Biographical Information

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was born on March 8, 1714 in Weimar, Thuringia, Germany. He is the second son of J.S. Bach and Maria Barbara Bach. He began his studies at St. Thomas School at Leipzig at ten years old. He later studied law at two German universities. After completing his degree, he decided to abandon a legal career for a life of music. His first appointment was service to the crown prince of Prussia. C.P.E. Bach was one of the foremost clavier-players in Europe and composed numerous sonatas for the piano. “Through the latter half of the 18th century, the reputation of C.P.E. Bach stood very high. W.A. Mozart said of him, "He is the father, we are the children." The best part of Haydn's training was derived from a study of his work. Ludwig van Beethoven expressed for his genius the most cordial admiration and regard. This position he owes mainly to his clavier sonatas, which mark an important epoch in the history of musical form. Lucid in style, delicate and tender in expression, they are even more notable for the freedom and variety of their structural design; they break away altogether from the exact formal antithesis which, with the composers of the Italian school, had hardened into a convention, and substitute the wider and more flexible outline which the great Viennese masters showed to be capable of almost infinite development” (Oron 2).