Falling In Love with J.S.

Let me guess. You have questions. Who is J. S.? When did you meet him? Why haven’t you said anything about him? Why all the secrecy about your new fellow?

Well, it is not quite what you think. J. S. is a man of the Baroque, better known as Johann Sebastian Bach. I got your attention, though. I have known this fellow for decades through the music that he wrote in his lifetime centuries ago. There has been no secrecy with regards to a blossoming relationship. However, over the last few months, I can truly say that my thoughts and feelings toward the music that he wrote has undergone a bit of a transformation.

To fully appreciate my changing view, I need to go back a while to my younger days as a young piano student. I cannot pinpoint exactly but I think it was in my early to mid teens that I began to be aware of the musical styles of the various big name composers. As an aside, musical education has changed quite a bit from the 1980s and now most teachers who work with the Royal Conservatory of Music (RCM) curriculum are discussing musical stylings much earlier in a student’s development than what I experienced.

Honestly, teenage me did not like the music of J. S. Bach. I found it to be cerebral with minimal dynamic and expressive interest. I was more drawn to the much more dramatic Ludwig van Beethoven, and composers with similar dramatic works. My absolute favourite piano concerto at the time was Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No 1 in with the crashing chords for its opening. I loved expressive, stormy music. J. S. and his fugues and inventions could not compete with their interlocking melodies and carefully constructed harmonies. They were too bland by comparison.

In high school, I started to discuss the option of doing my RCM grade 9 piano with my teacher, Miss West. One of the topics for discussion was the creation of an exam program. Miss West had moved to PEI after retiring from teaching at the RCM, and only accepted a few students. My brother and I were two of her students. She talked a lot about preparing a program and the importance of having the ability to adapt and perform the various musical styles of the various periods of music. We talked about the importance of J. S. and how his music is essentially the cornerstone of the music of the Baroque era.

My complaint about J. S. was not that it was the Baroque era per se. I really enjoyed Handel and Vivaldi. It had to do with the music of J. S. in particular. Nothing would make me happier than to avoid playing his music altogether. She, rightly, pointed out that I had reached the point in my piano development that it was going to be an impossibility to avoid him.

RCM requirements in the 1990s and even in the early 2000s stipulated that for grade 9, grade 10, and ARCT, one of those exams must have in its program a Prelude and Fugue by J. S. Bach. There was absolutely no way I could avoid him forever. She also pointed out that when I did finally get to play his work, I was going to need to figure out how to play it like I loved it. A good musician must also be a good actor. Sigh. That was exactly how she phrased it. I did a fabulous job of avoiding him. I ended up not completing my grade 9 piano in high school and not auditioning for music school like I had initially discussed with Miss West and my trumpet teacher, Mr. Voye.

In fact, I did not have any conversation of any consequence regarding my feelings toward J. S. Bach’s music again until 2004. This time, it was with a different teacher and I had finally committed to doing my RCM grade 9 piano exam. As before, there was a discussion regarding my preferences for the selection for the Baroque era. I made it abundantly clear that if there was even the smallest chance that I could play something other than music by J. S., then that is what I was going to do. I would delay my J. S. Bach prelude and fugue requirement for later. That is precisely what I did. My teacher, Ms. Torney, found a lovely Handel that I played instead of J. S. Bach’s music for my grade 9 program. I was happy. I got to dodge his music some more, but I knew the day of reckoning would come.

It ended up coming far later than I had expected. Life intervened and needless to say, a few years passed by. I had completed all my harmony and counterpoint. I managed to acquire an intellectual appreciation for the music of J. S. Bach. Not sure if anyone would consider it an upgrade in opinion, but he went from being considered bland to being thought of as cerebral.

In the throes of the pandemic, I found myself with extra time on my hands, so I made the decision to finally tackle my grade 10 piano, or as it had been renamed, level 10. Honestly, I still think of the RCM levels as grades. Requirements had changed. In fact, the RCM program had changed overall. I was happy to see that the technical requirements were slimmed down to something that was more humanly manageable. I did not even try to wiggle out playing J. S. It was time for me to stop avoiding him.

I managed to enjoy playing his Prelude and Fugue in d minor. I did not find it to be as terrible as I had expected in my teenage years, or even as I had expected when I did my grade 9. I was still a long way from really appreciating or even liking J. S., let alone loving it. I still thought of his music as being quite cerebral. Hardly a compliment.

So, what happened to have me change my mind after all this time? Simple. I started my organ journey. In the last few months, I started to learn how to play organ with a full footboard. I grew up with the old Hammond organs, but had not had the privilege to encounter an organ with a full footboard. This is a new musical experience, which is always fun.

Learning the footboard is a process. It is no different than learning any other new instrument. It will take time, patience, and practice. However, I still need to play every week. It means that for now, while I work the feet in my practice sessions, I am limited to using the manuals for services., which is what the keyboards are called on an organ.This is not a bad thing as there is music that has been written for manuals only. And my exploration into the realm of organ music for manuals has led me to the eighteenth century.

I must admit that I did not go happily to the eighteenth century. It just made the most sense as the starting point. It seemed also, that my search for music for manuals kept sending me in that direction.

I started my journey with a couple of books on 18th century English organ music. It made sense. After all, I play in the Anglican church, which is the Church of England. This music was specifically written for churches in England. I don’t think you can get a better match than that.

These books have a host of composers that I have never encountered before. For the most part, I spend time at the piano starting the learning process at home, with a bit of time working it out on the organ at the church. I must admit, on the piano, these selections are not that interesting at first try. They are kind of in the same realm as Bach. However, once I sit at the organ and adjust the voicings, they become something different. I start to see and sense nuances that, to this point, I have missed by playing them on the piano.

One of my organ instructional books does have a couple of pieces by Bach. When I play them on the organ, I see something different from when I play them on the piano. They have a different feel. I have long said that each instrument “says” something different, even with the exact same melody line. The organ and the piano are different instruments. They may have keyboards, but they are different.

As I play through the 18th century English organ music and give it life through the organ voicing, I am now starting to understand the Baroque selections better. For it is not only J. S. Bach that I am coming to know, it is also George Handel. It is William Boyce, James Hook, John Stanley, and others who wrote organ music in that same time period, that I am getting to know. It is by learning about the music of these other composers that I am really starting to grasp the genius of J. S. Bach. These other composers wrote wonderful music. I do not intend to diminish their accomplishments. I am enjoying their music and am having lots of fun playing it. The voicings on the organ and how they bring the interweaving melodies and harmonies are really demonstrating to me the capacity of a keyboard or organ manual. These composers really understood their instrument.

With regards to J. S., he did not write for a piano. He wrote mainly for an organ or a harpsichord. These are different instruments. To play Bach on an organ versus a piano is to really understand his music on another level. Now, when I sit at a piano to play his music, I have noticed an internal shift. It no longer feels like the musical version of Buckley’s cough syrup, where “it tastes awful, but it works”. 

The last few months have most definitely been a period of musical growth. If you had have told the younger me that there would be a time when I would come to actually enjoy playing J. S.’s music, I would never have believed it. I have noticed that this shift has also extended to listening to performances of his music.

I am in awe that this has happened. Who knew that something like this could shift inside a person? If my opinion of J. S. Bach’s music could change so subtly and yet so profoundly, then it makes me wonder, what else is on the horizon for me?