The ' Cello Suites Were Written by Mrs. NOT Mr. Bach.

[gamba]

A programme on BBC 4 on Friday the 20 th.of March.

It was Magdalena wot did it ( clever girl ) !

Don't forget, BBC channel 4, Friday, 20th. March at 8.00 pm

( definitely not to be missed )

[Roehre]

A programme on BBC 4 on Friday the 20 th.of March.

It was Magdalena wot did it ( clever girl ) !

Don't forget, BBC channel 4, Friday, 20th. March at 8.00 pm

( definitely not to be missed )

Nice to see that nonsense dished up again.
IF Mrs Bach (in whose handwriting the best part of the cello-suites have survived) were the composer, why is this then her only surviving work????
Further -to think about: compare scores of which we've got manuscript copies by both Mr and Mrs Bach (including parts of these Cello-suites!) and one will be surprised by the similarities in their music writing (for performance or publication scores that is - for scores obviously written in a hurry JSB's handwriting is quite different - and it's the latter which gives the best clues about chronology).

[BBMmk2]

hmmm (I played three suites yesterday evening, by chance. Def JSB, imo!

[mercia]

the BBC programme will feature Professor Jarvis I think

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/classicalmusic/11188153/Did-Bachs-wife-write-his-finest-works.html

http://www.for3.org/forums/showthread.php?12210-Anna-Magdalena-s-Cello-Suites&highlight=magdalena+cello

[Stanfordian]

A programme on BBC 4 on Friday the 20 th.of March.

It was Magdalena wot did it ( clever girl ) !

Don't forget, BBC channel 4, Friday, 20th. March at 8.00 pm

( definitely not to be missed )

Hiya gamba,

It's best ignoring nonsense like this.

[Beef Oven!]

Hiya gamba,

It's is best ignoring nonsense like this.

Anyway, you can tell they were written by a bloke, MrGG will bear me out on that.

[MrGongGong]

hmmm (I played three suites yesterday evening, by chance. Def JSB, imo!

That settles it then

(I bet your version is all in the treble clef )

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

(I bet your version is all in the treble clef )

[BBMmk2]

That settles it then

(I bet your version is all in the treble clef )

Bass cleff(I transpose :) ) - infact minor 3rd down and change to treble so technically bass cleff then transfer to treble

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

infact minor 3rd down and change to treble so technically bass cleff then transfer to treble

I've just spent ten minutes working this out! It'd be a lot easier if you just learnt to read Bass Clef, Bbm.

[Richard Barrett]

Hmmmm... why are the cello suites her only surviving work? (a) maybe they aren't, (b) as a woman writing music in the early 18th century she would be lucky if any of her work survived, I imagine. Not that I would presume to come down on one side or the other of this argument, but I would say that there are stylistic difference between the solo violin and solo cello music ascribed to JS Bach which possibly can't be entirely accounted for by the differences between the instruments.

As for "I played them and they're definitely JS Bach", generations of organists would have said that about the D minor Toccata and Fugue which nobody seriously still believes was written by him. The arguments around such authorship issues very often revolve around "well, I just know", which isn't a very scientific way to look at things.

[P. G. Tipps]

Well, here's a very subtly-hidden clue regarding the objective 'forensic evidence' that solves the Bachian mystery ...

'Prof Jarvis said he aims to overturn the “sexist” convention ... '

Ah-hah ... gotcha, Prof!

[Richard Barrett]

Here we have Steven Isserlis writing in the Guardian:

"... why am I so sure that Bach himself composed the suites? It is partly because there are countless connections between the suites and many of his other works; but even more because the language is so clearly his – that perfection of utterance that is pure JS Bach.:

In other words, "I just know." Not the kind of thing that would stand up in a court of law I think. On the other hand, looking at the full text of a 2012 lecture by Prof Jarvis on the subject he seems also to be rather short on factual support for his theory - only towards the end does he claim that: "By the end of 2003 ... I had found 17 musical reasons why the Cello Suites were not likely to have been composed by Johann Sebastian [Bach]", though he doesn't say what these are; nor does he marshal any strongly convincing evidence to support Anna Magdalena as the author, apart from the fact that the earliest extant manuscript was written by her. Nevertheless, there are well over fifty works in all genres with BWV numbers which are clearly not by JS Bach and which in many cases have now been attributed to their rightful authors. So the idea that the cello suites might be misattributed is not a complete fantasy; and the idea that in past ages women composers were discouraged from putting their own name to the works is well-attested. It seems on balance to be a stretch to jump from there to Prof Jarvis's conclusions, but surely saying "I just know" (or for that matter "Gotcha!", whatever that's supposed to mean) isn't good enough either.

[Warlock]

I once heard an anecdote from a member of the Elgar Society that during a talk at one of their meetings the speaker described how Earnest Newman had once said that when he visited Elgar during his final illness Elgar had said five words to him as he was leaving. Newman said that he never
had or would repeat those five words. Apparently Joyce Kennedy (wife of Michael) immediately suggested "Alice wrote all my music!"

[BBMmk2]

I've just spent ten minutes working this out! It'd be a lot easier if you just learnt to read Bass Clef, Bbm.

Not when your tuba is in Eb! :)