# Scarlatti and Bach



## maria barbara

We all know that Bach, Scarlatti (Domenico) and Händel were born on the same year 1685. Scarlatti and Handel met in Italy and greatly appreciated each other, but Bach never met Handel nor Scarlatti. Most musicologists pretend that Bach has never heard of Domenico Scarlatti, and never seen his famous "Essercizi" (29 sonatas plus the "cat's fugue"), published in 1738-9 and widely available in London and Paris. How could a man like Bach ignore the novelty of scarlattian music ? And why, two years later, did he publish the Goldberg's variations (30 pieces) which obviously seem to me like an answer to the Essercizi ?


----------



## Ukko

Next time I run into Sebastian I will ask him about DS. BTW that 'obviously' would have more force if it were placed (as 'obvious') immediately before 'answer'. It's an example of the benefits of the sentence diagramming discipline.

[Sorry. You may well have phrased the sentence to impart exactly your intended meaning. I'm trying to validate the usefulness of sentence diagramming, even though it is is far too late for that.]

:tiphat:


----------



## PetrB

maria barbara said:


> We all know that Bach, Scarlatti (Domenico) and Händel were born on the same year 1685. Scarlatti and Handel met in Italy and greatly appreciated each other, but Bach never met Handel nor Scarlatti. Most musicologists pretend that Bach has never heard of Domenico Scarlatti, and never seen his famous "Essercizi" (29 sonatas plus the "cat's fugue"), published in 1738-9 and widely available in London and Paris. How could a man like Bach ignore the novelty of scarlattian music ? And why, two years later, did he publish the Goldberg's variations (30 pieces) which obviously seem to me like an answer to the Essercizi ?


We all know that in musicology, true scholarship leaves such a supposition as yours as nothing but a supposition, a mere flimsy conjecture -- _unless it can be verified via documentation_.

Documents from that era will be in writing, most admissible and acceptable if they are written by Bach; far less acceptable are secondary sources, those requiring that much more confirmation as to their reliability before being accepted as proof.

No documentation has so far been found, anywhere, concerning Bach's being aware of the Scarlatti Sonatas.

Dilettantes can make any supposition they care to make.


----------



## Taggart

Agreed. This is from the Guardian



> The comings and goings at the highly musical court of Dresden are likely to have made Bach aware of the composer of the 30 Essercizi, and it remains an open question as to whether they could have prompted him to produce the relatively flamboyant, if altogether weightier, 30 Goldberg Variations.


Then there is the question raised by the harpsichordist John Sankey about tuning. He thinks that Scarlatti may have used a French style tuning (the problem with Rameau and Couperin on Piano). Given the French influences in English music that may be why it was picked up in England. Bach used (probably) a Werckmeister temperament which would not be wholly consonant with Scarlatti's tuning. If this important (and I agree with PetrB that in the absence of full documentation we can't decide) then the Goldberg and the Essercizi may simply be independent examples.

Scarlatti's work is also discussed in this Guardian article which also refers to Sankey and his tunings.


----------



## Vaneyes

Some suspicions and light evidence via this link. I'll just suspect this poor horse has been flogged to death.

http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Other/Scarlatti-Gen1.htm

Instead, give joy that Yucko's back!:tiphat:


----------



## PetrB

Vaneyes said:


> Some suspicions and light evidence via this link. I'll just suspect this poor horse has been flogged to death.
> 
> http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Other/Scarlatti-Gen1.htm
> 
> Instead, give joy that Yucko's back!:tiphat:


I'm reminded of Cole Porter's quip that the only inspiration he ever needed was a check (i.e. a commission.) 
Since the Goldberg Variations were yet another commission for Bach....

On another plank, I'm sure the only people who care, or care most to prove that Scarlatti influenced Bach are Italians, who have to live with and ignore that the majority of Scarlatti's works were commissioned and written in Spain


----------



## Vaneyes

Oh well, Vivaldi will hafta do.


----------



## maria barbara

sorry to insist, even if Bach did not claim his admiration for Scarlatti, people who have carefully listened to the Essercizi are aware that its 29 sonatas are based on a subtle game with symmetry, and the ones who have studied the Goldbergs know that their structure is pure mathematical symmetry (geometrical symmetry was a great game during the Enlightenment). The nature of these symmetries can easily be documented...


----------



## PetrB

maria barbara said:


> sorry to insist, even if Bach did not claim his admiration for Scarlatti, people who have carefully listened to the Essercizi are aware that its 29 sonatas are based on a subtle game with symmetry, and the ones who have studied the Goldbergs know that their structure is pure mathematical symmetry (geometrical symmetry was a great game during the Enlightenment). The nature of these symmetries can easily be documented...


As if this was not the main game played by Bach well before Scarlatti!

Pushing an idea so far in hopes of crediting Scarlatti with triggering Bach's genius, that genius already well-exercised and proven again and again in work after work has got to have some very personal agenda behind it which has nothing to do with musicology.

As to symmetry -- this is nothing new, either realized perception of symmetry in nature







...or a proclivity for symmetry in man-made things













or in music, here, the 14th century Rondeau of Guillaume de Machaut, _Ma fin est mon commencement._








To think at all there is anything unique about either the alleged symmetry in the Scarlatti _exercizi,_ or for that matter, the patent symmetry of Bach's _Goldberg Variations_ is, I think, wildly naive.


----------



## KenOC

Interesting that Bach, Handel, and Scarlatti were born in the same year!


----------



## PetrB

KenOC said:


> Interesting that Bach, Handel, and Scarlatti were born in the same year!


Good crop that season!


----------



## Taggart

PetrB said:


> Good crop that season!


Don't forget Giuseppe Matteo Alberti or Lodovico Giustini (the first to write for the piano). They always get left out of the party.


----------



## maria barbara

Ok, I will try to document it with nice pictures, as you do. Symmetry is everywhere in nature, but it has very special translations in music...


----------



## Taggart

maria barbara said:


> Ok, I will try to document it with nice pictures, as you do. Symmetry is everywhere in nature, but it has very special translations in music...


Have a look at Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter if you want to get into symmetry in a big way.


----------



## PetrB

maria barbara said:


> Ok, I will try to document it with nice pictures, as you do. Symmetry is everywhere in nature, but it has very special translations in music...


Those 'translations' are not so special, and to prove your hypothesis you would better be a fully trained musicologist, deeply entrenched in music theory, history, and able to read fluently in at least three -- better four -- languages in order to access all those obscure documents spread throughout Europe in libraries, archives, private collections, etc.

My guess is you've _decided_ there is some parallel, and have become fixated upon it, perhaps also while thinking that for some reason, your intuition is keener than generations of musicologists, and unique.

Truly, if what you say had any truth in fact, it would have already been well-written up by musicologists and historians.

Bach _might have_ heard one, or a few, or all of the Scarlatti _Exercizi_; he _might have_ seen one, or a few, or all of them in manuscript. *Where is the documentation that he heard or saw any of them?*


----------



## maria barbara

I'm not the only one to think that. At the article "Scarlatti" of "Tout Bach", R. Laffont, 2009, one reads (my translation) : The intimity of Bach with Scarlatti's work has not been proved, unless some features of the Goldberg variations or Well tempered clavier (prélude n°5 of the second book) tend to prove his knowledge of the Essercizi published in London 1739. 30 Essercizi, 30 variations... And Essercizi is translated Übungen in german. Maybe Bach was put in contact with Scarlatti through the luthenist Silvius Leopold Weiss, who had met him in Rome. For Gilles Cantagrel (french specialist of Bach), the doubt is impossible : "Curious of any new music and living in a central town, european capital of books, Bach has certainly seen these pages, which by the way influenced many other musicias, including Rameau".

As for the symmetry, there is an excellent analysis of the Goldberg in "Finding Moonshine" by the mathematician Marcus Dusautoy. He explains that Bach has used all the possible symmetries. The variations are arranged in groups of 3, the third one being a canon, and frequency goes up by one interval at each canon. The structure of each canon is determined by two ternary choices : the number of notes per measure (2, 3 or 4) and the nature of the notes (duolet, triolet or quartolet) which are systematically explored... This is what mathematicians call "symmetry".

Scarlattian symmetry is a bit different and more graphical than mathematical. If you want to "see" it, don't look at a musical score, but ask for a "sonagram" of a sonata, or frequency/time diagram. Here, for example, is the sonagram of K14 :







Each colour represents a cell (orange is a double cell). You can see the first part of the sonata, then the moves Scarlatti has made to get the second part, and then the second part. It's easily seen that the symmetry of the first part (green violet green and blue orange blue) is much less elaborate than in the second part (green orange green / violet / blue orange blue). This is a common scarlattian game, specially in the Essercizi (after that, he has invented lots of other games)...


----------



## Mandryka

The topic is interesting, especially because it's so esoteric. Codes and stuff, I quite like that sort of thing. Up to now the only work I've ever consciously thought of in connection with the Goldbergs is Buxtehude's Cappricciosa. 

I think I once read somewhere that Landowska thought there were connections between the Essercizi and some of Bach's music, some of WTC 2 I think it was, though I expect that she was low on argument for this. I'll try and investigate it.


----------



## maria barbara

the story about Silvius Leopold Weiss as a link between Bach and Scarlatti is to be found in Landowska's article on the Goldbergs. By the way, she played the Goldbergs in concert in 1933 and recorded 25 Scarlatti sonatas the next year... Landowska may have been low on argument, but she was so high on musical intuition !


----------



## Mandryka

maria barbara said:


> sorry to insist, even if Bach did not claim his admiration for Scarlatti, people who have carefully listened to the Essercizi are aware that its 29 sonatas are based on a subtle game with symmetry, and the ones who have studied the Goldbergs know that their structure is pure mathematical symmetry (geometrical symmetry was a great game during the Enlightenment). The nature of these symmetries can easily be documented...





maria barbara said:


> I'm not the only one to think that. At the article "Scarlatti" of "Tout Bach", R. Laffont, 2009, one reads (my translation) : The intimity of Bach with Scarlatti's work has not been proved, unless some features of the Goldberg variations or Well tempered clavier (prélude n°5 of the second book) tend to prove his knowledge of the Essercizi published in London 1739. 30 Essercizi, 30 variations... And Essercizi is translated Übungen in german. Maybe Bach was put in contact with Scarlatti through the luthenist Silvius Leopold Weiss, who had met him in Rome. For Gilles Cantagrel (french specialist of Bach), the doubt is impossible : "Curious of any new music and living in a central town, european capital of books, Bach has certainly seen these pages, which by the way influenced many other musicias, including Rameau".
> 
> As for the symmetry, there is an excellent analysis of the Goldberg in "Finding Moonshine" by the mathematician Marcus Dusautoy. He explains that Bach has used all the possible symmetries. The variations are arranged in groups of 3, the third one being a canon, and frequency goes up by one interval at each canon. The structure of each canon is determined by two ternary choices : the number of notes per measure (2, 3 or 4) and the nature of the notes (duolet, triolet or quartolet) which are systematically explored... This is what mathematicians call "symmetry".
> 
> Scarlattian symmetry is a bit different and more graphical than mathematical. If you want to "see" it, don't look at a musical score, but ask for a "sonagram" of a sonata, or frequency/time diagram. Here, for example, is the sonagram of K14 :
> View attachment 49773
> 
> Each colour represents a cell (orange is a double cell). You can see the first part of the sonata, then the moves Scarlatti has made to get the second part, and then the second part. It's easily seen that the symmetry of the first part (green violet green and blue orange blue) is much less elaborate than in the second part (green orange green / violet / blue orange blue). This is a common scarlattian game, specially in the Essercizi (after that, he has invented lots of other games)...





maria barbara approvingly quoting Pierre Hantaï said:


> Scarlatti est en péril, sous-estimé par mes confrères clavecinistes. Ce sont jusqu'à présent les pianistes qui l'ont servi le mieux, ont su mettre en évidence la structure des sonates. Pourtant, le piano rend peu justice à cette musique qui exploite toutes les possibilités du clavecin. Scarlatti dans ses pages les plus flamboyantes, doit sonner comme du Liszt ou du Scriabine, mais les pianistes ont tendance à en faire des miniatures. Quant aux clavecinistes, leur problème vient de leur culture du détail et du raffinement. Scarlatti n'est pas Bach. Son langage fait de courtes cellules répétitives qui créent et alternent des couleurs et climats très variés ne se rapproche en rien de ce qui était connu à son époque. Pour le comprendre, il faut être attentif à ces particularités structurelles, être coloriste dans l'âme.


Can I ask you, to start with, do you think that Bach in the some of the Goldberg variations composed with _repetitive_ small cells to create varied colours? An example would be great.


----------



## maria barbara

Dear Mandryka,
No, Bach did not play the same game as Scarlatti. I've made the sonagrams for the Goldberg but the music is much more melodic (no distinctive cells), so the result is not easily readable. As far as I know, Scarlattis's collages are the only ones which give a good result with frequency analysis (maybe Bartok would, and most of structuralist musicians of our times, Xenakis, Varèse, aso). What I suppose is that seeing the novelty and boldness of the Essercizi, which play a very subtle game with symmetry, Bach decided to answer in his own way : completely and exhaustively mathematical, by exploring another sort of musical symmetry. But it's only a guess. Bach was obsessed by symmetry, he may have been challenged by scarlattian games. Whatever, the Golbergs and the Essercizi are clearly two great summits of music. Is n'it all what really matters ?


----------



## Ellenkaaa

maria barbara said:


> We all know that Bach, Scarlatti (Domenico) and Händel were born on the same year 1685. Scarlatti and Handel met in Italy and greatly appreciated each other, but Bach never met Handel nor Scarlatti. Most musicologists pretend that Bach has never heard of Domenico Scarlatti, and never seen his famous "Essercizi" (29 sonatas plus the "cat's fugue"), published in 1738-9 and widely available in London and Paris. How could a man like Bach ignore the novelty of scarlattian music ? And why, two years later, did he publish the Goldberg's variations (30 pieces) which obviously seem to me like an answer to the Essercizi ?


Hi, perhaps you might like this video about Scarlatti! 🎶

Domenico Scarlatti ROCKED HARPSICHORD


----------

