A Musical Offering
Works from the Court of Frederick the Great
Saturday, January 25 • 7:30 pm
Series Subscription Concert
Charlotte, NC
Bach Akademie Charlotte Ensemble
Guy Fishman, leader
Featuring Emi Ferguson, flute
Sonatas by Frederick the Great (King Frederick II of Prussia) and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach’s Musikalisches Opfer, BWV 1079 (The Musical Offering)
In 1747, an elderly Johann Sebastian Bach was summoned from Leipzig to the Royal Court in Potsdam to visit Frederick the Great, King of Prussia—as well as his own son, C.P.E. Bach, who was employed at court. The king, an avid flutist and composer, prepared (or had someone prepare) a complex tune and, upon meeting Bach, asked him to improvise a three-voice fugue upon the "Royal Theme," which Bach dispatched to the amazement of all present. Perhaps wanting to embarrass Bach, the king then asked him for a six-voiced improvised fugue. Bach declined, but promised to send the king a working-out of a six-voice fugue upon the now-famous theme. This gift—a fugue in six voices as well as multiple canons, fugues, and a sonata, all involving the king's flute—is known as the "Musical Offering," and contains musical riddles, theological commentary, and virtuoso writing. Music by Bach's sons and the king himself precedes Bach Akademie Charlotte's regifting of Bach's monumental and beautiful tribute not only to the author of the tune, but to his own mastery of counterpoint and invention.
Guest musician Emi Ferguson is one of the nation's premier baroque flutists. This is her first appearance with Bach Akademie Charlotte.
Frederick II ("The Great") Sonata no. 9 in E minor for flute and continuo, SpiF 154
Carl Philipp Emanuel BACH Sonata in D major for violin and keyboard, Wq 71
Johann Christoph Friedrich BACH Sonata in A major for violoncello and keyboard, HW x/3
Johann Sebastian BACH "Musical Offering," BWV 1079
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