Bach FAQ 28
Was Johann Sebastian Bach Rich?..
It is safe to say that Johann Sebastian Bach was not rich. He was not wealthy either. But he certainly never had to “count every thaler” in his life. Yet the same principle applied then as it does today: It is not just a matter of what you earn. It is also a matter of what you have to spend..
The focus is on “have to”. Today, the question is where and how often we go on vacation, depending on our income. And whether we can afford and want to buy a new car. And how much we want to or should spend on entertainment. In Johann Sebastian’s time, the only thing that really mattered was how expensive life was for his extended family in the various places where Bach worked and lived..
The family certainly had the most money at its disposal during his second marriage in Köthen, when the number of children who needed to be clothed and fed was offset by a high income from two salaries. That changed, however, when Bach moved to Leipzig. Bach writes – with great depression – about the very high cost of living there in a letter to his school friend Erdmann..
Generally speaking, it can be said that Bach never lacked money. But his remark in the aforementioned letter, namely, that the cost of living in Leipzig was unusually higher than in the tranquil town of Köthen where he had lived before, suggests that money was certainly not in abundance. One also gets a sense of this when reading how few of Bach’s now world-famous works were actually engraved on copper plates at the time. A mere four works. That was, after all, an extremely expensive undertaking back then..
Johann Sebastian Bach, however, earned more everywhere than his predecessors in that position had earned. Of course, he also received more than he had earned in the position he held before moving to a new location. A significant portion of his total income – in addition to his base salary, which he received from the princes in Weimar and Köthen, as well as the earnings he made in Arnstadt, Mühlhausen, and Leipzig – came from performing at weddings, funerals, baptisms, and special occasions. Johann Sebastian Bach was also a sought-after private music teacher..
In the early years of the 21st century, documents surfaced suggesting that Johann Sebastian Bach owned stock in a silver mining company. Even this does not prove that Bach was rich. After all, even today it doesn’t matter whether your parents or you yourself own a few shares of BMW, Google, or Siemens … you’re only rich once you’ve sold them, made a substantial profit, and stopped speculating..
However, another piece of evidence does not suggest that Bach was not even wealthy. It is the letter of appeal written by Johann Sebastian Bach’s widow to the Leipzig City Council. After all, writing such a letter and applying for a widow’s pension was quite a common practice at the time. It did not suggest that Bach had not left his family well provided for. Rather, as Dr. Eberhard Spree, the expert on Anna Magdalena Bach, points out, Bach’s second wife applied for this money and continued to work so that she would not have to give up her standard of living..
If something like GEMA (... ASCAP) had existed back then, and Bach had received royalties for the performance of his music, then 250 years later ABBA would pale in comparison to him. Whether that’s actually true, however, we won’t be able to determine until the year 2260. Then, if people in the 23rd century are still listening to Bach with great enthusiasm. And ABBA? Justin Bieber? Michael Jackson? Frank Sinatra? Maybe, too. After all, the sales of Bach’s musical works in 1750 and the years that followed – through Anna Magdalena and his musically gifted sons – as well as documents of immeasurable value today, suggest just how quickly and permanently any financial reserves he may have had were depleted. Johann Sebastian Bach was certainly not rich..
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