading from tonic to dominant. But both

employ contrary melodic motion between the outer voices (an ascent on tonic and dominant pitches in the solo part-f'-c"-f" in Bach, g'-d"-g" in Telemann-over a descending perfect fourth in the bass) and assign the final cadential motion to the ripieno strings.

Bach may not have been the only composer to borrow from TWV 51:G2/1. Telemann appears to have reused his opening theme for the first movement of the G-major flute solo TWV 41:G9, published in the Essercizii musici. As Example 2 shows, the opening of this movement bears more than a passing resemblance to that of the Andante: the solo

melody begins almost identically over a descending bass line, includes a

large upward leap in the middle of the second measure, comes to a tonic cadence on the downbeat of the third measure, and introduces a similar contrasting figure (though closely related to the mordent-like motive at the beginning of measure 2) in the third and fourth measures on the way to cadencing in the dominant. But the comparison cannot be pushed much further, as the melody is harmonized differently, the bass line does not maintain its descending profile, and the second phrase is shorter than in the putative model. As for the rest of the movement, it runs its course in a total of only fourteen measures by restating the opening theme in the dominant, then further "developing" the motive from measure 2. If one accepts the beginning of this little movement as a borrowing-and it is not nearly as clear-cut an example

i6 We owe this point to Gregory Butler.

557

Dow



558


EXAMPLE 2. Telemann, Solo in G major TWV 41:G9, movement 1, mm. 1-6.

Cantabile

Flauto traverso

[Fondamento]

6 16 6 7 66

5

5 6 6 6 43

as one could wish for-then it conforms to what may have been Tele- mann's usual self-borrowing procedure: the quotation of an initial melodic phrase that becomes the basis for an otherwise entirely new movement.17 The sonata is likely to have been written some years after the concerto, though probably considerably before the Essercizii musici was published in 1740.18

17 Good examples of this procedure occur in the following movement pairs: TWV 42:di/2 and 43: di/3, TWV 33:5/1 and 43:G2/2, and TWV 33:8/1 and 43:a3/1. Though much work remains to be done on the topic of Telemann as self-borrower, Martin Ruhnke has with some success attempted to trace thematic correspondences in the instrumental ensemble music. Many of those he cites, however, can be interpreted as simple repetitions of stock melodic and rhythmic motives. He does not note the similarity between TWV 41:Gg and 51:G2. See the list of "Akhnlichkeiten oder Ubereinstimmungen mit Anfangsthemen anderer Werke Telemanns" in Georg Philipp Telemann: Thematisch- Systematisches Verzeichnis seiner Werke: Telemann-Werkverzeichnis: Instrumentalwerke (= Georg Philipp Telemann: Musikalische Werke, Supplement), vol. 2 (Kassel: Barenreiter, 1992), 245; "Anmerkungen zum Telemann-Werkverzeichnis Teil III," in Nun bringt ein polnisch Lied die gantze Welt zum springen': Telemann und Andere in der Musiklandschaft Sachsens und Polens, 1 2. Arolser Barock-Festspiele 1997, Tagungsbericht, Arolser Beitraige zur Musikforschung, vol. 6, ed. Friedhelm Brusniak (Sinzig: Studio, 1998), 9-28; and the annotations to entries throughout Telemann-Werkverzeichnis, vol. 3. See also Payne, "Telemann's Musical Style," especially 6o-63.

18 For evidence that the collection's solos and trios were composed and circulated in manuscript copies as early as the mid 1720S, see Steven Zohn, "Music Paper at the Dresden Court and the Chronology of Telemann's Instrumental Music," in Puzzles in Paper: Concepts in Historical Watermarks, Essays from the International Conference on the History, Function, and Study of Watermarks, Roanoke, Virginia, ed. Daniel W. Mosser, Michael Saffle, and Ernest W. Sullivan II (New Castle, Delaware: Oak Knoll Press, 2000),

123-66, at 126-27; and Swack, "The Solo Sonatas of Georg Philipp Telemann," 145-47-

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

II

Having established a close musical connection between BWV 1056/2 (156/1) and TWV 51:G2/1, we are now in a position to revisit the question of when and where Bach encountered Tele- mann's concerto. In 1983 Rifkin proposed that Bach's Adagio, in its

putative original form as the middle movement of a lost D-minor oboe concerto, dates from the Weimar period.19 Much of his argument de-

pends on the identification of stylistic parallels between the concerto's outer movements and relatively early works such as the D-minor violin concerto BWV 1052a, the Third Brandenburg Concerto BWV 1048 (though the binary form of the third movement is shared not only by BWV 35/v, as Rifkin observes, but also by the fourth movement of TWV

51:G2), and Alessandro Marcello's D-minor oboe concerto, Bach's keyboard transcription of which (BWV 974) appears to have originated at Weimar.2o Suggestive as they are, these parallels would require more de- tailed investigation before firm conclusions could be drawn from them. As for the middle movement itself, Rifkin links its arioso style and shun-

ning of ritornello form to other early slow concerto movements by Bach, such as the second movement of the First Brandenburg Concerto BWV 1046, composed at Weimar or K6then.21 While this line of argument is rendered less compelling by the substantial debt Bach's Adagio owes to Telemann, it is nevertheless conceivable that Bach's interest in Telemann's Andante was due in part to his own preoccupation at Wei- mar with the arioso movement type. In this connection, Rifkin's linking of BWV 1056/2 (156/1) with 1046/2 is particularly apt, for these two slow movements not only share a relative brevity, "vocal" melodic style,

19 Liner notes to Pro Arte PAD 153- 20 The status of the Third Brandenburg Concerto as a Weimar composition has in

recent years been called into question. See, for example, Hans-Joachim Schulze, 'Johann Sebastian Bachs Konzerte-Fragen der Uberlieferung und Chronologie," in Bach-Studien, vol. 6: Beitraige zum Konzertschaffen Johann Sebastian Bachs, ed. Peter Ahnsehl, Karl Heller, and Hans-Joachim Schulze (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Hdirtel, 1981), 9-26, at 18-19; and Gregory Butler, '"Toward a More Precise Chronology for Bach's Concerto for Three Vio- lins and Strings BWV 1o64a: The Case for Formal Analysis," in Bachs Orchesterwerke, 235- 47, at 240-41 and 245. Schulze's suggested date of 1713-14 for BWV 974 must be regarded with caution, since the earliest datable source for Marcello's concerto is a Roger print of ca. 1717. However, the fact that Bach's transcription contains figurations similar to those in an undated Schwerin manuscript of the concerto may indicate that his model was not the Roger print. See Schulze, Studien zur Bach-Uberlieferung, 169; and Eleanor Selfridge-Field, The Music of Benedetto and Alessandro Marcello: A Thematic Catalogue with Commentary on the Composers, Repertoire, and Sources (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), 379 (D935).

21 For a thorough source-critical examination of the First Brandenburg Concerto, one that leaves open the question of exactly when during the period 1713-21 the work was composed, see Michael Marissen, "On Linking Bach's F-major Sinfonia and His Hunt Cantata," Bach: TheJournal of the Riemenschneider Bach Institute XXIII/2 ( 1992), 31-46.

559

Dow



560


and quasi-ostinato accompaniment, but, unlike the Telemann movement, conclude with a modified tonic return of the opening material. These features could indicate that Bach conceived the two concerto movements as instrumental equivalents of a certain type of aria found in his Weimar cantatas. Indeed, the recapitulatory function of the

concluding measures might be interpreted as a reference to "free" or "modified" da capo structure, or even as the concluding ritornello in a

through-composed aria structure.22 Along the same lines, we might note that the majority of Bach's Weimar continuo arias-the textural

near-equivalent of BWV 1056/2 (156/1)-feature quasi-ostinato ac-

companiments.23 Yet the parallels between concerto movement and aria can be extended only so far, for BWV 1056/2 (156/1), at least, does not allude to a tutti-solo opposition by means of thematic con- trasts, harmonic plan, or scoring. So if the concluding double return is read as a free da capo, we must imagine the form to exclude any kind of ritornello. And if the double return instead signifies a concluding ritornello, we would logically have to view the movement's opening measures as an initial ritornello. How, then, could we tell when the solo "voice" enters?

But perhaps we have drawn the comparison between Bach's Adagio and his cantata arias from an improper angle. That is, the double return might be less a reference to the aria per se than to a kind of sonata movement based loosely upon an aria type. Several of Bach's slow sonata movements in two and three parts-BWV 1016/3, 1021/3, and

1o34/3-strongly recall BWV 1056/2 (156/1) in both style and structure: all are ariosos that include a modified double return near the end of the movement, and BWV 1034/3 has a quasi-ostinato accompaniment as well.24 BWV 1021/3 is further related to BWV 1056/2 (156/1) by its unusually modest dimensions. While the return of the opening

22 For a survey of Bach's Weimar aria types, see Stephen A. Crist, "Aria Forms in the Vocal Works of J. S. Bach" (Ph.D. dissertation, Brandeis University, 1988); and Alfred Dfirr, Studien iiber die friihen Kantaten Johann Sebastian Bachs (Wiesbaden: Breitkopf & Hir- tel, 1977), 118-65. Miriam K. Whaples, "Bach's Recapitulation Forms,"Journal of Musicol- ogy XIV/4 (1996), 475-513, proposes the term "recapitulation aria" for the majority of Bach's arias usually described, following Dfirr, as being in "free da capo" form. Daniel E. Freeman, 'J. S. Bach's 'Concerto' Arias: A Study in the Amalgamation of Eighteenth- Century Genres," Studi Musicali XXVII/1 (1998), 123-62, at 137, sees such structures as embodying "a series of formal procedures used repeatedly by Bach in imitation of Vival- dian concerto forms."

23 Crist, "Aria Forms," 54. 24 BWV 1015/3 might also be included here by virtue of its modest dimensions,

near-literal repeat of the opening phrase at the end of the movement, and quasi-ostinato accompaniment. But it features strict canonic writing in the upper voices and treats the opening phrase almost like a ritornello, with a statement in the dominant occurring at measure 11.

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

theme is handled differently in each movement-rescored with new

counterpoint in BWV 1016/3, melodically varied in BWV 1021/3, and more thoroughly recomposed and extended in BWV 1034/3-the overall ternary implications of the structures are clear. Each of these sonatas is known to us through manuscripts of early Leipzig origin, but there is no evidence to exclude the possibility of all having been composed at K6then.25 That this kind of movement structure was far from unknown in German sonatas from the 1710os and early 1720os is suggested by several slow movements among Telemann's solos and trios of this period. Examples of brief ariosos with a modified double return near the end are found in TWV 41:hi/i (published in 1715), TWV 42:D4/1 and el/3 (both published 1731-33, but composed a decade or more earlier),26 and TWV 42:G1/1 (published in 1718).27 The stylistic gulf between Bach's and Telemann's sonata movements in aria mode and the real thing, as transferred to an instrumental idiom, is

nicely illustrated by BWV 1o19a/3 ("Cantabile ma un poco Adagio"). This unusual movement, an arrangement of a lost Kothen cantata aria, preserves not only the complete da capo structure of the original, but also the contrast between "tutti" (violin and harpsichord continuo) and "solo" (obbligato harpsichord).

Whatever these stylistic parallels tell us about Bach's generic conceptions of aria, concerto, and sonata, they only modestly narrow the chronological boundaries for the earliest version of BWV 1056/2 (156/1): the movement could conceivably have been composed at any time during the late Weimar, K6then, or first Leipzig years. It seems that if the pre-1729 origins of Bach's Adagio are to be further illumi- nated, we must turn to the sources and style of his model, for it is a fair assumption that Telemann's concerto was relatively new when Bach encountered it.

The only source for TWV 51 :G2 is a set of early-eighteenth-century manuscript parts, in two unidentified hands, now in the possession of the Universititsbibliothek Rostock but originally belonging to the Wfirttemberg-Stuttgart court between 1716 and 1731.28 The assertion

25 For a convenient chronological overview of Bach's music for instrumental ensemble, see Christoph Wolff, "Bach's Leipzig Chamber Music," in Bach: Essays on His Life and Music (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1991), 223-38.

26 On the dating of the early manuscript sources for the Six Sonates en trio dans le goust italien (Paris: Francois Boivin, 1731-33), see Zohn, "Music Paper at the Dresden Court," 125-26.

27 Johann Joachim Quantz also appears to have composed several movements of this type at Dresden during the period 1719-27. See Mary A. Oleskiewicz, "Quantz and the Flute at Dresden: His Instruments, His Repertory, and their Significance for the Ver- such and the Bach Circle" (Ph.D. dissertation, Duke University, 1998), 180-86.

28 The parts (D-ROu, Mus. Saec. XVII.18.45.'6) were available to us only through a photocopy. Hence we are unable to provide any information on the paper types

561

Dow



562


in the Telemann-Werkverzeichnis that the manuscript is incomplete owing to the loss of the continuo part ("ohne Cembalo") is incorrect: both

pages of the unfigured "Basso pro Cembalo" part do indeed survive, although they are so badly deteriorated that the text is lacking for the second half of the second movement and the last third of the fourth movement, as well as for brief passages elsewhere in the concerto. De-

spite the unfortunate combination of acidic ink and thin paper, the "Hautbois vel Traversiere," "Violino 1," "Violino 2," and 'Viola" parts survive complete (though small portions of text are obscured by "showthrough"). At some point after this full set was produced, a second unidentified scribe, known to have been active at the Wiirttemberg- Stuttgart court ca. 1717-22, made an accurate copy of the solo part in French violin clef and added a title page.29 That these are supplements to the set, and not remnants of a second manuscript, is confirmed by the common practice at the court of recopying flute parts into French violin clef, apparently to accommodate the flute-playing Crown Prince Friedrich Ludwig.30 To judge from the title ("Concerto/1 Traversiere/2 Violino/1 Viola/et/Cembalo/Haffiburg"), this second scribe did not know who had composed the concerto, only that the work (or at least the five original parts) had some connection to Hamburg. In the upper

contained therein (but see note 39 below). Concerning the music collection of the Wfirttemberg-Stuttgart court, apparently assembled by Crown Prince Friedrich Ludwig (1698-1731) in the years following his return to Stuttgart in 1716 from travels to Italy, Holland, and France, see Samantha Kim Owens, '"The Wiirttemberg HoJkapelle c.168o- 1721" (Ph.D. dissertation, Victoria University of Wellington, 1995), Chapter 7. On the Telemann sources in particular, see Klaus-Peter Koch, "Die Rostocker Telemann-Quellen. Zu einigen Aspekten ihrer Entstehung," in Georg Philipp Telemann: Werkiiberlieferung, Editions- und Interpretationsfragen, Bericht fiber die Internationale Wissenschaftliche Kon- ferenz anlaBlich der 9. Telemann-Festtage der DDR, Magdeburg 12. bis 14. Mirz 1987, ed. Wolf Hobohm and Carsten Lange, 3 vols. in 1 (Cologne: Studio, 1991), 2:3-10; and Steven Zohn, "New Sources for Telemann's Instrumental Music," in Telemann-Beitrdge: Ab- handlungen und Berichte, vol. 4: Wolf Hobohm zum 60. Geburtstag am 8. Januar 1998, Magde- burger Telemann-Studien, vol. 17, ed. Carsten Lange and Brit Reipsch (forthcoming).

29 On the dating of this copyist's activities, see Koch, "Die Rostocker Telemann- Quellen," 4-6. Two Rostock manuscripts of trios by Telemann are in the same hand: TWV 42:e7 (Mus. Saec. XVII.18.45.2'; unattributed and containing only a figured "Cem- balo" part) and TWV 42:A9 (Mus. Saec. XVII.18.45.23; containing only the flute and figured "Cembalo" parts).

30 Gerhard Poppe, "Eine bisher unbekannte Quelle zum Oboenkonzert G-moll HWV 287," Hdndel-Jahrbuch XXXIX (1993), 225-35, at 230, suggests that the prince's apparent preference for French violin clef could be the result of his contact with the French musician Des Essarts, who may have instructed him in composition. But this hypothesis does not quite square with archival documents examined by Owens ('"The Wiirttemberg Hofkapelle," 233-34), which establish that Des Essarts was not employed by the court until June 1724. Further examples of supplementary parts in the clef are found in the manuscripts listed below in notes 33 and 35.

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

right-hand corner of the title page, he assigned the parts number "1o" in the court's cataloguing system of music manuscripts. The only attribution to Telemann anywhere on the manuscript is supplied by a third

anonymous hand, who added "Telemafi" above "Hafinburg."31 So al-

though the style and quality of the concerto speak strongly for Tele- mann's authorship, a small measure of doubt must remain as to its

authenticity. Attempting to clarify the chronology of the manuscript, Klaus-Peter

Koch took the word "Hamburg" to indicate that the concerto was copied no earlier than 1721, the year of Telemann's move from Frankfurt to

Hamburg.32 On the face of it, this interpretation seems plausible enough, although it begs the question of why the copyist knew the concerto's place of origin but not its composer. An alternative interpretation, one that addresses this question, is suggested by another manu-

script in the Rostock collection with a similarly confused attribution. This set of parts to a D-major trio for two flutes and continuo bears the following title: "Sonata a 3/2 flut=Traversieres/con/Cembalo/ Hambourg."33 The upper right-hand corner of the title page is marked "N.0 9," and a second hand-possibly the same one responsible for "Telemafi" on the concerto manuscript-has added the words "Von Keiser" above "Hambourg." This is undoubtedly a reference to Rein- hard Keiser, who arrived at the Wiirttemberg-Stuttgart court from Ham- burg in April 1719, and remained there until August 1721.34 If the attribution is correct, then "Hambourg" might have been intended to indicate that the trio or manuscript came with Keiser from Hamburg, and would have distinguished the work from three other trios that

31 The same copyist added the words "Telemafi genafit" above the attribution "Sig.r Melante" (Telemann's Italianate anagram) on manuscripts of TWV 43:G1 1, 52:D4, and Anh. 51:Gi (Mus. Saec.

XVII.18.45.8-'o). 32 Koch, "Die Rostocker Telemann-Quellen," 7. Following Koch, the Telemann-

Werkverzeichnis assigns the concerto to "1721 / 22 oder friiher." 33 Mus. Saec. XVII.18.19.7. The parts themselves are in a different hand. The copy-

ist of the title page is also responsible for titles on several manuscripts containing trios by Reinhard Keiser, Johann Jakob KreB, and Telemann (Mus. Saec. XVII.18.19.2a, XVII. 18.19.2b, XVII. 18.20.'2, and XVII. 18.20.'3). In each case, he supplied titles on addi- tional flute or viola d'amore parts copied out by a court scribe who often signed title pages with the initials "C.H.H.," and who owned or copied manuscripts bearing the dates 1717, 1718, 172o, and 1722. See Poppe, "Eine bisher unbekannte Quelle," 230-32; and Koch, "Die Rostocker Telemann-Quellen," 4. Owens ("The Wiirttemberg Hofkapelle," 272) argues convincingly that "C.H.H." is Caspar Heinrich Hetsch, leader of the oboe band of the Garde Fusilier Regiment and from 1722 until 1751 also a member of the Wfirt- temberg Hofkapelle. A court document from 1722 (quoted in Owens, 348-49) mentions that Hetsch had already taken part in Hofkapelle performances prior to his official court appointment, which could explain his earlier activities as a copyist.

34 Koch, "Die Rostocker Telemann-Quellen," 7.

563

Dow



564


Keiser wrote at court in 1720.35 Without wishing to suggest the unlikely scenario of Keiser bringing an unattributed Telemann concerto from

Hamburg to Stuttgart, we might note that the two manuscripts were

apparently filed next to each other as numbers 9 and to in the court's music collection. While the consecutive numbering may be due to the

origin-perceived or actual-of the manuscripts in Hamburg, it seems more likely that we are dealing here with a case of educated guesswork on the part of the author of the concerto title page. Faced with an unattributed work, he might easily have included the word "Hamburg" by analogy to the trio, which, having probably just entered the court's music collection, he had reason to associate with the concerto.36 Such a se-

quence of events is more likely than it might at first appear, for a similar case of educated guesswork at the court almost certainly underlies the misattribution of Telemann's trio TWV 42:g915 to the Darmstadt Konzertmeister Johann Jakob KreB.37 If this interpretation of the concerto's title page fails to establish a more precise date for the work, it nonetheless leaves open the possibility that it was copied before 1721.

Before considering the style of the concerto as an indicator of its

chronology, it is worth asking which instrument-flute or oboe-Tele- mann intended to play the solo part. The concerto's classification in the Telemann-Werkverzeichnis as a work for flute and strings would seem to rest primarily on the manuscript's title page, which, as we have seen,

35 Mus. Saec. XVII.18.19.2a, XVII.18.1992b, and XVII.18.19.6. The three manuscripts, each bearing the date "1720," were filed as items 32-34 in the court's music collection. Admittedly, this explanation does not account for the initial omission of Keiser's name on the title page. At least one other work in the collection, the '"Trio ... de Man- heimb" (Mus. Saec. XVIII.47.12), appears to bear the name of a city rather than a composer.

36 As Owens points out ("The Wfirttemberg HoJkapelle, 275), the court's cataloguing systems were not organized according to genre, so the numbers may reflect the order in which the manuscripts were copied or acquired. Indeed, it is not difficult to imagine the trio and concerto having been placed next to each other in a pile of recent acquisitions requiring title pages.

37 The manuscript in question (Mus. Saec. XVII. 18.20.'3) includes a full set of parts in the hand of a copyist who probably worked in Darmstadt or Frankfurt, as his hand appears in two Darmstadt scores containing vocal works composed by Telemann in 1716 for the celebration of the birth of the Habsburg Prince Leopold: the serenata Teutschland griint und bliiht im Friede (TWV 12:1c; D-DS, Mus. ms. 1039) and the cantata Auf Christen- heit, begeh ein Freudenfest (TWV 12:1; Mus. ms. 1050). A supplementary flute part in French violin clef, copied by Hetsch, bears a title in the hand familiar from the Keiser trio: "Trio/1 Flut: Travers transpor:/1 Viola da Gamba Concert:/e/Cembalo." The attribution "Kress a Darmestatt" has been added by a second scribe, who seems to have taken his cue from the title of a KreB trio dedicated to Friedrich Ludwig (Mus. Saec. XVII. 1820.12o.; apparently missing a violin part and a flute part in treble clef): "Trio a 3/1 Flut: Traversiere transp:/1 Violino/Col/Cembalo o Vn Lut./Auth: Krefl a Darmestatt/ apertient a S: A. Sme/Monsegr. le Prince Hered:." In XVII.18.20.12 the combination of copying hands is identical to that in the supplementary flute part of XVII. 18.2o0.3.

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

is of later origin than the full set of parts.38 The earlier solo part, however, gives the instrumentation as "oboe or flute," a formulation also found on the same copyist's solo part to Telemann's D-minor oboe concerto TWV 51 :dl.39 Even more telling is the range of the solo parts to both concertos: d' to b", typical of early-eighteenth-century oboe parts but unusually restricted in the upper register for flute parts; certainly very few flute parts by Telemann, Bach, and their contemporaries do not call for at least c"' or d"'. Then, too, the relatively low tessitura of the solo parts would in some places cause a flute to be covered up by the string accompaniment. For these reasons, as well as the apparent convention at the Wiirttemberg-Stuttgart court of designating solo

parts to wind concertos as suitable for either oboe or flute (again, probably to satisfy Friedrich Ludwig's desire for new repertory to perform on the latter instrument), one must conclude that TWV 51 :G2 was conceived in the first place for oboe.4o Thus it appears that Bach emulated not only the musical substance of Telemann's movement, but also its

scoring. It is even possible, as Bruce Haynes has speculated, that Bach's movement was originally in G major as well, although none of the sur-

viving sources show any evidence of this.41 If the philological evidence adduced above suggests that TWV

51:G2 came into the possession of the Wiirttemberg-Stuttgart Hofkapelle between 1716 and the early 1720os, the concerto's musical style places it

38 Kross (Das Instrumentalkonzert, 127) describes the instrumentation as flute and strings, with the option of performance with oboe.

39 Mus. Saec. XVII.18.51.34, an unattributed set of parts that appears to be a companion manuscript to XVII.18.45.16. The slightly varying form of the treble clefs in the two manuscripts, however, may indicate that they were copied at different times. For a discussion of XVII.18.51 .34, whose text is also partially obscured by the combination of acidic ink and thin paper (bearing an unidentifiable watermark), see Zohn, "New Sources for Telemann's Instrumental Music." Both of the other manuscript sources for TWV 51:di (D-DS, Mus. ms. 1033/80 and D-Dlb, Mus. 2392-Q-47) unambiguously trans- mit the concerto as a work for oboe.

4o To be sure, TWV 51:G2 and 51:di were not the only "oboe or flute" concertos performed at the court. The recently discovered Rostock source for Handel's G-minor oboe concerto HWV 287 (see Poppe, "Eine bisher unbekannte Quelle") also has a solo part for oboe or flute ("Hautb. e Flute Travers:"), an instrumentation reversed on the title page. According to Owens ("The Wiirttemberg Hojkapelle, 256-57), other concerto sources of Wfirttemberg-Stuttgart provenance with solo parts for oboe or flute include works by "Giosna" (Mus. Saec. XVIII.33.'; oboe or flute), Johann David Heinichen (XVII.14.20; oboe or flute), Giuseppe Valentini (XVIII.61.2; flute or oboe), and "Zel- lerino" (XVII.62."; flute or oboe). As to the suitability of TWV 51:G2 for oboe, it could be objected that the slurred sixteenth-note leaps in the first movement are more id- iomatic to the Baroque flute than the Baroque oboe. Yet very similar figures are found in the first movement ("Andante e spiccato") of Marcello's D-minor concerto, a work that might easily have been known to Telemann through Bach or some other source. The slurs in TWV 51:G2 could, of course, be scribal additions, and omitting them in performance would do little to alter the movement's effect.

41 Haynes, "Oboenkonzerte," 37 and 41-42.

565

Dow



566


somewhat earlier. Indeed, all of the stylistic features identified by Wolf-

gang Hirschmann as characteristic of Telemann's early concertos (composed at Eisenach or Frankfurt, ca. 1708-16) apply to TWV 51:G2 to

varying degrees: 1) modest dimensions; 2) opening slow movements

organized by some means other than ritornello form; 3) fast-movement ritornellos dominated by Fortspinnung and displaying motivic homo-

geneity; 4) weak articulation of the tutti-solo opposition resulting from sonata-like motivic interplay between the soloist and ripieno strings (especially the first violin); 5) the generating of rhythmic contrast princi- pally between solo and tutti parts, not within individual parts; and 6) a preference for common time rather than 2/4.42 Absent from these

early works, as indeed from virtually all of Telemann's concertos written before the early 172os, are specifically galant stylistic features such as Lombardic and alla zoppa rhythms, a relatively slow rate of harmonic

change, and drum basses. Of considerable help in placing TWV 51 :G2 within the context of

Telemann's early works are his other oboe concertos, none of which appears to have been composed after the early 1720os. Particularly rele- vant here are TWV 51:ct, c2, di, el, and a2.43 Hirschmann rightly views the first three of these works as a group by virtue of their similar musical language, the most stylistically advanced being 51 :d 1. That this

group originated no later than Telemann's first years in Frankfurt is indicated by the Darmstadt manuscript source for the D-minor concerto, which bears the possessor mark 'JSEndler/1713."44 TWV 51:e 1 and a2 cannot have been composed many years later, although the more sophisticated handling of form within individual movements of the E-minor concerto suggests that this work dates from the middle or late 1710s.45 All five concertos, like TWV 51:G2, contain fast move-

42 Hirschmann, "Telemanns Frankfurter Konzertschaffen." 43 For analyses of these works, and of the oboe concertos TWV 51:D5, Esi, fi, and

f 2, see Hirschmann, Studien zum Konzertschaffen, 96-102 and 135-47. Following up on an observation made by Peter Huth, Hirschmann ("Telemann's Frankfurter Konzertschaf- fen") makes a strong case that TWV 51:a2 was originally conceived as an oboe concerto. Concerning the fragmentary D-minor concerto for oboe and strings TWV 51:d2, see Hirschmann's forthcoming study, "Ein Konzertfragment von Georg Philipp Telemann: M6glichkeiten und Grenzen der Rekonstruktion."

44 Johann Samuel Endler's whereabouts in 1713 are unknown, but the presence of Freiberg paper in the manuscript would seem to place him in Saxony, and perhaps in Leipzig, where he matriculated at the university in the summer of 1716. As Endler remained in Leipzig until his engagement at the Darmstadt court in early 1723, it is conceivable that TWV 51 :d 1 was still circulating in Leipzig when Bach arrived there later that year. For a summary of Endler's early life see Joanna Cobb Biermann, 'Johann Samuel Endlers Orchestersuiten und suitendthnliche Werke," in Bachs Orchesterwerke, 341-53, at 341-42.

45 The non-autograph parts to TWV 51:a2 (D-DS, Mus. ms. 1033/89) have been dated to 1716 by Brian Stewart and Oswald Bill (unpublished study of the paper types

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

ments in which the relationship between soloist and tutti is character- ized by a blending of concerto and sonata procedures.

Easily the most formally sophisticated movement in the G-major concerto is the second, with a ritornello form in which the initial distinction between solo and tutti material gradually breaks down in a manner recalling the Sonate auf Concertenart. (Statements of the soloist's music by the tutti, and vice versa, are of course also characteristic of Bach's fast concerto movements.) The ritornello-like opening phrase, played by the solo oboe with continuo and cadencing in the tonic, gives way to a contrasting idea played in thirds by the violins over a drone bass (Example 3).46 Already during the extended, motto-like restate- ment of the opening phrase, functioning as the first solo episode, the

ripieno strings gradually adopt the oboe's material by stating it in canon with the soloist or in false stretto among themselves. Following the second ritornello, played by both tutti and soloist and combining all of the material so far presented, the strings virtually abandon the drone idea and the oboe takes it up in both of its remaining episodes. In several places, such as the excerpt from the third solo episode given in Example 4, the oboe and first violin engage in imitation and voice-

exchange more characteristic of the sonata than the concerto. A similar instance of voice-exchange occurs in the brief, binary-form fourth movement, where the texture often resembles a trio sonata with added inner voices (Example 5).47 This kind of motivic interplay between soloist and first violin is also characteristic of TWV 51:c1/2 and 4, c2/2, and Esi/i, and the second movement's motto-like opening without an introductory ritornello finds parallels in the concluding movements of TWV 51:di and fi. The G-major concerto's slow third movement, in the relative minor, derives its pathos from the soloist's

angular melody, full of sighing figures, and the restless harmonic motion arising from the use of secondary dominants, the Neapolitan sixth, and modal mixture (Example 6). Especially interesting is the texture of the accompaniment, alternating between a bassetto bass supplied by

and copying hands in the Telemann manuscripts at the Hessische Landes- und Hoch- schulbibliothek, Darmstadt). A sketch for the third movement of TWV 51:ei found on the autograph score to the cantata "Da ich mich hier eingefunden" TWV 1:1748 (D-F, Ms. Ff. Mus. 809/78), performed in Hamburg in 1722, indicates that this concerto was composed no later than 1721-22. The non-autograph score of the completed concerto (D-DS, Mus. ms. 1033/4) can be dated to ca. 1725.

46 The stark contrast between the initial solo and ripieno material in this movement has also been noted by Kross, Das Instrumentalkonzert, 71.

47 As Kross observes (Das Instrumentalkonzert, 86-87), the structure of this finale is perhaps the simplest among Telemann's binary-form concerto movements, a fact that would seem to argue for the work's early origin. Contrary to Kross's diagram of the movement, however, the second half of the form is repeated.

567

Dow



568


EXAMPLE 3. Telemann, TWV 51:G2, movement 2, mm. 1-12.

Vivace

vL ~~oit ! "

,o

5 [t-1 o, A

A--i • ..

"tF R,==

4

I ,rJ~m ..

9

II~

r A

5 71

Ot a i

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE


t 60


26 ([Allegro]

PT?; K II

• I

4

j

o, A It" "f

i$ • • IL: • ~ i i-~ l=• " i i 7

A!lr ' ::•

• Ir• ,• Z•_,.6

EXAMPLE 5. Telemann, TWVV 5 1:"G2, movement 4, MM. 26-29.

26 [Alegro]

28 A , J t --, 0.0 1 1 E.: t i , ![ - . -46•

A- - - -- ----- p ,D=/-r

569

Dow



570



Adagio [Irl

0-11 9-.- - ..

-O '

4 M6 a - OR r- ;

V IrAI a Ir

-' A.ib

i!?"• ' •r ,•a t

the first violin (for reasons of compass briefly transferred to the continuo in measures 7-8) and block chords played by the entire ripieno. In two passages the soloist's sighing figures are accompanied only by a descending chromatic line in the first violin (measures 5-6 and 16- 17). Both the overall tonal instability and use of chromaticism bring to mind passages in TWV 51:c 1, c2, and di, and similar pathetic cantile- nas occur as the first movements to TWV 51:di, gi, and a2, where the

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

solo melodies are accompanied by rhythmic ostinati. Given these points of style, the transmission of TWV 51:G2 with di at the Wfirttemberg- Stuttgart court assumes greater import, for the two concertos may well have been composed around the same time.

In sum, musical and source-critical evidence allows us to posit the following sequence of events: 1) Telemann composed TWV 51 :G2 around 1712-16 as one in a series of at least eleven works for solo oboe and strings that can be connected to his years at Eisenach and Frank- furt; 2) the work entered the repertory of the Wfirttemberg-Stuttgart Hofkapelle between 1716 and the early 172os, by which time it must also have come into the possession of Bach; and 3) finding the first movement worthy of emulation, Bach not only borrowed the beginning of Telemann's theme, making relatively minor alterations to it, but also adopted details of the movement's scoring, ripieno string accompaniment, harmony, phrase and cadential structure, and overall dimensions. Exactly how much before 1729 the original version of BWV 1056/2 (156/1) came into being must for the moment remain an

open question. But the likelihood that Bach modeled his Adagio on a

relatively recent work by Telemann and the movement's stylistic and structural similarity to some of his cantata arias and slow sonata movements both point to the mid-to-late Weimar or early K6then years.

III

We come finally to the questions of why Bach borrowed from Telemann, and how his appropriation affects our under-

standing of his working habits. Those conversant with Handel's extensive borrowings from preexistent works by other composers will no doubt find much that is familiar in the relationship of BWV 1056/2 (156/1) to its model, for Bach's compositional procedure is nothing if not Handelian in varying and extending Telemann's opening idea, then more subtly appropriating various other elements later in the movement. Yet the traditional explanations for Handel's frequent use of preexistent material by himself and others-that he did so out of habit borne of his musical upbringing; out of necessity because of illness, lack of melodic invention, or time constraints; or out of an altru- istic desire to rescue promising, yet unformed ideas from obscurity through a kind'of musical alchemy-will clearly not suffice in the case of Bach, and in fact many of these explanations have been wholly or partially discredited for Handel as well.48 Whatever discomfort Bach's

48 A good critical survey of the various explanations of Handel's borrowing is found in John T. Winemiller, "Handel's Borrowing and Swift's Bee: Handel's 'Curious' Practice and the Theory of Transformative Imitation" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 1994), 55-74-

571

Dow



572


self-borrowings have caused his admirers, his uses of preexistent music

by others have, for various reasons, raised comparatively few eyebrows.49 On the one hand, their small number does not seriously cast doubt on his facility of invention. On the other, the majority of these

borrowings and arrangements-excluding chorale tunes-are acknowl-

edged in his own hand or in those of copyists (effectively preempting the charge of plagiarism), belong to either the first or last decades of his career (inviting us to view them as special cases), or are readily con- struable as acts of expediency, undertakings of stylistic research, or ful- fillments of external commissions.

Thus stylistic research, external commission, or a combination of the two has been taken-implicitly or explicitly-to account for a number of

keyboard works written up to about 1714: the fugues on subjects of Albi- noni (BWV 946, 950, and 951/951a), Corelli (BWV 579), and Legrenzi (BWV 574/574a/574b); the arrangements of sonatas from Reinken's Hortus Musicus (BWV 954, 965, and 966) and by an unidentified com-

poser (BWV 967); and the arrangements of concertos by Vivaldi, Tele- mann, Johann Ernst, and others (BWV 592-97 and 972-87).50

49 The only general study of Bach's borrowings in toto is Norman Carrell, Bach the Borrower (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1967), now seriously out of date. A more recent and selective discussion of Bach's borrowings and arrangements is found in Werner Breig, "Composition as Arrangement and Adaptation," in The Cambridge Companion to Bach, ed. John Butt (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 154-70. On Bach's parody arrangements, see especially Ludwig Finscher, "Zum Parodieproblem bei Bach," in Bach-Interpretationen, ed. Martin Geck (G6ttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1969), 94-105-

5o However, with regard to the fugues on subjects of Albinoni, Michael Talbot ("A Further Borrowing from Albinoni: The C Major Fugue BWV 946," in Das Friihwerk Johann Sebastian Bachs, 143-61, at 156) has proposed that Bach's appropriations were made "in the spirit of an objet trouvi," without any intention of mastering a particular style or sur- passing a specific model. Other recent treatments of the fugues and sonata arrangements include Siegele, "Kompositionsweise und Bearbeitungstechnik," 11-22; Christoph Wolff, "Bach and Johann Adam Reinken: A Context for the Early Works," in Bach: Essays on His Life and Music, 56-71; Robert Hill, "Die Herkunft von Bachs 'Thema Legrenzianum,'" Bach-Jahrbuch LXXII (1986), 105-07; BeiBwenger, Notenbibliothek, 46-56; David Schulen- berg, The Keyboard Music ofJ. S. Bach (New York: Schirmer, 1992), 50-57 and 67-72; Breig, "Composition as Arrangement and Adaptation," 155-6o; and Karl Heller, Kritischer Bericht to NBA V/11 (Kassel: Birenreiter, 1997), 143-70. For the now generally accepted explanation of the concerto arrangements as commissioned works, see the publications by Hans-Joachim Schulze cited above in note 8. More recent studies of these arrangements include Christoph Wolff, "Vivaldi's Compositional Art, Bach, and the Process of 'Musical Thinking'," in Bach: Essays on His Life and Music, 72-83; Schulenberg, Keyboard Music, 90- 109; Klaus Hofmann, "Zum Bearbeitungsverfahren in Bachs Weimarer Concerti nach Vivaldis 'Estro Armonio' op. 3," in Das Friihwerk Johann Sebastian Bachs, 176- 201; and Heller, Kritischer Bericht, 17-142. Heller ("Die Klavierfuge BWV 955: Zur Frage ihres Au- tors und ihrer verschiedenen Fassungen," in Das Friihwerk Johann Sebastian Bachs, 130-41) has made a convincing case for regarding BWV 955/955a as a wholly original work by Bach, rather than an arrangement of music by Johann Christoph Erselius. It remains unclear what role, if any, Bach had in the creation of the organ trio BWV 586, possibly

Dow



ZOHN 8c PAYNE

Similarly, arrangements of Bassani's Acroama missale Masses (including the "Credo in unum Deum" BWV 1081), the "Suscepit Israel" from Caldara's Magnificat in C major (BWV 1082), Pergolesi's Stabat mater (the parody arrangement Tilge, H6chster, meine Siinden BWV 1083), and the Sanctus from Kerll's Missa Superba (BWV 241) seem both to have filled a need for new repertoire and afforded Bach the opportunity to

study different styles of sacred vocal music in his later years.51 Relatively few appropriations of others composers' music involving significant recomposition or addition can be confidently placed between these

chronological poles.52 The suite for violin and obbligato harpsichord BWV 1025, an arrangement of a lute suite by Silvius Leopold Weiss, seems to have originated around the time of the lutenist's visit to the Bach household in 1739.53 Somewhat earlier, probably around 1730, Bach fashioned the well known concerto in A minor for four harpsi- chords and strings BWV 1065 from Vivaldi's Op. 3, No. lo (RV 580).54 Apparently belonging to the middle Leipzig years as well is the sonata for flute and obbligato harpsichord BWV 1031, the first movement of which relies almost slavishly upon a trio by Johann Joachim Quantz.55 The number of eyebrows raised in reaction to this particular borrowing

transcribed from or based on a lost work by Telemann. The NBA has published the work as an "fUbertragung nach einer unbekannten Vorlage (?)." See Karl Heller, Kritischer Bericht to NBA IV/8 (Kassel: Birenreiter, 1980), 89-93.

51 On these and other Bach arrangements of sacred vocal works, see especially Hans T. David, "A Lesser Secret of J. S. Bach Uncovered," Journal of the American Musicological Society XIV/ 2 ( 1961), 199-2 23; Christoph Wolff, Der Stile Antico in der Musik Johann Sebas- tian Bachs: Studien zu Bachs Spdtwerk (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner, 1968), 21-23 and 62-63; Francesco Degrada, "Lo Stabat Mater di Pergolesi e la parodia di Bach," in Bach und die Italienische Musik--Bach e la musica Italiana, ed. Wolfgang Osthoff and Reinhard Wiesend (Venice: Centro tedesco di studi veneziani, 1987), 141-69; Peter Wollny, "Bachs Sanctus BWV 241 und Kerlls 'Missa Superba,' " Bach-Jahrbuch LXXVII (1991), 173-76; Kirsten BeiBwenger, "Bachs Eingriffe in Werke fremde Komponisten: Beobachtungen an den Notenhandschriften aus seiner Bibliothek unter besonderer Berficksichtigung der latei- nischen Kirchenmusik, Bach-Jahrbuch LXXVII (1991), 127-58; and BeiBwenger, Noten- bibliothek, Chapter 6. On the possibility that the first movement of the motet Jauchzet dem Herrn, alle Welt BWV Anh. 16o was at some point arranged by Bach from a Telemann motet of the same title (TWV 8:10o), see Klaus Hofmann, "Zur Echtheit der Motette 'Jauchzet dem Herrn, alle Welt' BWV Anh. 16o," in Bachiana et alia musicologica: Festschrift Alfred Diirr zum 65. Geburtstag am 3. Mdiirz 983, ed. Wolfgang Rehm (Kassel: Bfirenreiter, 1983), 126-40.

52 As BeiBwenger (Notenbibliothek, 65) points out with regard to the K6then period, the paucity of sources greatly complicates the identification of composers and works in which Bach took a special interest.

53 Christoph Wolff, "Das Trio A-Dur BWV 1025: Eine Lautensonate von Silvius Leopold Weiss bearbeitet und erweitert von Johann Sebastian Bach," Bach-Jahrbuch LXXIII (1993), 47-67.

54 Schulze, Studien zur Bach-Uberlieferung, 68. 55 See Jeanne Swack, "Quantz and the Sonata in E6 major for Flute and Cembalo,

BWV 1031," Early Music XIII/1 (1995), 31-53; Siegbert Rampe, "Bach, Quantz und das Musicalische Opfer," Concerto LXXXIV (1993), 15-23; and Dominik Sackmann and

573

Dow



574


might be far greater were it not for the questionable status of BWV 1031 as an authentic work by Bach. But if one accepts Bach's author-

ship, then the stylistic research explanation holds a particular attrac- tion, since the model is in a progressive style and belongs to the somewhat unusual subgenre of the Sonate auf Concertenart.

So BWV 1056/2 (156/1), if it does in fact date from the late Weimar or early K6then years, helps plug the chronological gap between Bach's early borrowings and arrangements and those of his final two decades. Beyond this, its unusual modeling process invites us to re- examine the issue of Bach's indebtedness to the music of other com-

posers, for it now appears that this indebtedness was not invariably "less a matter of imitation of a model than an awareness of the possibilities, an expansion of his own manner of writing and a stimulation of his musical ideas."56 In the case of BWV 1056/2 (156/1), the stimulation of Bach's invention appears to have resulted directly from close imitation of the Telemann model.

As it happens, there is a rich aesthetic context for the type of mod-

eling we have observed in Bach's Adagio, for his use of Telemann's music resonates deeply with the concept of transformative imitation as

propounded by many seventeenth- and eighteenth-century musicians, poets, and painters.57 Although this concept has figured in several recent studies of Handel's borrowings, it seems never to have been brought to bear on Bach's appropriations of music by others.58 The

Siegbert Rampe, "Bach, Berlin, Quantz und die Flotensonate Es-Dur BWV 1031," Bach- Jahrbuch LXXXIII (1997), 51-85. Swack has also suggested that the fourth movement of BWV 1033, another sonata of doubtful authenticity, is modeled in part on a sonata movement by Christoph F6rster. See her "On the Origins of the Sonate auf Concertenart," Jour- nal of the American Musicological Society XLVI/3 (1993), 367-414, at 399-401.

56 Christoph Wolff, 'Johann Sebastian Bach," in The New Grove Bach Family (New York: W. W. Norton, 1983), 164-

57 The term "transformative imitation" is itself borrowed from G. W. Pigman III, 'Versions of Imitation in the Renaissance," Renaissance Quarterly XXXIII (1980), 1-32.

58 However, the notion of Bach as a musical critic delighting in re-imagining the inventions of his own and others is frequently encountered in the scholarly literature. For example, Christoph Wolff ("Bach andJohann Adam Reinken," 71) acknowledges that "at a very early point, there emerge elements of the most characteristic and essential parame- ters of Bach's compositional art: the probing elaboration, modification, and transformation of a given musical res facta originating from himself or another composer, with the aim of improvement and further individualization." And Laurence Dreyfus (Bach and the Patterns of Invention [Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996], 58) notes that "wherever one looks in Bach's oeuvre, one observes a tendency to assimilate musically re- ceived ideas, subject them to criticism, and recast them in unusually idiosyncratic ways." Discussions of transformative imitation as it relates to Handel include Winemiller, "Han- del's Borrowing and Swift's Bee," chapters 4-6; "Recontextualizing Handel's Borrowing," Journal of Musicology XV/4 (1997), 444-70; George J. Buelow, '"The Case for Handel's Borrowings: The Judgement of Three Centuries," in Handel Tercentenary Collection, ed. Stanley Sadie and Anthony Hicks (London: Macmillan, 1987), 61-82; and John H.

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

principle of model-based composition or rhetorical imitation, as is well known, extends back to Classical Greece and Rome, where such writers as Seneca, Quintillian, Cicero, Homer, and Longinus regarded it as a fundamental basis of invention. Since then it has frequently been ex-

pressed through the metaphor of the bee, which, having selected ap- propriate raw material (nectar from flowers), proceeds to turn it into

something new and better (honey and wax). The idea that the thing borrowed must be improved by the borrower is indeed a common theme in, for example, the neoclassical literary criticism ofJohn Dryden, Jonathan Swift, and Alexander Pope, and in eighteenth-century English treatises on painting by Jonathan Richardson the elder and Joshua Reynolds.59 Still closer in time and place to Bach and Telemann, writers such as Kuhnau, Mattheson, Heinichen, Scheibe, and Quantz all indicate that the use of a preexistent work to stimulate one's compositional invention (ideally resulting in improvement of the model) was a wide-

spread-if not entirely uncontroversial-practice in early-eighteenth- century Germany.

Among musical aestheticians it is Mattheson who is most vocal on the subject of transformative imitation. In the July 1722 issue of Critica musica a brief mention of Handel's borrowings from one of Mattheson's arias ("almost note for note") begets a lengthy footnote on the subject of borrowing in general:

It can sometimes happen that someone by chance comes across certain ideas which he may have heard before, without even knowing where they came from, and without applying them intentionally. But some have in them a memory that is too good to be true and that is by far more successful than that of others-a memory such as others might wish; this must be very convenient for them. Besides this, there are two advantages to having such a memory: 1) that such ideas- especially if there is good elaboration, which usually is paired with empty invention-must inevitably also please their first inventor and rightful owner, since no one is wont to censure his own work; 2) that the latter suffers no particular disadvantage from this borrowing, but indeed gains an extraordinary honor, if a famous man now and then happens upon his track, and-as it were-borrows from him the very

Roberts, "Why did Handel Borrow?," in Handel Tercentenary Collection, 83-92. The notion of imitation as a stimulus to invention has of course also figured prominently in studies of other musical repertories. For a review of recent studies on imitation in Renaissance music, see Honey Meconi, "Does Imitatio Exist?,"Journal of Musicology XII/2 (1994), 152-78. A broad survey of borrowing as a field of study is provided byJ. Peter Burkholder, "The Uses of Existing Music: Music Borrowing as a Field," Notes L/3 (1994), 851-70.

59 For an overview of classical and neoclassical conceptions of transformative imitation, see Winemiller, "Handel's Borrowing and Swift's Bee," 75-107; and "Recontextualiz- ing Handel's Borrowing," 447-49.

575

Dow



576


basis of his ideas. If only three people know, that is already honor

enough! ... Those people, however, who turn the invention into a

plagium, and who, as such, wish to excuse themselves with a pleasant elaboration, are on the wrong path and reason falsely....All elaboration-beautiful as it may be-is only interest; but the invention itself compares to the capital.6o

Mattheson comes across as a reluctant advocate of borrowing, seeming to

prefer that composers elaborate their own ideas, the musical "capital." But those who wish to pay interest on another's capital may apparently do so if they substantially transform the borrowed idea, rather than en-

gage in the superficial elaboration associated with plagiarism. And one test of a successful elaboration is whether it pleases the idea's "rightful owner," who may consider it a high form of flattery if the borrowing is done by a famous composer. Nearly two decades later, in Der vollkommene Capellmeister, Mattheson explains that all imitation falls into one of three

categories: 1) Aristotelian mimesis of nature ("all sorts of natural things and affections"); 2) "the effort one makes to imitate this or that master of musician's work, which is quite a good thing so long as no actual musical

thievery takes place in the process"; or 3) the successive imitation of "for- mulas, passages, or short phrases" (contrapuntal imitation).61 Further

6o Johann Mattheson, Critica Musica 1 (Hamburg: Mattheson, 1722; repr. Amster- dam: Frits Knuf, 1964), 72, note m: "Es kann wohl bisweilen kommen/daB einer/von ungefehr/auf gewisse Einfille st6sset/die er ehmahls geh6rt haben mag/ohne eben zu wissen/wo? und ohne dieselbe mit Vorsatz zu appliciren. Doch haben einige darinn eine fast verdichtige und weit glficklichere reminiscentiam, als andere wfinschen m6chten; welches ihnen sehr bequem fallen muB. Ausser diesem sind noch 2. Vortheile dabey: 1) DaB dergleichen Sachen/bevorab bey guter elaboration, (die sich gemeiniglich zu leeren Erfindungen gesellet) unausbleiblich allen/auch so gar/deren ersten Erfindern und rechten Eignern/gefallen mfissen: weil niemand sein eignes Machwerk zu tadeln plegt. 2) DaB diesen letzten daraus kein sonderlicher Nachtheil/wohl aber eine ungemeine Ehre zuwichst/wenn ein berithmter Mann ihm dann und wann auf die Spuhr gerith/ und gleichsam seiner Gedanken wahren Grund von ihm borget. Soltens auch nur drey wissen/so ist es schon Ehre genug! ... Diejenigen Leute aber/so ein plagium daraus machen/und es/qua tale, mit der glficklichen Ausarbeitung entschuldigen wollen/sind auf dem unrechten Wege/und raisonniren falsch.... Alle elaboratio, sie sey so sch6n wie sie wolle/ist nur mit Zinsen; die inventio aber mit dem Capital selbst zu vergleichen." Translated in Winemiller, "Handel's Borrowing and Swift's Bee," 266-67 (with modifica- tions).

61 Johann Mattheson, Der volkommene Capellmeister (Hamburg: Christian Herold, 1739; repr. Kassel: Birenreiter, 1954), 331, ? 4: "Diese Nachahmung nun hat in der Music dreierley zu bedeuten. Denn erstlich finden wir Gelegenheit, dergleichen Uibung [sic] mit allerhand natfirlichen Dingen und Gemfiths-Neigungen anzustellen, worin schier das gr6sseste Hfilfsmittel der Erfindung bestehet, wie an seinem Orte gesaget worden ist. Fiurs andre wird diejenige Bemiihung verstanden, so man sich gibt, dieses oder jenen Meisters und Ton-Kiinstlers Arbeit nachzumachen: welches eine gantz gute Sache ist, so lange kein f6rmlicher Musicalischer Raub dabey mit unterliufft. Drittens bemercket man durch die Nachahmung denjenigen angenehmen Wettstreit, welchen verschiedene Stim- men fiber gewisse F6rmelgen, Ginge oder kurtze Sitze mit aller Freiheit unter einander

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

softening his stance on borrowing in the chapter on invention, he states that returning a worthy object of imitation with interest is a necessary condition for borrowing, which is an acceptable and nearly universal practice:

The locus exemplorum could mean here the imitation of other composers, but only if fine models are chosen and the inventions are simply imitated-not copied or stolen. When all is said and done, if most is fetched out of the source for invention in just the sense we take it here, then that should not be censured--but only if it is done with restraint. Borrowing is permissible; but one must return the thing borrowed with interest, i.e., one must so construct and develop imitations that they are prettier and better than the pieces from which they are derived.

Whoever does not need to do this and has enough resources of his own, need not begrudge such; yet I believe that there are very few of this sort: as even the greatest capitalists are given to borrowing money, if they see special advantage or benefit in it.62

Mattheson's cautions here and elsewhere about "stolen" inventions and "musical thievery" imply, of course, that he perceived much bor-

rowing in early-eighteenth-century Germany as outright plagiarism by virtue of its too literal and crude appropriation of others' music.63 And he seems to have been joined in this perception by Heinichen, Quantz, and Kuhnau. In the latter's satirical novel Der musicalische Quack-Salber

ffihren" (footnotes omitted). Translated by Ernest C. Harriss as Johann Mattheson's Der volkommene Capellmeister (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1981), 637-

62 Mattheson, Der volkommene Capellmeister, 131-32, ?81-82: "Der locus exemplorum konnte wol in diesem Fall auf eine Nachahmung andrer Componisten gedeutet werden, wenn nur seine Muster dazu erwehlet, und die Erfindungen bloB imitiret, nicht aber nachgeschrieben und entwendet wfirden. Wenn endlich alles um und um k6mmt, wird aus dieser Exempel-Qvelle, so wie wir sie hier nehmen, wol das meiste hergeholet: es ist auch solches nicht zu tadeln, wenn nur mit Bescheidenheit dabey verfahren wird. Entlehnen ist eine erlaubte Sache; man muB aber das Entlehnte mit Zinsen erstatten, d.i. man muB die Nachahmungen so einrichten und ausarbeiten, daB sie ein sch6neres und besseres Ansehen gewinnen, als die Satze, aus welchen sie entlehnet sind. War es nicht n6thig hat und von selbst Reichthum gnug besitzet, dem stehet solches sehr wol zu g6nnen; doch glaude ich, daB deren sehr wenig sind: maassen auch die grossesten Capi- talisten wol Gelder aufzunehmen pflegen, wenn sie ihre besondere Vortheile oder Be- qvemlichkeit dabey ersehen." Translated in Harriss, Johann Mattheson's Der vollkommene Capellmeiste , 298.

63 In his treatise on melody, Mattheson mentions those "that happily snap up a for- eign invention from the mass of things that fall under their hands, of which often not two notes are their own. But they know how to arrange, elaborate, and embellish this theft so skillfully that it is a pleasure." Johann Mattheson, Kern melodischer Wissenschaft (Hamburg, 1737; repr. Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1976), 128, ?3: "Hiergegen gibt es andre, die er- schnappen gerne eine fremde Erfindung aus derjenigen Menge Sachen, die ihnen unter die Hdnde gerathen, davon doch oft nicht zwo Noten ihre eigene sind; sie wissen diese Entwendung aber dermassen geschickt einzurichten, auszuarbeiten und zu schmficken, daB es eine Lust ist."

577

Dow



578


(1700), the fictional composer is a plagiarist who takes "all his invention from the music he had copied," without understanding "the art by which the most beautiful invention can often be extracted from the best songs."64 Heinichen, writing in 1728, reports on the considerable trouble taken by composers to avoid the charge of plagiarism, and the

zealotry of those doing the charging:

Indeed, even nowadays one has to avoid the misfortune to include in so many large theatrical works a single aria or even a melodic pattern of a few notes seeming to have the slightest similarity with a former work. For even if these [similarities] are only approximations and occur contrary to the composer's intention, or the inventions are barely similar in tertio, quarto, comparable to women who resemble each other in sexufeminino; there will be those who will in stupidity and pas- sion take the opportunity to rebuke the composer for plagiarism (because he who could not write instead of such a little formula twenty others extemporaneously must be considered a poor composer).65

In a subsequent footnote discussing the efficacy of the rhetorical loci topici as a stimulant to a composer's "natural imagination," Heinichen mentions

"musical raw beginners," evidently in Italy, who mechanically appropri- ate ideas from others without adequately "restirring the brew." Composers of integrity, he adds, avoid listening to "great" music before composing, thus eliminating the possibility of inadvertently including a reference to it in their own works and arousing the "suspicion of ignorant censors."66

64 Johann Kuhnau, Der musicalische Quack-Salber (Dresden, 1700); quoted and translated in Roberts, "Why did Handel Borrow?," 85-86.

65 Johann David Heinichen, Der Generalbass in der Composition (Dresden: Heinichen, 1728; repr. Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1969), 29: "Ja man hat sich noch heut zu Tage vor dem Unglfick zu hfiten/daB man in so viel und grossen Theatralischen Wercken nicht eine einzige Aria, oder nur eine Clausul von wenig Noten noch einmahl vorbringe/ welche etwan einer ehemahligen Invention auch nur in den geringsten piinctgen ahnlich scheinet. Dann wann solches gleich nur ohngefehr und wieder die Intention des Compo- nisten also gerathen/oder die Inventiones kaum in tertio, quarto, wie alle Weibsbilder einander in sexu fceminino gleichen: so wollen doch unverstindige/und passionirte gleich daher Gelegenheit nehmen/den Componisten vor einen plagiarium zu schelten (da es doch ein schlechter Componiste seyn mfiste/welcher statt eines solchen formulgen nicht ex tempore 20o. andere hinzuschreiben wfiste)." Translated in George J. Buelow, Thorough-Bass Accompaniment According to Johann David Heinichen, rev. ed. (Lincoln, Neb.: University of Nebraska Press, 1986), 330.

66 Heinichen, Der Generalbass in der Composition, 32-34, note m: "... gleichwie bey gewissen Nationibus manche Musicalische Frischlinge zu sagen pflegen: bi sogna farsi idea, damit lauffen sie in andere Musiquen, und schreiben hernach den Kern der besten Gedancken anderer Compositorum, mit einer kaum etwas verdnderten Brfihe, wieder in ihre Arbeit hinein. Ordentlicher weise aber vermeyden behutsame Compositores die Gele- genheit, kurz vorhers grosse Musiquen zu h6ren, wenn sie selbst dergleichen zu setzen im Wercke begriffen sind, aus Furcht, daB nicht, wie zu geschehen pfleget, wider unsern Willen etwas hangen bleibe, welches den Componisten durch Innocente Niederschreibung

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

More than two decades later, Quantz also speaks of novice Italian opera composers who, having won popular acclaim despite their insufficient training, avail themselves of music by others when cobbling together their latest operas: '"They bring along their inventions not in their heads but in their luggage."67 But it was not simply a matter of certain Italians "decking themselves out in another's plumes," for Quantz more generally cautions the beginner to avoid the works of "self-taught composers who have not learned composition through either oral or written instruction.... The majority consist of a hodgepodge of borrowed and patched-up ideas."'68 Evidently wishing to disassociate himself from such autodidactic plagiarizers, Quantz points out in his autobiography that as a novice composer he managed to study "the scores of acknowl-

edged masters, attempting to imitate trios and concertos and their method of composition, without actually writing them down."69

If the line between "patched-up" thievery and original invention in these passages often seems faintly drawn, it is surely by design, since Mattheson's "prettier and better" is as impossible to objectify as musical "interest" is to calculate; we can hardly expect to be told exactly how much and what manner of transformation is sufficient to convert a plagiarism into an original work of art. But as George Buelow has

seiner vermeynten eigenen Gedanken bey unverst~indigen Censoribus in Verdacht bringen k6nne." See the translation in Buelow, Thorough-Bass Accompaniment, 331.

67 Johann Joachim Quantz, Versuch einer anweisung die Fl6te traversiere zu spielen (Berlin: Johann Friedrich VoB, 1752; repr. Kassel: Birenreiter, 1983), 13-14, ?14: "Deswegen ah- met einer dem andern nach, schreibt seine Arbeit aus, oder giebt wohl gar fremde Arbeit ffir seine eigene aus, wie die Erfahrung lehret; zumal wenn dergleichen Naturalisten sich gen6thiget finden, ihr Glfick in fremden Landen zu suchen; und die Erfindungen nicht im Kopfe, sondern im Koffer mit sich ffihren. Haben sie auch allenfalls noch die Fihigkeit, etwas aus ihrem Kopfe zu erfinden, ohne sich mit fremden Federn zu schmficken; so wenden sie doch selten die geh6rige Zeit an, die ein so weitlauftiges Werk, als eine Oper ist, erfodert.... Es pfleget also denenjenigen, die sich auf das Ausschrei- ben legen, oft fehl zu schlagen: so daB man bald merken kann, ob die Gedanken aus einem einzigen Kopfe ihren Ursprung haben; oder ob sie nur auf eine mechanische Art zusammen gesetzet worden sind." Translated in Reilly, On Playing the Flute, 20-21.

68 Quantz, Versuch, 98, ?21: "[Ein Anflinger] hiute sich vornehmlich ffir den Stficken der selbst gewachsenen Componisten, welche die Setzkunst weder durch miindliche, noch durch schriftliche Anweisung erlernet haben: denn darinne kan weder ein Zusam- menhang der Melodie, noch richtige Harmonie anzutreffen seyn. Die meisten laufen auf einen Mischmasch von entlehnten und zusammen geflickten Gedanken hinaus." Trans- lated in Reilly, On Playing the Flute, 1 17.

69 JohannJoachim Quantz, "Herrn Johann Joachim Quantzens Lebenslauf, von ihm selbst entworfen," in Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg, Historisch-kritische Beytrdge zur Aufnahme der Musik, vol. 1, "Stfick 5" (Berlin: Schfitz, 1755), 21o; repr. in Willi Kahl, Selbstbiographien deutscher Musiker des XVIII. Jahrhunderts (Cologne: Staufen-Verlag, 1948), 171: "Indessen studirte ich, in Erwartung einer bequemern Gelegenheit, die Partituren grfindlicher Meister fleiBig durch, und suchte ihrer Setzart, in Trios und Concerten nachzuahmen, doch ohne auszuschreiben." Translated in Paul Nettl, Forgotten Musicians (New York: Philosophical Library, 1951), 290o.

579

Dow



580


shown, Mattheson comes very close to telling us.70 A passage in Der volkommene Capellmeister describes the collecting of "moduli"-assorted brief melodic figures, turns, cadences, etc.-as a good way of building a compositional vocabulary. Even if these snippets come from the works of others (which is, Mattheson tells us, the best way of collecting them), their combination into a new melody constitutes a "unique invention." Yet Mattheson cautions that building such a vocabulary is best done

mentally, as constructing melodies from a collection of written-down moduli will likely result in a "lame and botched arrangement, if one's

clumsy melody is patched together from such bits."71 This sort of mind- less ars combinatoria is presumably the kind of process that Heinichen and Quantz inveighed against-and what "ignorant censors" of the time regarded as plagiarism. Indeed, Mattheson's own example of a four-measure phrase derived from three motives makes it plain that at least a modest degree of transformative imitation was expected when

composing with moduli. One logical inference to be drawn from the writings of Mattheson

and other German critics is that most musicians of Bach's time would have considered the process of transformative imitation in BWV 1056/2 (156/1) to pay back Telemann's invention with more than the

requisite interest. But would Bach's Adagio have pleased Telemann himself, the "first inventor and rightful owner" (to use Mattheson's

phrase) of the borrowed ideas? An answer in the affirmative seems to be provided by a brief passage in Scheibe's Ueber die musikalische Compo- sition (1773). After acknowledging that Handel and Hasse often borrowed the inventions of Reinhard Keiser, Scheibe points out that they nevertheless understood "the art of making these inventions their own, so that they were transformed in their hands into new and original ideas. Mattheson and Telemann assured me of this more than once, and in light of other reliable reports I cannot doubt it."72 We have every reason to believe Scheibe's assertion that Telemann knew and ap- proved of Handel's borrowings, for the two composers were intimately familiar with each other's music, Telemann having performed many of Handel's operas at Hamburg, and Handel having borrowed liberally

70 George J. Buelow, "Mattheson's Concept of 'Moduli' as a Clue to Handel's Com- positional Process," Giittinger Hdndel-Beitrage, vol. 3, ed. Hans Joachim Marx (Kassel: BWrenreiter, 1987), 272-78.

7' Mattheson, Der volkommene Capellmeister, 122-23; translated in Buelow, "Matthe- son's Concept of 'Moduli,' " 274-76.

72 Johann Adolph Scheibe, Ueber die musikalische Composition, Erster Theil: Theorie der Melodie und Harmonie (Leipzig: Schwickert, 1773), liii; quoted and translated in John H. Roberts, "Handel's Borrowings from Keiser," Goittinger Hdndel-Beitrage, vol. 2, ed. Hans Joachim Marx (Kassel: Bidrenreiter, 1986): 51-76, at 51. Another translation of the passage is given in Buelow, "The Case for Handel's Borrowings," 64.

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

from Telemann's Harmonischer Gottes-Dienst, Musique de table, and Sonates sans basse over the course of more than two decades.73 And given that Bach's process of imitation in BWV 1056/2 (156/1) unquestionably produces "new and original ideas" and closely mirrors some of Han- del's own borrowing procedures, one must imagine that Telemann would have sanctioned it.

This report of Telemann's apparently sympathetic stance towards transformative imitation is corroborated by a growing body of evidence that he, too, practiced the craft at various stages of his career. In his

quartet for recorder, violin, viola, and continuo TWV 43:g4, probably written at Eisenach, Telemann borrowed both principal motives in the "Allamande" from Partia IV of Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber's Harmo- nia arificiosa-ariosa, first published in 1696.74 Three movements from the E-minor orchestral suite TWV 55:e8, which turn out to be dances from the lost 1724 opera Omphale (TWV 21:14), are dependent upon dances from the 1701 opera of the same name by Andre Cardinal Destouches.75 And the theme of the variation movement concluding the A-minor quartet for flute, violin, viola da gamba or cello, and continuo TWV 43:a2, published in the Nouveaux quatuors en Six Suites (Paris, 1738), is based upon the A-minor Gavotte et doubles in Jean- Philippe Rameau's Nouvelles suites de pieces de clavecin (Paris, 1728).76 In each of these borrowings Telemann, like Handel and Bach, critiques and recontextualizes material from his model: though the two motives

73 Roberts ("Handel's Borrowings from Telemann," 148) points out that Harmoni- scher Gottes-Dienst apparently furnished more ideas for Handel than any other single external source. It is possible that Handel's reliance on Telemann's music extended back to the beginnings of their careers, when the two young composers discussed melodic matters through written correspondence and during visits in Leipzig and Halle. See Tele- mann's 1740 autobiography in Johann Mattheson, Grundlage einer Ehren-Pforte (Hamburg: Mattheson, 1740; repr. Kassel: Birenreiter, 1969), 359-

74 Telemann's borrowing, discovered by Reinhard Goebel, was first reported in Ruhnke, Telemann-Werkverzeichnis, vol. 2, 175. On the dating of Biber's collection see Eric Chafe, The Church Music ofHeinrich Biber (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1987), 241.

75 Peter Huth, '"Telemanns Hamburger Opern nach franz6sischem Vorbild," in Franz6sische Einfliisse auf deutsche Musiker im 18. Jahrhundert, o10. Arolser Barock- Festspiele 1995, Tagungsbericht, Arolser Beitrige zur Musikforschung, vol. 4, ed. Fried- helm Brusniak and Annemarie Clostermann (Cologne: Studio, 1996), 115-45, at 30- 32. For a modern edition of Telemann's suite, see Ian Payne, ed., Georg Philipp Telemann: Ouverture in E minor for Two Violins, Viola, and Basso Continuo, Severinus Urtext Telemann Edition, vol. 124 (Hereford: Severinus Press, 1999).

76 One might consider this borrowing as something of an hommage a Rameau, whose acquaintance Telemann may have made during his Paris visit of 1737-38. Rameau's movement may itself be borrowed in part from Handel, as Kenneth Gilbert has noted the strong resemblance of the first three variations to those of the "Air con Variazioni" movement in the Suite in D minor HWV 428 (Suites de pisces pour le clavecin [London, 1720]). See Gilbert, ed., Jean-Philippe Rameau, Pieces de clavecin (Paris: Heugel, 1979; Le Pupitre 59), x. Rameau could also have known Handel's movement from the early D-minor suite HWV 449, a work that is thought to date from the composer's Hamburg period.

581

Dow



582


of Biber's allemande are adopted almost literally, they are subjected to more rigorous contrapuntal treatment and now furnish most of the thematic material in a ritornello-form movement with a "solo" recorder; Destouches' dances provide the structure, dimensions, and rhythmic profile for Telemann's, but musical "interest" is paid through frequent and extensive departures in melody and harmony; and while the

melody of Telemann's variation theme begins very much like Rameau's, it is presented in octaves rather than in Rameau's sixths or tenths, is im- bued with greater rhythmic interest and given a richer harmonization, and more or less follows its own course after the first eight measures.

Returning to Bach, something of his own view toward imitation can be gleaned from a contemporary account of his playing. In 1741 Jo- hann Leberecht Pitschel reported that Bach the improviser was not warmed up until his powers of invention had been roused by playing the music of other composers.

You know, the famous man who has the greatest praise in our town in music, and the greatest admiration of connoisseurs, does not get into condition, as the expression goes, to delight others with the mingling of his tones until he has played something from the printed or written page, and has [thus] set his powers of imagination in motion. ... The able man whom I have mentioned usually has to play something from the page that is inferior to his own ideas. And yet his superior ideas are the consequences of those inferior ones.77

This passage could almost be a description of Handel's creative process. Pitschel's last sentence seems to indicate that the improvisations were

generated through transformative imitation (Bach's ideas were the

"consequences" [Folgen] of the others), but we cannot be certain of how the "superior" and "inferior" ideas actually related to each other. It is in any event clear that, as far as Pitschel was concerned, Bach's creative powers were in no small measure dependent upon the external stimulation of other composers' music. The report meshes nicely with two often-cited recollections by C.P.E. Bach that testify to the intellec- tual stimulation his father derived from music by others. In the obitu- ary written with the help of Johann Friedrich Agricola in 1750, Emanuel noted that his father "needed only to have heard any theme to be aware-it seemed in the same instant-of almost every intricacy that artistry could produce in the treatment of it."78 Much later, in a December 1774 letter to Forkel, Emanuel recalled that his father liked to improvise a fourth contrapuntal voice when accompanying the trios

77 Bach-Dokumente, vol. 2, No. 499; The New Bach Reader, No. 336. 78 Bach-Dokumente, vol. 3, No. 666; The New Bach Reader, No. 306.

Dow



ZOHN & PAYNE

of other composers, a practice which recalls the arranging process in BWV 1025.79

Although the theory of transformative imitation may help explain the aesthetic impulses behind Bach's borrowing of Telemann's music, and in particular why he sought to reconceptualize the model so thor-

oughly after the opening measures, it cannot tell us why he chose to borrow from this particular piece in the first place. Perhaps the sim-

plest explanation is that Bach's interest in Telemann's Andante was based upon the quality of its musical invention and its potential for elaboration. Another explanation would emphasize the novelty of Tele- mann's concerto in the realms of style and scoring. Indeed, the musical

language of TWV 51:G2 is far more individualized than that of either TWV 51:g1 or 52:G2, both distinctive works that, as Bach must have

recognized at Weimar, are nevertheless firmly rooted in the turn-of-the-

century concerto styles of Albinoni and Torelli. And to a German com-

poser in the second decade of the eighteenth century, a solo wind concerto was probably still something of an exotic animal. It is worth

recalling in this respect that of all the Bach concerto transcriptions whose sources are known, only one-the Marcello transcription BWV 974-is based on a solo wind concerto. Moreover, few of Walther's sur-

viving transcriptions, presumably made around the time of Bach's, appear to take wind concertos as their models.80 In fact, TWV 51:G2 and the Marcello concerto, perhaps along with others of Telemann's oboe concertos and Albinoni's Op. 7 (1715), may well have been the first solo wind concertos Bach encountered at Weimar or K6then.8l One

might also speculate that Bach's borrowing was to some degree moti- vated by feelings of admiration for and competition with his older

79 Bach-Dokumente, vol. 3, No. 8oi01; The New Bach Reader, No. 394; Bach-Urkunden, [24-27].

so Among the sixteen or so Walther concerto transcriptions discussed in note 8 and edited by Klaus Beckmann in Johann Gottfried Walther (1684-1748): Sdmtliche Orgelwerke, vol. 1: Freie Orgelwerke, Konzerttranskriptionen (Wiesbaden: Breitkopf & Hirtel, 1998), only that of TWV 52:cl is clearly based on a work with a solo wind instrument. Despite the fact that many, if not most, of Walther's transcriptions appear to have been lost, there is no reason to doubt that the surviving examples are representative of the types of concertos he encountered during the 171os. In his 1740 autobiography Walther claimed to have made 78 keyboard transcriptions ("aufs clavier applicirte Stficke") of works by other composers. See Johann Mattheson, Grundlage einer Ehren-Pforte (Hamburg: Mattheson, 1740; repr. Graz: Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt, 1969), 389. Most of Walther's surviving concerto transcriptions are also published in Max Seiffert, ed., Johann Gottfried Walther: Gesammelte Werke fiir Orgel, Denkmiler deutscher Tonkunst, vols. 26-27 (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Hfirtel, 1906; repr. Graz: Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt, 1958), 285-364-

81 Butler ('j. S. Bach's Reception of Tomaso Albinoni's Mature Concertos," 31) suggests that Bach's contact with Albinoni's Op. 7 is unlikely to have occurred before the fall of 1717, and perhaps not until several years later.

583

Dow



584


friend Telemann, who in the years before 1715 was probably a more ex-

perienced composer of concertos and other types of instrumental ensemble music. In appropriating elements of Telemann's Andante, then, Bach may have sought simultaneously to pay a compliment to his friend (interest and all) and to demonstrate his emerging mastery of the concerto as a genre.

But let us not be tempted by indications that BWV 1056/2 (156/1) is a relatively early work to dismiss the act or nature of Bach's modeling as a youthful indiscretion, unthinkable from the mature composer of the late K6then or early Leipzig years. There is no reason to believe that Bach would have outgrown this kind of transformative imitation after a certain point in his career; Telemann and Handel clearly did not, although some details of the latter's practice changed over time,82 and Mattheson stresses that imitating the works of others, properly done, is far more than a pedagogical tool for inexperienced composers. Nor are we in an ideal position to determine, given the small repertory of Bach's known borrowings from other composers, whether the process of imitation in BWV 1056/2 (156/1) is more reflective of his

technique in 1712, 1717, or even 1722. But questions of the work's chronology aside, the discovery that one of Bach's most famous slow movements owes its inspiration to Telemann not only enriches the musical and aesthetic context in which we may understand his achieve- ment, but imposes a fresh layer of meaning onto Adorno's bon mot, "they say Bach, mean Telemann."83

Temple University Open University

82 For example, Roberts ("Handel's Borrowings from Telemann," 151) notes that the size of Handel's individual appropriations from Telemann gradually increased between the late 172os and late 1730s.

83 Theodor Adorno, "Bach Defended against His Devotees" [1951], in Prisms: Cul- tural Criticism and Society, trans. Samuel and Shierry Weber (London: Spearman, 1967; repr. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1981), 135-46, at 145.

Dow

