Maria Barbara Bach ( – buried 7 July 1720) was a German singer and the first wife of composer

Johann Sebastian Bach Johann Sebastian Bach (German: Help:IPA/Standard German, �joːhan zeˈbasti̯an baχ ( – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque music, Baroque period. He is known for his prolific output across a variety ...

. She was also the daughter of his father's cousin Johann Michael Bach.

Life

Maria Barbara Bach was born at Gehren,

Schwarzburg-Sondershausen Schwarzburg-Sondershausen was a small principality in Germany, in the present day state of Thuringia, with its capital at Sondershausen. History Schwarzburg-Sondershausen was a county (earldom) until 1697. In that year, it became a principal ...

, to Catherina (d. 1704) and Michael Bach (1648–1694). Her father was organist and town scribe at Gehren. Her older sister, Barbara Catherina, gave testimony on Bach's behalf in the famous 'Geyersbach' incident in which Bach was punched in the face by a student and defended himself by drawing his sword. Her godparents were Martin Feldhaus, a merchant and burgomaster in Arnstadt, and Magarethe Wedermann (daughter of the Arnstadt town scribe Johann Wedemann), with whom she lived after her mother's death in 1704. Maria Barbara was twenty-three years old when she married Johann Sebastian Bach. The extended Bach family was closely knit, and as Maria Barbara was his second cousin, it is fairly safe to assume that they knew each other at least casually from childhood. They became close during Bach's tenure as organist of

Mühlhausen Mühlhausen () is a town in the north-west of Thuringia, Germany, north of Niederdorla, the country's Central Germany (geography)#Geographical centre, geographical centre, north-west of Erfurt, east of Kassel and south-east of Göttingen ...

's St. Blasius Church, and were able to marry at Dornheim on 17 October 1707, thanks to an inheritance of 50 gulden (more than half his annual salary) which he received from his maternal uncle, Tobias Lämmerhirt. Little is known of her life or their marriage, except that they were contented. According to the ''Nekrolog'' ('obituary') co-authored by Carl Philipp Emanuel and Bach student

Johann Friedrich Agricola Johann Friedrich Agricola (4 January 1720 – 2 December 1774) was a German composer, organist, singer, pedagogue, and writer on music. He sometimes wrote under the pseudonym Flavio Anicio Olibrio. Biography Agricola was born in Dobitschen, Th ...

, Maria Barbara's death in 1720 was sudden and unexpected. Bach was at the Carlsbad spa accompanying his employer, Prince Leopold of

Anhalt-Köthen Anhalt-Köthen was a Princes of the Holy Roman Empire, principality of the Holy Roman Empire ruled by the House of Ascania. It was created in 1396 when the Principality of Anhalt-Zerbst was partitioned between Anhalt-Dessau and Anhalt-Köthen. T ...

, when she died. When Bach left Köthen, Maria Barbara was in perfectly good health; but when he returned two months later, he was shocked to learn that she had died and been buried on 7 July. The cause of her death is undocumented. Professor Helga Thoene proposed that Bach's famous Violin Partita No. 2 (especially the final "Chaconne" movement) was written as a

tombeau A tombeau (plural tombeaux) is a musical composition (earlier, in the early 16th century, a poem) commemorating the death of a notable individual. The term derives from the French word for "tomb" or "tombstone". The vast majority of tombeaux date f ...

for Maria Barbara.Thoene, Helga. 1994. "Johann Sebastian Bach. Ciaconna—Tanz oder Tombeau. Verborgene Sprache eines berühmten Werkes". In Festschrift zum Leopoldfest 5. Köthener Bachfesttage 14–81. Cöthener Bach-Hefte 6, Veröffentlichungen des Historischen Museums Köthen/Anhalt XIX. Köthen. However, these claims are controversial. Johann and Maria Barbara had seven children, three of whom died in infancy: * Catharina Dorothea (28 December 1708 – 14 January 1774). * Wilhelm Friedemann (22 November 1710 – 1 July 1784). * Johann Christoph (23 February 1713 – 23 February 1713). * Maria Sophia (23 February 1713 – 15 March 1713), twin of Johann Christoph. * Carl Philipp Emanuel (8 March 1714 – 14 December 1788). * Johann Gottfried Bernhard (11 May 1715 – 27 May 1739). * Leopold Augustus (15 November 1718 – 29 September 1719). Anna Magdalena Wilcke became Johann's second wife 17 months after Maria Barbara's death and raised her stepchildren along with her own children with Johann Sebastian Bach.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bach, Maria Barbara 1684 births 1720 deaths People from Ilm-Kreis People from Schwarzburg-Sondershausen Maria Barbara Bach