SEYMOUR WHINYATES (Violin)
THE B.B.C: ORCHESTRA
(Section C)
(Led by F. WEIST HILL)
Conducted by PERCY PITT
BACH and Handel were born in the same year,
1685, and died in the middle of the next century within a few years of one another. Some 20 or 30 years later, Sir John Hawkins published in London the first edition of his fascinating General History of Music, which purported to inform in his day much as Grove's Dictionary informs in ours. It is quite clear from this history that while Mr. Handel (Hawkins usually calls him so) was, both before and after his death, considered without question the greatest musician of his time, Johann Sebastian Bach was nobody in particular, and so far from being forgotten soon after he died, was never really known at all, at least in this country.
Hawkins had evidently learned a little of Bach from his son, Johann Christian Bach , who was then resident in London, but that little consisted apparently only of unimportant anecdotal matter.
The only compositions of Bach mentioned in the History, or even known to Hawkins, were a great variety of excellent compositions for the harpsichord' and ' a double fugue in three subjects in one of which he introduces his name.' To the church cantatas, the Mass, the Passions,. no reference at all. That he was celebrated for his skill as an organ player, however, is admitted by Hawkins, who generously quotes another as saying that ' on this instrument he was even superior to Handel.' But of his compositions for the organ and the Organ Preludes Hawkins makes no mention. He is even a year out in giving his death. Hawkins, however, is not alone in his estimation of Bach. It is perfectly true that for the best part of a century after his death Bach was little more than just a half-forgotten name.