A Brief History of Bach's Brandenburg Concertos

So Very Nearly Lost to the Ages in the Scourge of War

In 1721 one could not make a living as a composer without a wealthy, royal patron. In that year JS Bach sent six concertos to a minor prince, essentially doing what all musicians have always done: he was trying to hustle up a paying gig in the court of the Margrave of Brandenburg.

He failed. Bach’s cold-call job application, the Brandenburg Concerti, were filed, forgotten, and lost until 1849.

Although published in Vienna in the 19th Century, the Concerti were never performed, as J.S. Bach (he died in 1750) was then known as a Baroque keyboard master but only a minor composer. Indeed, Ludwig Van Beethoven became famous as a child prodigy, touring the Hapsburg Empire in 1781 playing Bach’s “Well-Tempered Klavier” by memory at age 11.

The Brandenburg Concerti were again nearly lost to history in WWII. The final, extant, autograph copies were in the possession of a Prussian librarian during the Fall of Berlin. When his fleeing train was shelled, he stumbled from the still-moving, burning train car into the woods with the Bach’s original score tucked in his underwear.

The Brandenburg Concerti became famous only in the mid-20th century.