Imagine spending over three decades chasing a hunch, a musical whisper in a dusty library. That's precisely what musicologist Peter Wollny did, and it led to the stunning rediscovery of two lost organ works by Johann Sebastian Bach! But here's where it gets controversial... can we truly be certain after all this time?
Wollny's story is a testament to perseverance, a real-life musical detective story. It all started in 1992 when he stumbled upon two intriguing, unattributed sheets of music while researching at the Royal Library of Belgium in Brussels. At the time, Wollny, now 65 and director of the Leipzig Bach Archive, was a graduate student at Harvard University. He wasn't even initially convinced they were Bach's! He admitted that the handwriting simply fascinated him, sparking a vague feeling that these pieces of paper might one day prove significant. So, he made photocopies and began a file that would accompany him for the next thirty years.
Despite dedicating his life to the study of Baroque music and its greatest composer, Wollny confessed that he didn't seriously consider the possibility of Bach's authorship until just a few years ago. It's a humbling reminder that even the most seasoned experts can be surprised.
Born in Issum, Germany, Wollny's academic journey took him through musicology, art history, and German studies before landing him at Harvard for his PhD, focusing on the music of Bach's eldest son, Wilhelm Friedemann Bach. After earning his doctorate in 1993, he joined the Bach Archive in Leipzig, eventually becoming its director in 2014.
According to his colleague and co-researcher, Bernd Koska, Wollny is known for his meticulous and thoughtful approach. He carefully considers all angles before reaching a conclusion – a crucial trait for a music detective!
What made these two works, Chaconne in D minor BWV 1178 and Chaconne in G minor BWV 1179, so unusual? They were both chaconnes, a musical form originating as a Spanish dance that evolved into a stylized art form around 1700. The defining characteristic of a chaconne is the ostinato, a short, repeating bass line that anchors the piece.
And this is the part most people miss... In typical organ chaconnes of that era, the ostinato bass motif usually spans six, seven, or eight bars – no more, no less. However, the Chaconne in D Minor that Wollny discovered broke this convention. The composer began with a seven-bar ostinato, then daringly stretched it to eight, then twelve, and finally sixteen bars! This unconventional approach immediately raised eyebrows.
The anonymous composer also employed other daring techniques, such as repeating the bass melody in a higher register with a one-bar delay, creating a canon. They even transformed the ostinato bass into a four-part fugue, a complex musical device used to weave a single theme throughout the composition. Wollny describes these idiosyncratic touches as the musical equivalent of hapax legomena – unique words that appear only once in a text. He emphasized that these works were outliers, defying the standard compositional practices of around 1703.
The only other known composition from this early period displaying similar boldness was Bach's Passacaglia in C Minor BWV 582.
Now, let's address the elephant in the room: the potential for obsession. Bach's music, with its intricate structures and mathematical puzzles, has a reputation for captivating its devotees, sometimes to an unsettling degree. From the sinister Bach enthusiasts in Lars von Trier's Nymphomaniac films to the novels of Nobel laureate László Krasznahorkai, Bach's influence can be seen in unexpected and sometimes disturbing places. Even Hannibal Lecter, in The Silence of the Lambs, enjoys the Goldberg Variations while committing unspeakable acts!
Professor John Butt of Glasgow University points out that, throughout history, many musicologists have felt an unusually personal connection to Bach's works. This can lead to... questionable attempts at authentication. He cautions that relying solely on stylistic analysis to determine the authenticity or date of Bach's works has a history of embarrassing misattributions.
However, Wollny possessed another crucial skill: a talent for recognizing handwriting features. He modestly described it as a potential aptitude for identifying unique characteristics in handwriting. After discovering the anonymous works, he felt a profound "inner duty" to uncover their author, meticulously studying the unique characteristics of the lines on the paper. He started by examining the treble and bass clefs, recognizing their individualistic qualities. He noted that the writer had a distinctive way of drawing the C clef, with a line at the bottom curling backwards, similar to Bach's notation.
Wollny knew the Brussels scores weren’t written by Bach himself. Composers often employed students as copyists, either for practical purposes or for commercial gain. These copyists would transcribe manuscripts, sometimes converting them from German organ tablature into standard notation, learning in the process.
Over the years, Wollny discovered twenty more documents matching the original handwriting in archives across Europe, dating from 1705 to 1715. These documents included lyrics and introductory texts, allowing him to develop a profile of the copyist's professional duties and interests.
But he still lacked the name. For years, he mistakenly believed the score was written by a cousin of Bach. However, in 2012, Wollny's colleague, Koska, discovered a 1727 letter from one Salomon Günther John applying for an organist position in Schleiz, Thuringia. The handwriting matched Wollny's documents, and the letter stated that John had studied under an organist in Arnstadt, where Bach had held his first organ teaching position. Suddenly, the pieces began to fit together.
Could the works have been composed by the young student instead of Bach? The researchers dismissed this theory because of small mistakes in the notation.
Still, Wollny remained uncertain, questioning his own biases. He feared making a mistake that could be perpetuated for centuries.
Finally, in 2023, the last piece of the puzzle emerged. A court document written by John in 1716, from a feudal estate in Oppurg, Thuringia, matched the handwriting of the Brussels chaconnes with absolute certainty.
Wollny doesn't recall celebrating the breakthrough. He simply sat there, turning the pages with a contented grin.
He acknowledges that artificial intelligence might one day accomplish in hours what took him 35 years. But that's okay, he says.
Here's a final thought: Even with all the evidence, can we ever be absolutely certain of authorship in cases like this? What role does intuition play in musicological discoveries? And what might these newly discovered pieces reveal about Bach's early development as a composer? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
