Bach the Teacher

This chapter examines the works of Bach’s later years, including several published collections, in the context of his teaching. The latter, considered in its broadest sense, included not only instruction in the St. Thomas School but private lessons and mentorship for university students and younger professional musicians. To these activities Bach added the revision and publication of compositions that could serve as examples for study and emulation. Among the latter are the four volumes of Clavierübung, including the harpsichord partitas, Italian Concerto, and Goldberg Variations; the Schemelli Chorales and Canonic Variations for organ; and the Musical Offering and Art of Fugue. Also instructive, in a profound sense, are the great vocal works of these years: the passions, oratorios, and Latin church music, including the B-Minor Mass.

"It is Different Each Time I Play": Variability in Highly Prepared Musical Performance

PERFORMANCES BY CONCERT PIANISTS in the Western classical tradition are normally highly prepared, yet must sound fresh and spontaneous. We propose that musicians achieve the necessary spontaneity by strategic management of the variability inherent in any action. Musical gestures that make up the artist's interpretation (e.g., crescendos, ritardandos) are attenuated or exaggerated to different degrees in each performance, while movements critical for technique are less varied.We examined 7 highly polished performances of J.S. Bach's Italian Concerto (Presto) by a concert pianist. There were small but consistent differences between performances in 4 of 9 identified musical gestures, each of which occurred in several locations. In contrast, at points where the pianist reported attending to technique during performance, slower tempi and lower dynamic variability suggested that she controlled execution of planned movements more closely. Increased control at technical difficulties permitted more spontaneous variation in the musical gestures important to her interpretation.

"Seeing the Big Picture": Piano Practice as Expert Problem Solving

Experts in many fields approach a new problem by identifying the general principles involved before starting work on details. Do expert musicians similarly begin work on a new piece with the big picture, an artistic image of the piece, in mind? To find out, a concert pianist recorded her practice of the third movement, Presto, of J. S. Bach's Italian Concerto, commenting as she did so about what she was doing. The behavioral record of where playing started, stopped, and slowed down indicated the musical dimensions affecting practice, while the comments indicated the main focus of the pianist's attention. An artistic image for the piece was already evident in the initial sight-read performance, guided work on technique in sessions 1-6, and was transformed into a plan for performance by practice of performance cues in sessions 7-8. Interpretive details were added in sessions 9-10 and remaining problems touched up in session 11-12. Despite its pervasive effects on practice, the pianist's artistic image was mentioned only indirectly in comments about technique in sessions 1-6 and about structure, memory, and interpretation in later sessions.

Practicing Perfection: Piano Performance as Expert Memory

A concert pianist recorded her practice as she learned the third movement, Presto, of J.S. Bach's Italian Concerto. She also described the formal structure of the piece and reported her decisions about basic features (e.g., fingering), interpretive features (e.g., phrasing), and cues to attend to during performance (performance cues). These descriptions were used to identify which locations, features, and cues she practiced most, which caused hesitations when she first played from memory, and which affected her recall 2 years later. Effects of the formal structure and performance cues on all three activities indicated that the pianist used the formal structure as a retrieval scheme and performance cues as retrieval cues. Like expert memorists in other domains, she engaged in extended retrieval practice, going to great lengths to ensure that retrieval was as rapid and automatic from conceptual (declarative) memory as from motor and auditory memory.