RE: Discovering The Six Brandenburg Concerti by J.S. Bach

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Discovering The Six Brandenburg Concerti by J.S. Bach

in classical-music •  6 years ago 

I assume these recordings are of performances at A440? Do you happen to know what pitch Bach composed in?

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No, most of them should be at 415 as the modern baroque normal. Also in various temperaments.

Bach used a variety of A, to deal with the inconsistency of pitch across different cities. Depending on the location, the A would have been 415, 440 or 466 with sometimes the wind, choir and strings playing different pitches, with the pieces being written in different keys to make it work. Koortoon and Kamertoon if you are interested. Also it is suspected that he would have used a variant of Werckmeister for temperament.