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The six Brandenburg concertos ( BWV 1046-1051) by Johann Sebastian Bach are a collection of instrumental works presented by Bach to the Margrave of Brandenburg in 1721, but probably composed earlier. 1 History
By 1721, Bach's third year as Kapellmeister at Anhalt-Cöthen, he was becoming restless and began looking for career opportunities outside the small town. As the story commonly goes, on March 24, he assembled these six concertos (which had almost certainly been performed at Cöthen) and presented them, by way of a job application, to the Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg. (The application was not successful.)
The concertos have little in common; the dedication page Bach wrote for the collection merely indicates they are six pieces for several instruments. Indeed, the six works seem to reflect an effort by the composer to write for as many different ensembles as possible. The concertos have been called a "microcosm of Baroque music," because they seem to exemplify the potential of the musical style of the era, in all its variety—in only six concertos.
2 The concertos: orchestral versus chamber music
In modern times these works have been performed by chamber orchestras, using a fairly substantial string section. However, they have also been performed as chamber music, with just one instrument on each part. The very small size of the orchestra in Bach's day means that the distinction between the two approaches would not have been very significant at that time.
A minor detail about the Fifth Concerto indicates something about the size of the forces with which they were originally performed. This concerto (see below) features a harpsichord solo, which was almost certainly performed by Bach himself. It also lacks a second violin part. The best explanation of this goes as follows. We know that when playing in the string section, Bach preferred to take the viola part; according to a surviving letter, this was so he could sit "in the middle of the harmony." Since as keyboard soloist Bach was not available to take the viola part for this concerto, one of his violinists must have had to move over to play the viola. The explanation, of course, relies on the assumption that Bach's ensemble used only one musician per part.
What we will probably never know is whether, had Bach worked in a wealthier musical establishment, he would have wanted to assign more musicians to the string section; this remains a choice that modern performers are free to make.
3 The individual concertos
3.1 Brandenburg Concerto #1 in F major
- I. (Allegro)
- II. Adagio
- III. Allegro
- IV. Menuetto; Trio I; Polacca; Trio II
The First Concerto in F major calls for two French horns, three oboes, a bassoon, and a violino piccolo as well as two violins, a viola, and a basso continuo for accompaniment. This concerto is the only one in the collection of six with four movementThe term Movement has a variety of different meanings: Physical movement between points in space ("A to B"). The amount of movement is called distance. Together with a direction you have a displacement. The rate of movement is the speed. Again, with the ds, rather than three. The last movement is an extensive and relaxed sequence, consisting of a minuetA minuet sometimes spelt menuet is a dance for two persons, usually in 3/4 time. The word was adapted, under the influence of the Italian minuetto from the French menuet meaning small, pretty, delicate, a diminutive of menu from the Latin minutus menuetto played four times, with a separate trioGenerally speaking, a trio or threesome is a group of three. The word is most often used in music to refer to a group of three musicians. For example, a group of three singers would be called a trio. The word is also used in chamber music to mean a groupi or polacca section for each of the intervals. An earlier version of this concerto survives as a sinfoniaIn music, a sinfonia can be one of three things: 1) In the very late Renaissance and early Baroque, a sinfonia was an alternate name for a canzona, fantasia or ricercar. These were almost always instrumental forms. Later in the Baroque period it was more, BWV 1046a.
