The Bach-Archiv Leipzig or Bach-Archiv is an institution for the documentation and research of the life and work of Johann Sebastian Bach. The Bach-Archiv also researches the Bach family, especially their music. Based in Leipzig, the city where Bach lived from 1723 until his death, the Archiv is recognised by the German government as a "cultural beacon" of national importance. Since 2008 the Bach-Archiv has been part of the University of Leipzig.

History

The Bach-Archiv was founded on the occasion of the bicentennial of Bach's death in 1950 by Werner Neumann, who remained its director until 1973. It served as a central archive for manuscripts and historic documents connected to the composer and a central research center related to him and his family. At the time of the institution's foundation Leipzig was in East Germany. Prior to German unification there was collaboration with Bach experts in West Germany. For example, the second edition of Bach's complete works, the Neue Bach-Ausgabe, was a joint project between the Bach-Archiv and the Johann-Sebastian-Bach-Institut in Göttingen, West Germany. Uwe Wolf (editor); Contributions by Georg von Dadelsen, Alfred Dürr, Hans-Joachim Schulze, Frieder Zschoch and others
''Die Neue Bach-Ausgabe 1954–2007: Eine Dokumentation''.

Bärenreiter Bärenreiter (Bärenreiter-Verlag) is a German classical music publishing house based in Kassel. The firm was founded by Karl Vötterle (1903–1975) in Augsburg in 1923, and moved to Kassel in 1927, where it still has its headquarters; it also ...

, 2007. P3. 3ff After unification the Bach-Archiv became part of the Konferenz Nationaler Kultureinrichtungen, a union of more than twenty cultural organizations in the former East Germany which are deemed to be nationally significant. The Göttingen Institute closed in 2006. Since 23 November 2008 the Bach-Archiv has been an institute of the University of Leipzig.

Location

The Bach-Archiv has been housed in the historic

Bosehaus The Bosehaus is a historic house in the Thomaskirchhof, Leipzig, Germany. The building is of 16th century origin, but was updated in baroque style by Georg Heinrich Bose. It currently houses the Bach-Archiv Leipzig and its Bach Museum along with th ...

opposite the Thomaskirche since 1985. The site was restored from 2008 to 2010 to comply with the latest safety requirements, and was opened again on 20 March 2010 by the President of Germany, Horst Köhler. The Neue Bachgesellschaft shares the premises, which also houses a Bach Museum.The Bach Museum Leipzig
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Management

Directors: * 1950–1973: Werner Neumann * 1974–1979: Hans-Joachim Schulze * 1979–1991: Werner Felix * 1992–2000: Hans-Joachim Schulze * 2001-2013: Christoph Wolff * : Peter Wollny Presidents (new position as of 2014; Presidents are appointed for a five-year term): * 2014-2019: Sir John Eliot Gardiner * : Ton Koopman

Projects

Projects with a major participation by the Bach Archive: * New Bach Edition (critical Urtext edition of all of Johann Sebastian Bach's extant works, published between 1954 and 2007) * Bach Digital (portal website, launched in 2010, with data and digital facsimiles of compositions by members of the Bach family)Legal note
at Bach Digital website. * Online Bach Bibliography (merger, operated since 2012, of the data of the former Bach Bibliography website by , which had been online since 1997, into the bibliographical data of the Archive, accessible via a web interface) * jsbach biografie online (multimedia calendar documenting Bach's life story) *

Bach 333 Johann Sebastian Bach (28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the ''Brandenburg Concertos''; instrumental compositions such as the Cello Suites; keyboard wo ...

(complete recordings set of Johann Sebastian Bach's works, with detailed documentation, released in 2018)''Bach 333'' website
(26 October 2018)

Acquisitions

In 2021, the Bach Archive acquired

Gustav Mahler Gustav Mahler (; 7 July 1860 – 18 May 1911) was an Austro-Bohemian Romantic composer, and one of the leading conductors of his generation. As a composer he acted as a bridge between the 19th-century Austro-German tradition and the modernism ...

's Bach edition, 59 of the 61 volumes of the

Bach-Gesellschaft-Ausgabe Joh. Seb. Bach's Werke () is the Bach Gesellschaft's collected edition of Johann Sebastian Bach's compositions, published in 61 volumes in the second half of the 19th century. The series is also known as Bach-Gesellschaft edition (german: Bach-Gese ...

, the first collected edition of Bach's works, with handwritten annotations by Mahler and his arrangement of the Gavotte from Bach's Orchestral Suite, BWV 1068. The edition had been in private possession, and will become open to musicologists and the public for the first time, as Wollny told the press.

Relevance

Today the Bach-Archiv is a renowned center of Bach research with a scientific library for Bach topics. There is engagement with a wider public via the Bach-Museum and via performances of Bach's music, especially the '' Bachfest Leipzig'' (an international festival) and the ''Internationaler Johann-Sebastian-Bach-Wettbewerb'' (an international music competition).

References

External links

Website of the Bach Archive
(in English)
Bach-Archiv in Leipzig
Leipzig
Bach-Archiv Leipzig zieht positive Jahresbilanz 2010
Bach-Archiv, Leipzig, 23 December 2010 (in German) {{Authority control Music archives in Germany Music in Leipzig East German music Johann Sebastian Bach 1950 establishments in East Germany Leipzig University