Biography (read more)
Johann Christian Bach (1735–1782) was the youngest surviving son of Johann Sebastian Bach and Anna Magdalena Bach, born in Leipzig. After his father’s death in 1750 he moved to Berlin to continue his training with his half-brother Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. In 1754 he travelled to Italy, studied with Padre Martini in Bologna, converted to Catholicism and was appointed organist of Milan Cathedral in 1760, writing sacred music and his first operas. In 1762 he settled in London to work for the King’s Theatre, became music master to Queen Charlotte and, with Carl Friedrich Abel, founded the celebrated Bach–Abel subscription concerts. His popularity and finances declined in the late 1770s, and he died in London on 1 January 1782.
Known as the ‘London Bach’ or ‘English Bach’, Johann Christian was the most cosmopolitan of the Bach sons and a decisive figure in the transition from the late Baroque to the Classical style. His music favours cantabile melody, clear periodic phrasing and a harmonically simplified texture, and he did much to establish the sinfonia concertante. He met the eight-year-old Mozart in London in 1764 and taught him for several months; Mozart later described him with lasting affection, and scholars have regarded Bach as the strongest single influence on his early style. He was also a shrewd defender of his own interests, winning the landmark case Bach v. Longman (1777), which established that English copyright law applied to printed music. The six Quintets Op. 11 for flute, oboe, violin, viola and continuo, published in 1774 and dedicated to the Elector Karl Theodor, are among the most attractive chamber works of his London years.
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