Scheibe: Trio Sonata in B-flat Major, II: Langsam

Johann Adolph Scheibe (1708 – 1776) was a German-Danish composer and music theorist. Whilst his musical career was quite distinguished, his compositions esteemed and his critical music magazine (‘Der Critische Musikus’, 1737-1740) was widely read and appreciated, Scheibe’s reputation continued to decline more than a century after his death. Why? Well, whilst Scheibe had often expressed his view that J.S. Bach was one of the finest keyboard composers of their time, he did make one infamous reservation that Bach’s devoted followers never forgot. Again, still writing with great praise for Bach, he did observe that Bach’s fame and esteem could increase even further if he did not write in such a difficult and complex style – especially by writing music for singers and instrumentalists with the difficulty of his keyboard music. Scheibe accuses Bach of obfuscating the melody and harmony through an excess of ornaments – these errors, he claimed, were artificial, and conflicted with Nature. Scheibe was certainly not the only person to accuse Bach of writing too complex music, but after his death, he was the person most remembered for his Bach criticism. The unfortunate result during and long after his death were continual personal attacks of his character and career and harsh criticism against him. As Bach’s fame rose, Scheibe’s infamy grew with it, and until recently, no one remembered how well-respected Scheibe had really been, nor how much Scheibe had truly admired Bach. And now, to the music for today. Scheibe’s Trio Sonata in B-flat Major demonstrates his approach to music quite well, and perhaps you will now see why he made that criticism of Bach. His own Trio Sonata always preserves a very clear melody and harmony throughout, whilst Bach’s own are certainly more packed with complexity and traditional counterpoint. What we really have here then, is a very interesting debate formed at the crossroads of two eras: Scheibe was leaning towards the elegant Classical idiom, whilst Bach never budged from the ornate Baroque. The score may be found here: http://partitura.org/index.php/johann... Performed on the J.A. Silbermann organ at Arlesheim Cathedral, Switzerland through Hauptwerk. If you enjoy this video, please subscribe to Pep Organ for a new upload every Saturday. #PepOrgan