User:Annelisehuynh/Johann Christian Bach

The Bach-Abel concerts were a series of public concerts that eventually gave way to the development of modern day concert series. In collaboration with his friend and German virtuoso viola da gamba player, Johann Christian Bach and Carl Friedrich Abel created these subscription concerts, which were the first of its kind in Europe. These concerts first started at Abel's residence but an increase in popularity led to these concerts being held at larger venues.

These concerts were not only the first of its kind to be a subscription concert but also would feature a program as well. In terms of programming, these concerts would feature new works by Bach and Abel and new contemporary music at the time - these concerts also gave a platform for newer musical artists, such as Haydn, to feature their works on a public stage. Because these concerts required a subscription, they cultivated a regular audience as the audience members prepaid for that season's concert series. Furthermore, the Bach-Abel concerts allowed the middle class greater access to live classical music. Previously, live music performances were limited to private, aristocratic settings; however, these subscription concerts were made available to the wider public, allowing middle class people to engage in the arts and society.

J.C. Bach had an immense influence on Mozart. In fact, Mozart’s partiality to wind instruments in his early symphonies were influenced by Bach. As J.C. Bach believed that wind instruments should be carriers of their own melodic material and not just act as doubled instruments, Mozart followed suit. J.C. Bach’s influence on Mozart was so grand that the theme of the slow movement of Mozart’s Concerto K414 contains a reference to the overture of Bach’s opera, La calamita de cuori.

The status of the Bach-Abel concerts waned in popularity and ended due to changing musical tastes and Bach's death.

Cecilia Grassi is his spouse, Born in 1746 died in 1791