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A Musical Offering

When Bach arrived at Sanssouci,
King Frederick said, “Sir, you must be
tired. My fortepianos may
help to revive you. Please, come play.”
While Bach was busy at the keys,
the king presented him a tease:
“My dear Herr Bach, I’m wondering
if you could do a little thing
for us. Your kind indulgence I
would beg, that we might hear you try
to craft a fugue upon a theme
of my own making. Would you deem
it worthy of your close attention?
A three-voiced fugue of your invention
would be for us here a delight.
Let all your fantasy take flight!”
Bach thought a long moment or two,
then sat and reeled off, right on cue,
the fugue. Most listening sat stunned.
Frederick recovered, “What a fund
of fine ideas woven so well!                                    |
Indulge me, please: I would compel
of you one more fugue—fugue’s the game
through which you’ll magnify your name!
Three voices proved a task too light
for one of your creative might.
My thought was … six—a ricercar
a sex could show how shines your star
much more than one a tres.” Bach bent
in deference to the king, but went
back home. Frederick was slightly miffed,
but soon received from Bach a gift—
the fugue a sex that he’d requested,
the three-voiced fugue by hindsight tested,
a trio, and canons arcane—
all fashioned, with no little pain,
on Frederick’s theme. The broadest smile
broke over Frederick’s face. “What guile …
my theme is handled with such taste,
in such a wealth of forms encased …”
But some dismissed the learned manner,
claiming instead the galant banner.
They’d yawned all through Bach’s recent visit,
and now sniffed, “Mold—it’s his zeal, is it?”
They further scoffed, “For goodness’ sake!
How many days did this trick take?”
“He failed the king when he was here—
just hastened home to sip his beer.”
“It’s all unfair, besides. Know why?
The cheat—he must have used AI!”

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The F–A–E Sonata

frei aber einsam: free but lonely

“Frei aber einsam” often was the way
Joseph Joachim summarized his life.
Acquaintances of his, needless to say,
conjectured he was searching for a wife.

In this, three friends of his proved themselves wise:
They left the spouse hunt to his mind and heart.
Instead, his motto they initialized
and from it drew a work of tonal art.

This was the three’s Sonata F–A–E.
Once finished, the collaborators made
their friend guess which composer’s artistry
came where in the four–movement cavalcade.

And guess he did: the second and the fourth
were Schumann’s, Albert Dietrich wrote the first,
and Brahms, young flaming genius from up north,
the third, which with explosive passion burst.

(The work had no effect, so it would seem,
On marriage prospects for poor Joachim.)

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Poet’s Note: Written in 1853, this sonata was first performed by its dedicatee, Joseph Joachim, violin, and Clara Schumann, piano, in October of that year. Schumann and Dietrich both used the melodic sequence F-A-E prominently in their contributions. Brahms’s shares other material with Dietrich’s.)

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Julian D. Woodruff, who contributes poetry frequently to the Society of Classical Poets, writes poetry and short fiction for children and adults. He recently finished 2020-2021, a poetry collection. A selection of his work can be read at Parody Poetry, Lighten Up Online, Carmina Magazine, and Reedsy.

NOTE TO READERS: If you enjoyed this poem or other content, please consider making a donation to the Society of Classical Poets.

The Society of Classical Poets does not endorse any views expressed in individual poems or commentary.


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10 Responses

  1. Roy Eugene Peterson

    These tantalizing poems had me seriously reading them attempting to grasp the musical genius you were providing in erudite fashion and then laughing at the conclusions of both of them either for relief or for their high humor. Two great mind challenging poems with wonderful conclusions!

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thanks for reading, Roy. The Musical Offering is very much “head music<" and would not have appealed to some members of a court that was (probably with an eye toward France) was trying to be au courant. Others would be at least credited the master with skill and ingenuity. I doubt any would have sneered with quite the hostility I ascribe to some in the poem, but that's a point on which I have to confess ignorance.

      Reply
  2. Cynthia Erlandson

    Thank you, Julian, for these musical lessons! I love the stories they tell. Like Roy, I laughed at both of the unexpected final lines. I absolutely love fugues; I think they prove there’s a higher world, and that the Creator sometimes lets glimpses of it into this one. I am amazed at anyone who can compose them, but especially Bach (of course!) Six voices, indeed — what a mind!

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thank you, Cynthia. Your fascination with is shared by so many illustrious composers, most famously first Mozart, then Beethoven, then right on through the 19th century and well into the 20th. And canon, an even more demanding genre than fugue, was equally on Bach’s mind in his last years, and again (thanks to him) on the minds of followers such as Brahms, Bartok, Stravinsky et al.

      Reply
  3. Margaret Coats

    Julian, I must say I like the sonata and corresponding poem better than the fugue. Is that a fugal poetic form you’re using? Or one structured by numbers? It certainly makes fun of Frederick and court. Were they making fun of Bach, or do you think the project (at least the first portion of it) was a sincere test of his artistry? Thanks for including recordings for both musical pieces, and especially for the score with the sonata recording. By ear rather than by score analysis, I believe I recognized Brahms.

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thank you for reading & commenting, Margaret. In the 1st, all I was trying to do was narrate in rhymed couplets. Maybe the twisting of a few sentences to conform to the rhyme & rhythm didn’t fully agree with the narrative approach. No, I don’t think they were making fun of Bach: he had a reputation as a great organist, and as a practitioner of the old (yawn) learned style. Except to connoisseurs and certain professionals, though, his music was of little interest after his death in 1750 until Mendelssohn revived the Matthew Passion in 1829. But Bach’s 2nd son, Carl Philippe Emmanuel, was employed as a musician at Frederick’s court, and though he struck out on his own as a composer, certainly gauged his father’s extraordinary musical skills and knowledge accurately, if not the genius we recognize today.
      It’s interesting that you prefer the Sonata. I submitted the 2 poems together because both celebrate musical cusps of sorts. Bach was 3 years short of his death at the time he composed the M.O. The flood of contrapuntal tours de force was about to end abruptly. Purveyors of the galant style were in the ascent–Gluck, Jomelli, Johann Stamitz et al. Pergolesi had died already–11 years before. In the case of the F-A-E, Schumann was in eclipse–within half a year he was committed to an insane asylum; Brahms, on the other hand, was off and running, with the publication of his 1st 2 piano sonatas and Schumann’s rave review of his E-flat minor Scherzo.

      Reply
  4. Cheryl Corey

    Julian, I really like the opening line, “When Bach arrived at Sanssouci”. It even sounds musical when I say it. I don’t understand a whit of musical jargon, but the poem is very enjoyable. Ever since I was a teen, I’ve been partial to the harpsichord. Might you consider write some poetry regarding the same?

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Hi, Cheryl. I’m glad you liked the MO poem. Consider it one poem about harpsichord music: although Bach, as a guest of Frederick II, was testing his fortepianos, the 2 ricercars from the collection work better on the harpsichord (pace, any pianists out there). Maybe I’ll think about The Goldberg Variations, or something less formidable. (Plenty of things to choose among, after all.)

      Reply
  5. Brian A. Yapko

    I very much enjoyed “A Musical Offering,” Julian. Your poem’s title is the eponymous way I have heard the Bach fugue described in other contexts — e.g., film representations of that famous meeting between J.S. Bach and Frederick the Great. Since first hearing of this meeting, I’ve thought of it as a challenge derived from both sincere admiration and just a touch of musical jealousy. The melody that Frederick gave to Bach to improvise a fugue upon was certainly not an unchallenging one!

    I’ve never heard the term “ricercar” so this is a good education for me! And Bach’s musical genius was such that AI would have a difficult time catching up!

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Hi, Brian. Thanks for your enthusiastic response to the Bach poem (& his music, of course). The term “ricercar” goes way back–to the 1st half of the 16th century, at least. It was applied to instrumental music (especially keyboard music) of an imitative character (like the later fugue), but was derived from or imitative of high choral style (Mass, motet), and so characteristically relies on longer note values and a less decorative style than the fugue. The 6-voice ricercar, like the 5-voice fugues in the Well-Tempered Clavier, is closer to a representative ricercar than is the 3-voice ricercar in the MO.
      Bach used the term also as part of the heading for the work, in an acrostic:
      Regis
      Iussu
      Cantio (being Frederick’s theme)
      Et
      Reliqua (being Bach’s response, apparently)
      Canonica [fugal etc.]
      Arte
      Resoluta (worked out)

      We think pretty much the same about AI, incidentally.

      Reply

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