Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) was a German composer and organist of the late Baroque. Orphaned at ten, he lived five years with brother Johann Christoph and from 1700 studied at St Michael’s School. In 1705 he travelled to Lübeck, reportedly on foot, to hear Dieterich Buxtehude play.

He married Maria Barbara in 1707, became Konzertmeister at Weimar in 1714, and in 1717 was hired by Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Köthen as Kapellmeister. Leopold wanted no elaborate church music, so Bach wrote mostly secular works, among them the Brandenburg Concertos.

In 1723 he became Thomaskantor at Leipzig, responsible for four churches’ music. The St Matthew Passion followed in 1727, and his last years were given to the Mass in B minor and The Art of Fugue. He died in 1750 after unsuccessful eye surgery, his grave unmarked for 150 years. Felix Mendelssohn’s 1829 St Matthew Passion performance began the Bach Revival.