From your reading of the textbook you should be well and truly informed about J.S. Bach’s relative obscurity during his lifetime. In contrast to the towering reputation that he has today, J.S. Bach published only five volumes of music during his lifetime, with a sixth that was in preparation at the time of his death.

The scholar David Yearsley has pointed out however that there was at least one other Bach publication that should be taken into account: in 1728, Bach published a single puzzle canon in “Der getreue Music-Meister,” a bi-weekly journal that was edited by G.P. Telemann and circulated widely. A solution to the puzzle was published around a decade later in a similar journal. Yearsley notes, “Given the popularity of ‘Der getreue Music-Meister’ and ‘Der vollkommene Capellmeister’ among music professionals and enthusiasts it is probably fair to say that in the first half of the eighteenth century [this particular puzzle] canon was Bach’s most famous piece,” (Yearley 2002, 42-43).

At the time, of course, music as mathematical puzzle and even the kind of invertible counterpoint that this puzzle epitomizes was increasingly seen as old fashioned and esoteric, and younger, more fashionable composers (including Bach’s sons) turned towards a simpler, more natural and melodious style of composition.

Today, though, I want you to linger with J.S. Bach and with his puzzle. Take a long look at the music and see if you can figure out how to solve the puzzle (there are at least two solutions!). How many parts are there? How many clefs? How does this fit together? If you need MS paper, you can download them here. Comment on what it was like to think about musical material in this way. If you do solve the puzzle, upload your solution to your Notebook.

Also, as a bonus thing to look at, here is some German organ tablature in J.S. Bach’s hand--an interesting form of notation to think about as something that has largely faded from practice in our standardized modern formats.