Incomplete And Utter History Of Classical Music

WAR AND PEACE MORE WAR

s fi The opening line of Zadok the Priest continues 'Zadok the Priest and Nathan the Prophet annointed Solomon King.31 always feel sorry for good, reliable Nathan the Prophet. He got equal billing in the original story but it is only Zadok who gets remembered. fifi No pun intended. ? that was 1729. More or less, give or take a couple of years. To get to the next major landmark, you have to traverse the opening of the Covent Garden Opera House, the birth of Haydn, and the founding of the Academie of Ancient Music. That's just in music. Elsewhere you also had the building of 10 Downing Street; the rise of the game Ninepins; the advice of Dr John Arbuthnot to watch what you ate; the founding of the Seventh Day Baptists by Conrad Beissel; the coronation of Christian VI of Denmark; the succession of Tsar Ivan V's daughter, Anne - who apparently gets expenses and a company cart; the beginning of the four-course system of husbandry by Viscount 'Turnip' Townsend - no, don't ask me, either; the death of three of the great English literati - Daniel Defoe, Elijah Fenton and John Gay; the birth of Stanislaus II, the last independent King of Poland; and the first ever subscription library started by Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia. My word, glad that's over.

In addition to that, there's a war on. Well, to be fair, there usually is, somewhere or other. I mean, I don't want to belittle these things in die slightest, but I do often think it was a case of 'Look, whose turn is it?' A bit like planning the office holiday rota: 'Erm, right, well, the Spanish Succession boys would rather take the last two weeks in August. Apparently that allows them July to violate the Partition Treaty. Fiona, pass me my coffee, can you, love? Now, that means the Thirty Tears will have to go in June, the Hundred Tears in the front half of July, and… now who are you?' 'The Seven Tears!'

'Damn, forgot about you. Erm… right, Seven Tears… Seven Tears… oh, look!??? guys can have the back half of July… when the schools break up. Everybody happy? Right, let's have a look at that stationery order…' Well… possibly. Possibly not. In actual fact, the war that's just started is die Polish Succession. Nice name. Good branding. Next year there'll be one with Turkey and Persia, but it'll only last twelve months or so. Huh! ONLY! The year after that, it's Russia and Turkey, then Prussia meet Austria in the quarter-finals in 1740, before Turkey and Persia come back to battle it out in the play-offs. Result: Turkey win on the away dead rule. I don't know. Millions of lives, millions of pounds and all for a handful of disputed borders and dodgy marriages. These days, government central office would simply rearrange the boundaries without anyone noticing. Which reminds me: BACH!

How does that remind me? Well, you see in 1733, Bach was having a minor war himself. Not quite on die same scale, it's true, but still, a war no less. JSB's war is with die church authorities - again! -this time the ones at St Thomas's in Leipzig, and, of course, the problem is over money. Or, according to Bach, die lack of it. His job of t amor means he plays the organ, writes new music - every week, mind! - for two churches and all dieir services. He rehearses, directs,IIHI trains people at a. further two churches, and also, in his - wait for this - spare time, he has to teach Latin and music at die local school. Added to this is die fact that the living quarters that go witii die job.?? a tad squalid, and the salary mere peanuts. So, you can imagine,? \s a virtual running battle. And what does it do to his 'muse', as it were? Does the music dry up? Is he writer's-blocked, and unable to pen a note? Well, no, actually. Quite die opposite, oddly enough. The I,cipzig years will turn out to be one of his most prolific times.

Great pieces were to come from this period. The Art of Fugue, albeit unfinished, was a huge undertaking, using almost every feature of the current music thinking at the time. It is one HUGE piece of showing off, really. In it, Bach wrote himself one single tune. He then set about showing you how many times and in how many different ways he could change and vary and re-present this tune. It's a bit like a jazz musician being given a small tune and then improvising on it for hours, just to show how clever he is. Then there's The Musical Offering, the Goldberg Variations and, of course, started in tins very year, 1733, the mere trifle that is…The Mass in? Minor.