- Period: Classical (1750-1819)
- Country: Germany
- Born: 1759
- Died: December 25, 1845 in Berlin
Biography
Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst (W.F.E.) Bach was the last musical scion of the great Bach family of central Germany. During their great days, their part of Germany, Thuringia, was divided among many small political divisions, ruled variously by little princes, dukes, counts, and the like. They each had a musical establishment at their court. Moreover, most of the towns and all of the churches had some need of musicians. The Bach family was by far the most prominent of several families that traditionally devoted themselves to music. At one time, Bach family musicians were so plentiful that the word "Bach" (which means "brook") became a synonym for "musician." The traced themselves back to a man named Viet Bach.W.F.E. Bach's ancestors were Johannes Bach (1550 - 1626), Christoph Bach (1613 - 1661), Johann Ambrosius Bach (1645 - 1695), the great Johann Sebastian Bach (1885 - 1750), and Johan Christoph Friedrich Bach (1732 - 1795).
W.F.E. was born nine years after his famous grandfather died. His father, Johan Christoph Bach, was the director of the musical establishment of the Count of Bückeburg, and stayed there virtually all his career.
Although this was yet another of the myriad little states scattered about Germany, the unprepossessing Bückeburg was actually one of the most musically lively and intellectually stimulating such places in Europe. The court parson was Johann Gottfried Herder, a brilliant writer who was one of the founding lights of the Romantic movement in Germany literature.
The Countess and the Count followed each other in death in 1776 and 1777. That year JCF Bach asked for leave to travel widely with his son, who was just turning 18, showing musical promise, and in need of the stimulation of exposure to a wider variety of music. Father and son set off first for Hamburg, where the boy's uncle Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was working. C.P.E. gave him some additional teaching to add more perspective to the solid training JCF had given him.
Then it was off to London, then rapidly becoming the liveliest musical city in Europe. Johann Christian Bach, another of his uncles, was one of the leading musicians of London. He took his brother and nephew to some of the notable concerts of the day, including the premiere of his new oratorio. W.F.E. remained in London when his father returned to Bückeburg. He studied with J.C. Bach for three years.
He returned to Germany, taking a job as Kapellmeister at another little principality, Minden, in 1786. The place was only five miles from Bückeburg, so we imagine that he and his father saw each other frequently. In 1788, Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia heard his cantata Westphalens Freude. The King was impressed enough that he hired W.F.E. to be Kapellmeister in Berlin for his wife, Queen Elisabeth Christine. When that queen died, he kept the same position in the service of the next queen, Luise (consort of King Friedrich Wilhelm III). He retired from service in 1811, and lived with his wife in a long and evidently happy retirement.
W.F.E. married twice, he had two daughters by his first wife, who died at the age of 20. He had his only son, who died in infancy, by his second wife. Neither of the two daughters married, and this branch of the Bach lineage was extinguished.
Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst Bach was a well-schooled minor composer. His music is bright and charming, mostly light in effect, and often very witty. A cantata, Die Musikanten, is for baritone and toy instruments. He wrote a concerto for piano, six hands, which is written so that it should be performed by one large male and two petite female pianists. The man sits between the two women, stretches his arms around their waists, and plays at the opposite extremes of the keyboard while the ladies play the parts in the middle register. ~ Joseph Stevenson, All Music Guide
