Book Description Peter Wiliams approaches afresh the life and music of arguably the most studied of all composers, interpreting both Bach’s life by deconstructing his original Obituary in the light of new information, and his music by evaluating his priorities and irrepressible creative energy. How, though belonging to musical families on both his parents’ sides, did he come to possess so bewitching a sense of rhythm and melody, and a mastery of harmony that established nothing less than a norm in western culture? In considering that the works of a composer are his biography, the book's title 'A Life in Music' means both a life spent making music and one revealed in the music as we know it. A distinguished scholar and performer, Williams re-examines Bach’s life as an orphan and a family man, as an extraordinarily gifted composer and player, and an energetic and ambitious artist who never suffered fools gladly. Review "Peter Williams is a master of putting question marks where they belong. He is wise enough to admit that definite answers are rarely possible. Nevertheless, guided by the 1754 Obituary, he gives splendid food for thought with his penetrating insights and truly erudite suggestions." --Gustav Leonhardt "Williams has created a well-rounded portrait of Johann Sebastian Bach that leavens erudition with entertaining turns of phrase.[...]Highly recommended for academic and music collections and for public libraries with a knowledgeable clientele." -- Library Journal

Many listeners and players are fascinated by Bach's Goldberg Variations. In this wideranging and searching study, Professor Williams, one of the leading Bach scholars of our time, helps them probe its depths and understand its uniqueness. He considers the work's historical origins, especially in relation to all Bach's Clavierubung volumes and late keyboard works, its musical agenda and its formal shape, and discusses significant performance issues. In the course of the book he poses a number of key questions. Why should such a work be written? Does the work have both a conceptual and a perceptual shape? What other music is likely to have influenced the Goldberg and to what extent is it trying to be encyclopedic? What is the canonic vocabulary? How have contemporaries or musicians from Beethoven to the present day seen this work and, above all, how has its mysterious beauty been created?

《我爱巴赫:巴赫钢琴弹奏导读》作者林华，一首前奏曲，即便是篇幅短小，但它的气势却是宏大的；反之，一首风笛舞曲，哪怕篇幅再长也只能以恬静，优雅、风趣的品味处理。在复调音乐中，每个声部都在歌唱，你必须把它们的进行始终同时置于你手指的控制之正点，以便随时调整不同层次的抗衡关系。 如果没有秩序美感，又怎能把一个乐思的发展逻辑，严密地演释清楚？如果没有情感体验，又怎能让音响符号打动人心呢？

Finalist for the 2001 Pulitzer Prize in Biography. A landmark biography of Bach on the 250th anniversary of the composer's death, written by the leading Bach scholar of our age. Although we have heard the music of J. S. Bach in countless performances and recordings, the composer himself still comes across only as an enigmatic figure in a single familiar portrait. As we mark the 250th anniversary of Bach's death, author Christoph Wolff presents a new picture that brings to life this towering figure of the Baroque era. This engaging new biography portrays Bach as the living, breathing, and sometimes imperfect human being that he was, while bringing to bear all the advances of the last half-century of Bach scholarship. Wolff demonstrates the intimate connection between the composer's life and his music, showing how Bach's superb inventiveness pervaded his career as musician, composer, performer, scholar, and teacher. And throughout, we see Bach in the broader context of his time: its institutions, traditions, and influences. With this highly readable book, Wolff sets a new standard for Bach biography. "A monumental work that must find its way into the library of every musician and every dedicated lover of music."—Isaac Stern "It's unlikely that anyone will fashion a finer tribute to [Bach's] genius."— Los Angeles Times Book Review "A magisterial biographical portrait...necessarily learned, but also user-friendly, helpful and entertainingly informative."— Chicago Tribune "Likely to be the standard one-volume Bach biography for some time to come."— New York Review of Books "A work of clarity worthy of its subject and his music."— Wall Street Journal "Undoubtedly the most important Bach biography since Phillipp Spitta's life written over a century ago."— The New Republic 42 black and white illustrations

纪念册 5 悼念罗斯特洛波维奇 7 理查·施特劳斯《最后四首歌》首演 逝者 11 被低估的大师：安德烈·克路易坦 15 低音之王：尼古拉伊·吉奥洛夫 古典音乐欣赏入门3· 巴赫 22 巴赫手中的魔方 ——廖嘉伟、黄亚蒙谈巴赫 29 巴赫键盘作品的风格演变 32 轻松聆听《平均律》 40 巴赫BACH:每一滴都是汪洋 44 心随曲动二十载 49 巴赫需要独享 56 《创意曲》的情趣 60 “本真主义”复活无疑是正确的 67 超越巴罗克 74 伟大迷宫的入口 80 键盘上的交响 84 如果种子不死 ——我眼中的巴赫现代诠释者们 93 现代钢琴版的巴赫,辫剪了,神留着 98 部分巴赫键盘乐名家唱片目录 100巴赫生命中的重要人物 104巴赫在科滕 112远方的桥 116不可忽视的巴赫的演绎者们 130部分巴赫键盘乐名家唱片目录 139巴罗克永远是顶峰 143巴赫音乐中的舞曲 专访 157安德列斯·希夫访谈 话题 164柳儿之死 ——我对《图兰朵》的一点理解 唱片说明书 168格里格钢琴作品全集 173比贝尔奏鸣曲 早期音乐笔记 177奥兰德·拉絮斯（下） 爱乐笔记 189仆役的尊严 ——事关海顿的一份雇用合同 193“你的罪恶猩红必将变得洁白如雪”（下） 201孤独与交谈 歌剧简史连载(三) 204歌剧的前身 歌剧物语 218看戏，还是听歌(下) 购片、听片与收藏 224走进吉东·克莱默的音乐世界(下) 我的爱乐生活 234我的“欣赏”史（上）

Johann Sebastian Bach is one of the most unfathomable composers in the history of music. How can such sublime work have been produced by a man who (when we can discern his personality at all) seems so ordinary, so opaque—and occasionally so intemperate? John Eliot Gardiner grew up passing one of the only two authentic portraits of Bach every morning and evening on the stairs of his parents’ house, where it hung for safety during World War II. He has been studying and performing Bach ever since, and is now regarded as one of the composer’s greatest living interpreters. The fruits of this lifetime’s immersion are distilled in this remarkable book, grounded in the most recent Bach scholarship but moving far beyond it, and explaining in wonderful detail the ideas on which Bach drew, how he worked, how his music is constructed, how it achieves its effects—and what it can tell us about Bach the man. Gardiner’s background as a historian has encouraged him to search for ways in which scholarship and performance can cooperate and fruitfully coalesce. This has entailed piecing together the few biographical shards, scrutinizing the music, and watching for those instances when Bach’s personality seems to penetrate the fabric of his notation. Gardiner’s aim is “to give the reader a sense of inhabiting the same experiences and sensations that Bach might have had in the act of music-making. This, I try to show, can help us arrive at a more human likeness discernible in the closely related processes of composing and performing his music.” It is very rare that such an accomplished performer of music should also be a considerable writer and thinker about it. John Eliot Gardiner takes us as deeply into Bach’s works and mind as perhaps words can. The result is a unique book about one of the greatest of all creative artists.