The Bach family was of importance in the history of music for nearly two hundred years, with over 50 known musicians and several notable composers, the best-known of whom was Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750). A family genealogy was drawn up by Johann Sebastian Bach himself and completed by his son Carl Philipp Emanuel.

The Bach family never left Thuringia until the sons of Sebastian went into a more modern world. Through all the misery of the peasantry at the period of the Thirty Years' War this clan maintained its position and produced musicians who, however local their fame, were among the greatest in Europe. So numerous and so eminent were they that in Erfurt musicians were known as "Bachs", even when there were no longer any members of the family in the town. Sebastian Bach thus inherited the artistic tradition of a united family whose circumstances had deprived them of the distractions of the century of musical fermentation which in the rest of Europe had destroyed polyphonic music.

Ancestors of Johann Sebastian Bach

Four branches of the Bach family were known at the beginning of the 16th century, and in 1561 we hear of Hans Bach of Wechmar, a village between Gotha and Arnstadt in Thuringia, who is believed to be the father of Veit Bach.

• Veit (Vitus) Bach (d. 1619) was "a white-bread baker in Hungary" who had to flee Hungary because he was a Lutheran and who "found the greatest pleasure in a little cittern which he took with him even into the mill".
• His son Johannes Bach (d. 1626) "der Spielmann" (lit. the player), was the first professional musician of the family. "at first took up the trade of baker, but having a particular bent for music" he became a piper.
• His second grandson Christoph (1613–1661) was an instrumentalist.
• His first grandson Johann Ambrosius was Johann Sebastian Bach's father.

Others born before 1685

Johann Ambrosius' eldest brother, Heinrich of Arnstadt, had two sons: Johann Michael and Johann Christoph, who are among the greatest of J. S. Bach's forerunners, Johann Christoph being once supposed to be the author of the motet, Ich lasse dich nicht ("I will not leave you"), formerly ascribed to Sebastian Bach and now confirmed to be his (BWV 159a). Another descendant of Veit Bach, Johann Ludwig, was admired more than any other ancestor by Sebastian, who copied twelve of his church cantatas and sometimes added work of his own to them.

Descendants of Johann Sebastian Bach

• Of the seven children that Johann Sebastian Bach had with his first wife only three survived him. Two of these had musical careers of their own: Wilhelm Friedemann and the aforementioned Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach.
• Johann Sebastian Bach then married Anna Magdalena Wilcken, herself a gifted soprano and daughter of the court trumpeter of Prince Saxe-Weissenfels. They had 13 children, of whom Gottfried Heinrich, Johann Christoph Friedrich and Johann Christian became significant musicians. A further three survived into adulthood: Elisabeth Juliane Friederica (1726-1781) who married Bach's pupil Johann Christoph Altnikol, Johanna Carolina (1737–1781) and Regina Susanna (1742–1809)

Family tree

Expanded genealogy

• Veit Bach (about 1550–1619)
  • Johann „Hans“ Bach I (d. 1626) (son of Veit Bach)
    • Johann „Hans“ Bach III (1604–1673) - the so-called Erfurt Line
      • Johann Christian Bach I (1640–1682)
        • Johann Jacob Bach II (1668–1692)
        • Johann Christoph Bach IV (1673–1727)
          • Johann Samuel Bach (1694–1720)
          • Johann Christian Bach II (1696–)
          • Johann Günther Bach II (1703–1756)
      • Johann Aegidius Bach I (1645–1716)
        • Johann Balthasar Bach (1673–1691)
        • Johann Bernhard Bach I (1676–1749)
          • Johann Ernst Bach II (1722–1777)
            • Johann Georg Bach I (1751–1797)
        • Johann Christoph Bach VI (1685–1740)
          • Johann Friedrich Bach II (1706–1743)
          • Johann Aegidius Bach II (1709–1746)
      • Johann Nicolaus Bach I (1653–1682)
    • Christoph Bach (1613–1661)
      • Georg Christoph Bach (1642–1697)
        • Johann Valentin Bach (1669–1720)
          • Johann Lorenz Bach (1695–1773)
          • Johann Elias Bach (1705–1755)
            • Johann Michael Bach III (1745–1820) (?)
              • Johann Georg Bach II (1786–1874)
              • Georg Friedrich Bach (1792–1860)
      • Johann Christoph Bach II (1645–1693)
        • Johann Ernst Bach I (1683–1739)
        • Johann Christoph Bach VII (1689–1740)
      • Johann Ambrosius Bach (1645–1695)
        • Johann Christoph Bach III (1671–1721)
          • Johann Andreas Bach (1713–1779)
            • Johann Christoph Georg Bach (1747–1814)
          • Johann Bernhard Bach II (1700–1743)
          • Johann Christoph Bach VIII (1702–1756)
            • Ernst Carl Gottfried Bach (1738–1801)
            • Ernst Christian Bach (1747–1822)
            • Philipp Christiann Georg Bach (1734–1809)
        • Johann Jacob Bach III (1682–1722)
        • Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) - wed in his first marriage to second cousin Maria Barbara Bach (1684–1720); in second marriage 1721 with Anna Magdalena Wilcke (1701–1760)
          • Catharina Dorothea Bach (1708–1774)
          • Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (1710–1784) - the so-called „Dresden Bach“ or „Halle Bach“
          • Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714–1788) - the so-called „Hamburger Bach“ or „Berlin Bach“
            • Johann Sebastian Bach (1748–1778) - painter
          • Johann Gottfried Bernhard Bach (1715–1739)
          • Gottfried Heinrich Bach (1724–1763)
          • Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach (1732–1795) - the so-called „Bückeburg Bach“
            • Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst Bach (1759–1845)
          • Johann Christian Bach III (1735–1782) - the so-called „Mailänd Bach“ or „London Bach“
    • Heinrich Bach I (1615–1692) - the so-called Arnstädt Line
      • Johann Christoph Bach I (1642–1703)
        • Johann Nikolaus Bach II (1669–1753)
        • Johann Christoph Bach V (1676–)
          • Johann Heinrich Bach II (1709–)
        • Johann Friedrich Bach I (1682–1730)
        • Johann Michael Bach II (1685–)
      • Johann Michael Bach I (1648–1694)
        • Maria Barbara Bach (1684–1720) - married Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
      • Johann Günther Bach I (1653–1683)
  • Philippus „Lips“ Bach (1590–1620) - son of Veit Bach
    • Wendel Bach (1619–1682)
      • Johann Jacob Bach I (1655–1718)
        • Nicolaus Ephraim Bach (1690–1760)
        • Georg Michael Bach (1703–1771)
          • Johann Christian Bach IV (1743–1814)
        • Johann Ludwig Bach (1677–1731) - the so-called „Meininger Bach“, composer
          • Gottlieb Friedrich Bach (1714–1785) - court organist, court painter Meinigen
            • Johann Philipp Bach (1752–1846) - musician, painter
          • Samuel Anton Bach (1713–1781)
    • Johann Bach IV (1621–1686) - nephew of Lips Bach
      • Johann Stephan Bach (1665–1717)

• Caspar Bach I (1570–1640) (brother of Veit Bach???)
  • Caspar Bach II (1600–)
  • Heinrich „Blinder Jonas“ Bach (–1635)
  • Johann Bach II (1612–1632)
  • Melchior Bach (1603–1634)
  • Nicolaus Bach (1619–1637)

References

• The New Grove Bach Family by Christopher Wolff et al., MacMillan 1983 ISBN 0 333 34350 6 provides a substantial treatment of each noted musician in the family

1. New Grove Bach Family, p. 98, p. 111

See also

• P. D. Q. Bach, a fictional member of the Bach family
• Bach , for people named Bach who were not related to JSB.
• Bach

External links

• Bach Family Tree Image map
• Bach Family
• Article on the Bach Family