The Manuscripts of the Inventions

About the Manuscripts

Someone said: the Internet is the greatest library of the world! Only, it is an unusual library where the books are scattered on the floor so you can really find anything just by chance...

I felt the same way when I researched the net for pictures of the original manuscripts (MSs) of the Inventions... I couldn’t find anything almost!

I thought to myself: this can’t be! The Inventions are the most important teaching material in the history of the piano and we can’t have access to the MSs on the Internet collected?!

But then I thought: well, this is an opportunity! Let’s make this blog a proper place for the manuscripts. I will try to locate, download and upload all the original manuscripts of the Inventions.

I’d greatly appreciate if you could help me in this!

Why is it important to see the Manuscripts of the pieces?

Maybe it’s only me but I always found it very-very intriguing and inspiring to look at the original handwriting of a writer or composer. Simply, just seeing the ”original energy” on paper is revealing! Just think of the heroic battle of Beethoven, Chopin or Liszt on the paper itself... or the magnificent cleanliness of Mozart’s handwriting... (well, of course, if you happened to see them!)

Bach’s handwriting is very neat. It’s always clean – and revealing. Somehow, the motifs come alive much better than on the printed sheets. (Especially the fugues are revealing)

And very importantly – the phrasing of the music becomes more understandable, too.

For example, in Invention Nr. 2, the phrasing in my “Urtext edition” is incorrect: it doesn’t follow Bach’s original intention, in which he clearly wanted to articulate the phrases with the first note being a staccato (quick and non-legato) note! (And for that matter, not even the great Andras Schiff or Glenn Gould are playing the theme and the piece “correctly” if I may say so... just listen to their otherwise beautiful recordings of the Inventions)

But I happened to find the Manuscript of the Invention Nr.1. (well, a fragment of it)

Take a look at the picture I attach (the MS of the Invention Nr.1): look at the beautiful handwriting of Bach and the simplicity of the idea of music! It’s worth contemplating on this picture. Look at the symbols of silence... all very logically and neatly laid out. I think it’s nonsense that Bach just jotted down these notes while teaching at the piano... he must have been sitting alone – and composing the whole thing in his head alone.

So: let’s find the manuscripts together!

It would be a great help if you could help me where to find them! Thanks!  :o)

David

How Bach taught his pupils

On Wikipedia, one can read very interesting stuff on how Bach taught his pupils to play the piano.

Bach  introduced the collection with the following words: "Honest method, by which the amateurs of the keyboard – especially, however, those desirous of learning – are shown a clear way not only (1) to learn to play cleanly in two parts, but also, after further progress, (2) to handle three obligate parts correctly and well; and along with this not only to obtain good inventions (ideas) but to develop the same well; above all, however, to achieve a cantabile style in playing and at the same time acquire a strong foretaste of composition."

It is a very short and very dense text so we need to analyze it a bit – as it is very-very revealing!

First of all: Bach says it is an HONEST method. To be a good musician  - one has to be first and foremost an honest person.  Interesting! Arturo Toscanini, one of the most famous conductors of the 20^th century (a musician I hold in very high esteem) praised honesty as the single most desirable quality in a musician. What does honesty mean in a musician? For me: (a) sticking to what is written in the  composition, (b) playing counterpoint clearly (c) reflecting deeply on what emotions does the music transmits.

Second: Bach emphasizes of learning to play cleanly in two parts. This is not an easy thing! In fact, the great wonder of this is, if you can play two tunes simultaneously you can then play even more voices at the same time...

Third: Bach taught his pupils gradually... only after one has learned to play well two-parts one can go further playing three obligate parts as well.

And Fourth , “above all” – to achieve a cantabile style in playing – while acquiring a strong foretaste of composition. Cantabile style: this notion – I think – misled many. For Bach, this notion meant that one plays the part as melodies, lines, melodically and interpreting these sounds as things that ‘mean’ something – and not just for the sake of counterpoint.

As for the “strong foretaste of composition” – these are truly amazing pieces that are perfectly capable of showing good compositional method to pupils of all age and maturity. There is not a single bar in these pieces that wouldn’t have a relation with the main theme of the piece. There is not a single bar that couldn’t be understandable in the light of the preceding material or the main themes. They are perfectly logical and organic. They are separate universes on their own! They all have their own rules. They establish rules, follow them and bring them to full fruition. They are true to their keys and moods. They are modern. They are efficient. They are melodic, rhythmic and yet mystical compositions all the way through. They are true Bach-music!

And they are - as I learned about them very soon – not easy pieces.

They are only recommended only to ‘those desirous of learning’ – other pupils will simply be discouraged from further learning.

According to the pianists themselves, such as Andras Schiff, (who is maybe today the foremost interpreter of Bach’s music in the world) playing Bach’s music is the most difficult challenge for a musician – and for a pianist. Not only technically – but musically speaking. Anyone, who can master Bach’s music, can master any other kind of music. The problem is – mastering Bach’s music is the greatest musical challenge of all.

About the Inventions

What the Inventions are about

The Inventions are musical ideas – it is said that Bach wrote the pieces while teaching his pupils, giving them good material to practice them. But probably he composed them alone for his pupils. We don’t know how Bach improvised and how he composed his pieces but according to his contemporaries his improvisations were unlike others. (He was such a great player that even after his death he was remembered as a supreme organist and as a composer – one can imagine the effect of his playing on his audience). So probably he was able to compose very quickly, while maintaining a level of very high intelligence in his pieces.

The great miracle of the Inventions is that all of the music is organically derived from the theme of the piece in question. As a good example, analysts usually show the C-Major Nr.1 Invention, where virtually all the bars stem for the first musical theme of the piece. This means there is not a single bar in the piece that would have not derived from the theme! And that is probably the very reason why Bach was never equaled by any other composer. The level of intelligence of his pieces has never been challenged by anyone (maybe Beethoven comes closest, in my view).

So the Inventions are very-very closely knit tapestries, in which there is nothing that is not derived from the main theme!

What it means in terms of playing these pieces: the musician (and the listener, of course!) is intellectually challenged all the way through, not only physically, technically and musically. To play any of the pieces the player has to attain such a complete focus that is only alike of deep meditation. Nothing can be on the mind of the player, only that peculiar bar he/she is playing and the piece as a whole.

That’s why the Inventions are difficult to play!

But maybe it’s not right to say that.

The Inventions are challenging pieces and only those musicians can play them who are mature enough musically, technically and intellectually for them!

Johann Sebastian Bach Inventions Blog

“Mastering Bach’s music is the greatest musical challenge of all”

Welcome!

This blog is about Johann Sebastian Bach’s Inventions – and about my personal journey toward learning how to master playing them well.

My primary goal is to learn to play piano music – as if my private piano teacher would be Johann Sebastian Bach, himself. Not a bad choice, isn’t it? :o)

Bach’s Inventions – the 15 two-part small musical compositions – was the basis of how Johann Sebastian Bach instructed his pupils.

The pieces represent the ”pillars of artistic piano playing”  as József Gát, the editor of the Hungarian edition aptly put it.

When I had the idea of having Bach teaching me to play the piano, I started a little background research. I learned from Wikipedia and other sources about Bach that he first had his pupils (including his wife and his sons) learn the small pieces from the “Clavierbüchlein für Anna Magdalena Bach”.

Nevertheless, I had a strange feeling about the pieces in that collection: most of the times they struck me as “strange Bach” music, but I dispersed the idea with the thought that the pieces must have been written for pedagogical reasons. Only later did I learn that these pieces were NOT written by him – with the exception of one (D minor) Menuet that on the other hand resembled true Bach music, like a violin piece from one of the sonatas, for example.

So, finally, I turned to the Two-Part Inventions.

They didn’t appear to be difficult pieces (yes, that was a very foolish thought) so I said to myself: LET’S PLAY THEM ALL, let’s go through them QUICK! Well, I didn’t go through them quick – to say the least. :(

Ever since I started playing them around 2010 Spring, I find more and more stuff for practice as if they were a never-ending source for learning!  This was the first miracle...

Every day I learn newer and newer things about them, about my own playing, about music, about counterpoint and music-writing...

So the day came when I realized: I must write down my experience! I should start a blog on this! God knows... maybe only for myself. Or maybe others will join me... who knows.

I thought this blog might help other people playing Bach’s music. It’s my way of rediscovering Bach’s music: from the onsets. I imagined this blog as a Traveller’s Diary. This is a journey towards Bach’s music – and towards myself.

Hope you will enjoy it – as I myself enjoyed writing and experiencing it.

Happy reading!     :o)

David