Anna Magdalena Bach had servants at her disposal! (See: Were there servants in the Bach family household?) So it was possible for her to pursue various activities not only in between times, but to a significant extent. This is the subject of the following articles.
I shall examine her activities as a singer in three articles. In Part I I treated the time in Köthen up to the move to Leipzig in 1723. Part II, just published, is about the subsequent years.
Extract from the accounts of the Köthen court, March 1729
Several years ago, in connection with my dissertation, I started looking more intensely at the life of Anna Magdalena Bach. She is very often portrayed as a woman who was a singer at some point and copied music for her husband Johann Sebastian, but whose life revolved around looking after the many children, doing the cooking and cleaning the apartment. My long years of research lead me to doubt this image, which I treated in two books. But I still come across subjects related to Anna Magdalena Bach which are worth examining more closely. That is the purpose of this blog, in which I post regular articles on this interesting woman. A sub-title “Johann Sebastian Bach in private” would also be suitable, as in many cases the circumstances of her life are closely related to those of her husband. Opinions about him may also change. Does it make any difference to you for example, whether he ordered a cup of coffee from his wife or from a maid who passed it on to an employee in the kitchen? (See: Were there servants in the Bach family household?)
My publications about Anna Magdalena Bach:
My piece “Anna Magdalena Bach – Ehefrau und Geschäftspartnerin” gives some impressions of what this book is about. It was produced by the German cultural radio station Deutschlandfunk Kultur and broadcast on 30th March 2022.
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My piece "Die verwitwete Frau Capellmeisterin Bach als Musikalienhändlerin", produced by the German cultural radio station Deutschlandfunk Kultur and broadcast on 29th May 2019, contains extracts from my research results which I present in this book.
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I would like to thank Alan Shepherd for the English translation.