Johann Sebastian Bach

Bach's music features masterful counterpoint—multiple independent melodic lines weaving together with perfect logic and beauty. His harmonies explore every possibility of tonal music, often featuring chromatic inflections and daring modulations. He had an unmatched ability to develop tiny motifs into vast architectures, whether in a fugue or a chorale prelude. His music balances intellectual complexity with immediate expressiveness.

Studied his predecessors obsessively, copying out works by Vivaldi, Buxtehude, and others. The German chorale tradition and Lutheran theology deeply shaped his sacred music. He absorbed Italian concerto style, French dance elegance, and German contrapuntal rigor, synthesizing them into something uniquely his own. His influence on subsequent composers is incalculable—Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, and Schoenberg all revered him.

Early years as organist and court musician produced much of his organ music. The Cöthen period (1717-23) focused on instrumental music—Brandenburg Concertos, solo works. His final decades in Leipzig brought the great choral works—Passions, B Minor Mass, cantatas—while also producing keyboard masterpieces like the Goldberg Variations and Art of Fugue. Each period shows evolution while maintaining his essential voice.

Bach was arrested and imprisoned for a month in 1717 after demanding his employer, the Duke of Weimar, release him from his post so he could take a better job. Bach spent his prison time composing, possibly working on the Orgelbüchlein. The Duke finally released him—without a good reference—but Bach got the better job anyway and became Kapellmeister at Cöthen.

Bach was largely forgotten after his death except as a keyboard virtuoso, not a composer—it took Mendelssohn's 1829 revival of the St. Matthew Passion to begin the Bach renaissance that established him as one of music's supreme geniuses. For nearly 80 years, this monumental body of work was gathering dust.

Bach is one of the most frequently performed composers worldwide, appearing on virtually every type of classical concert from recitals to orchestral programs. His music anchors the repertoire and has never gone out of fashion. He's the definition of evergreen—performed constantly across all performance contexts from historically informed practice to modern instruments.