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The Musikalisches Opfer is a special collection of chamber music within the work of Johann Sebastian Bach, written for Frederick the Great of Prussia. Musikalisches Opfer means ‘a musical offering’, and that is precisely how the collection originated. In May 1747, Bach was introduced to Frederick, who had heard that Bach was a great improviser and asked him on the spot to improvise a fugue on a given theme. According to the sources, Bach made a brilliant job of it and showed such enthusiasm about the ‘royal theme’ that he promised to have the fugue engraved ‘on copper’ and printed. No sooner said than done. Two months later, Bach published a series of compositions: a trio sonata, a three-part and a six-part ricercar and ten canons, all inspired by the king’s theme. The two ricercars in the Musikalisches Opfer are each other’s opposites in many respects. It is as if Bach wanted, after visiting Frederick the Great, to reaffirm exactly what he was capable of, at his age and with his reputation. Just compare the ‘galant’ three-part fugue on the ‘thema regium’ ( – improvised spontaneously in Potsdam and later worked out properly) with its counterpart: this far from spontaneous six-part musical edifice. Although the number of parts is not so unusual, it is remarkable how long it takes before each part has presented the lengthy theme. This ‘exposition’ takes up more than a third of the work, on its way to a climax in the bass. In the rest of the Ricercar a 6, the theme recurs another 6 times; further apart and more surprising. As in its three-part counterpart, Bach actually keeps things simple. The theme recurs without contrapuntal tricks, unlike examples by the grand masters of the genre, Gabrieli and Frescobaldi, whose ricercars open up all the registers of counterpoint. True creativity is found in the ‘episodes’, the passages containing no theme material. Here, Bach often writes variations on motifs from the countertheme, up to three at a time and all nicely proportioned, whereas the Ricercar a 3 is more inclined to let the musical ideas do their own thing. Recorded for the project All of Bach on July 8th 2020 at the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam. If you want to help us complete All of Bach, please subscribe to our channel
