He could speak on almost any topic in the arts, knew the classical music literature intimately, and had a fantastic knowledge of German and French literature from the later 18th and early 19th century. His powers of extemporization were legendary. I remember being with a group of students at a restaurant in Chicago's Chinatown where he was talking about how the Romantic musical ideal was related to the interest in classical ruins all over Europe; that works by Schumann, for example, sometimes resemble shards. I asked what he thought about the start to the Brahms Rhapsody Op. 79 no. 2, where the opening seems to start "in medias res." Charles took a paper napkin and scrawled out the chord symbols and chord degrees to show how the opening played into the tonality of the whole piece, then laughed as he remarked that Beethoven had gotten some heat over his first symphony because the first chord was a dominant 7th. (I still have the napkin--it's a bookmark for my copy of "The Romantic Generation.")
Yes this way of explaining the reception and use of JS Bach's music is so vivid, and the explanation of style and fugue is also the clearest. I haven't been to Juilliard, but have a Masters in Musicology and feel that the way music-"science" was approached was tinted by a romantic-psychological way of seeing art as the unfolding of genius which we must adore (or even worship!) ❤
This is wonderful. I did not know that Charles Rosen had died, and am saddened. He had anrazor sharp intelligence, as this video shows. His voice will be missed by many, without doubt.
Truly excellent! Anyone else noticed how eerily different Bach looks in every portrait? It’s like completely different people. His eyes, mouth, everything changes from one to the other.
Rosen is one of my favorite intellectuals. Supposedly he could not be turned off -- he was a spigot of erudite commentary on the arts, so much that he ruined at least one dinner party with his enthusiasm from the perspective of the host, a famous modernist composer. His appetite for the high arts was prodigious and his professorial but unpretentious commentary continue to edify. Sincerely looking forward to reading THE CLASSICAL STYLE one day. RIP sir!
The Classical Style and The Romantic Generation are wonderful! It's a shame Roosen didn't get to write a similar book on modernism. But he did write a great little book on Schoenberg
The Classical Style oppcupies a prominent place on my bookshelf. Most of my 300 other books are in boxes right now. Much of what I know about Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven are from Rosen - and of course the professor who directed us to the book. I'd forgotten that he had passed away.
I was privileged to hear Charles Rosen in the early eighties in Hamilton , Ont. Canada where h played some Schumann and Beethoven. I was able to speak to him after at a post concert reception and mentioned that I was learning the Stravinsky Serenade in A for piano, inspired by his recording of that piece. He was so accommodating and generous and , just like this video shows, completely unpretentious in his manner. I will always treasure the memory of my encounter with this great musician and human being.
I hope with all my heart that this music and level of intellectualism never gets forgotten by future generations. We seem to be entering a period of 'idiocracy' among artists and audience. There's no money in classical music and fewer people are studying and playing 'proper' instruments.
I played many years ago for Charles Rosen in a piano workshop in college. He was very complimentary and I appreciate that more than the years I spent at the University.
Wonderful. How sad that at a certain point such wonderful people such as Charles Rosen are gone. Thankfully, videos such as this one captures their brilliance and humanity to be seen later by others.
I read quite a few articles by Charles Rosen in the NY Review of Books, but had never heard/seen him. Indeed, he lives up to his reputation. What a delight.
I have just encountered this wonderful person and you say he is already gone from our world. I am heart broken. Such a fine teacher. thank you for this opportunity to have briefly met this wonderful person.
This is a wonderful document, so many interesting historical, technical facts given to us by a very knowledgeable and generous Charles Rosen!!. Excellent video!; thank you.
Can we please give Goethe some credit? (I found out about that during my own research. Here is a summary by ChatGPT) Yes, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the renowned German writer and polymath, played a role in Mendelssohn's discovery of Bach's music. Mendelssohn's encounter with Bach's "St. Matthew Passion" was indeed facilitated by Goethe. In 1829, Mendelssohn visited Goethe in Weimar, and during his stay, Goethe suggested that Mendelssohn perform Bach's "St. Matthew Passion" in Berlin. Goethe was familiar with Bach's music and recognized its significance, and he believed that Mendelssohn, with his talent and enthusiasm, could help reintroduce Bach's works to a wider audience. Mendelssohn took Goethe's suggestion seriously and organized the performance of the "St. Matthew Passion" upon his return to Berlin. This event marked the beginning of Mendelssohn's lifelong dedication to promoting Bach's music and cemented his own reputation as a leading figure in the Bach revival movement of the 19th century. So, while Mendelssohn's rediscovery of Bach's music was his own initiative, Goethe's encouragement and support were instrumental in making it happen.
The quodlibet of the Goldbergs is exactly as Rosen describes- whatever you please (Latin). It is an incredible variation that has one of the most pleasing, “popular” tunes of Bach’s own inception. It is the first one my son has tried to play, from hearing all my attempts at a collection of these master inventions.
Wow, way too short. Are there more videos of him talking? I have been playing Bach for 50 years and learned so much from this half hour. So many interesting facts I never knew, the Italian Concerto and French Overture were related, I wondered why they seemed apart from the other works. I knew every piece he played after 3 notes and still learned so much. The final of the Matthew Passion is a serenade??? Wow that is just mind blowing, I love Virgil Fox playing it on the organ now I must find a piano transcription. I think I must just listen to it again, I love stories of Bach, he wrote so much for every instrument with such genius. I just discovered the cantatas 6 months ago after years of knowing Bach I thought. I am just floored with them, sometimes on a walk I just stop and listen to this greatness even though I don't understand the German it is like I still know what it is about, joy, pain, etc. After years of not answering the question of who is the greatest composer, I would say there are a lot of great composers, I now know Bach is the greatest and the real question is who is the 2nd greatest?
My mind's blown watching him talk and then demonstrating as if it was nothing. You don't just play Bach's complex Art of Fugue at a drop of a hat. It's unnatural. He must have had amazing memory. The note at the end made me sad. We no longer have a great musical mind like his, or Bernstein anymore.
The organist Marie-Claire Alain recorded Bach’s complete organ works _3 times,_ as more organs were restored or made available to her, such as when East and West Germany re-unified, and she had the majority from memory. I saw her give masterclasses when she would jump onto the organ bench to demonstrate something, and she never glanced at the score, but looked at the students as she played to emphasize point or to see if they understood. This was often in the middle of a 5-voice fugue! I say this to demonstrate that there were/are several “minds” like this (Glenn Gould and Andras Schiff are only two) to amaze us, and they’re online, to watch for free!
I saw him play Beethoven’s Sonata 29 and Diabelli Variations. He spoke about each piece to any listeners who came up to piano at intermission. Very interesting.
Incredibly interesting post, although the title is a bit misleading. Mendelssohn's involvement and bringing back to the public takes perhaps 30 seconds of the entire post. But Bach's importance as a pedagogue both in his lifetime and until Mendelssohn is quite remarkable and interesting
Rosen said the 6-voice fugue must have been written for the piano. He didn’t really explain why/he tried to but I was still confused. If anything I would suggest it was quite the reverse: proper voicing of a 6-part fugue is generally beyond anyone for two-hand keyboard. I wish I could have spoken with him (the more I heard the more I wished to hear). The fugal (interval voicing) insights he presented are an example of his musical sense because I haven’t heard them before. The Black Pearl. How precious is one life.
Watching it again I now think his point was that Bach didn’t write the parts in an impossible range for two hands. Right. Well, to achieve proper independence I’m still not surprised that most directors prefer to hear it with an ensemble.
I got to presume that this interview were made about the time Mr. Rosen wrote the book called "The Romantic Generation "(1995). I actually quit surprise to find a Video on RUclips when he talked, and played Bach, which in books written by him that i got. Mr Rosen only written always on Classical, and Romantic Composers.
During his life, Bach was famous as a composer and virtuoso violinist and organist, then forgotten until his works were rediscovered and revived by Mendelssohn.
Bach was never famous for his compositions during his lifetime. Outside of the towns where Bach was in charge, it is fair to state that nobody knew his works. You need to know that only about 30 of his more than 1500 known works were published while he was alive. So the musicians of his time had access to not even 0.7% (!) of the total of his body of works - if they ever had bought the notes, as notes were expensive. Pupils of Bach made copies of some pieces, however, and copies of copies spread around among insiders. Later, those have become precious sources for the reconstruction of lost original manuscripts. Bach's music, actually, was rather frowned upon by the public (which was people in the church and the authorities as in Bach's time one did not yet hold public concerts like some 100 years later when music spread to an ever bigger and wealthier social stratum). It had never gained the popularity of his fellow Telemann, and in the second generation it was his son C.P.E. Bach who became what one can call "famous", while the father already was nearly completely forgotten.
ruclips.net/video/eSYZ0rXFrAQ/видео.html @ 46:22 miinutes it gets interesting ....... Bartholdy also a great composer and "explorer" of this great composer "J.S. Bach!!!!!!!!!!!" This movie is very special! And ... it seems forbidden in germany - but friends from southamerice seems to share it.
Fascinating and enlightening. And yet despite his expository gifts Rosen as a pianist never quite convinces me. I know this is recorded near the end of his life but I find the same thing in recordings from his prime. There is something unfocussed in his playing. I don't mean I want him to play metronomically. But his rhythm is lax rather than flexible.
Following his performance of a cocerto the conductor (adolph busch--his father in law), the enthusiastic applause called for an encore. What shall I play he asked Busch. Play the The Goldberg Variations, was the reply (probably not serious) and he did! It is said that by the😅 end there were only a few people remaining, one of whom is said to have been Einstein.
Well, surely, God calls on us to participate in his everlasting art of… in time, Bach did ‘some work’ to project some of it, I believe… influenced by M Luther u.a., so this vid. is of high importance, educ.
How Mendelsohn brouet Bach. back : Charles Rosen (8/04/21) Wonderful !!indeed !! In clear. : if this « second tank musicien « .. had not been ... Thé greatest western Genius ... Musician ... THAT IS BACH .. should havé Never. Been Known ... !!! - Wonderful « révisionnist. Talmudiq. .. fable ....!! Sionist Propaganda !!
Very informative but it ruined my love of Bach. It is like teaching history as series of dates and people. Music is a highest art, not a series of technicalities
Do not let anything or anybody ruin your love for Bach; (no Bach, no classical music!). Of course music is a highest art!... music history has many aspects and elements, take what you like and are interested in, it may be the origin of concertare, the rules at composing a symphony or the complexities of a composer’s life; enjoy and keep loving Bach forever! Take care.
I have been studying and loving Bach's music since 1970 and I'm afraid it is a series of technicalities. You don't get to build a bridge without engineering, and you don't get to write the Matthew Passion without counterpoint.
If knowledge worsens your experience of the music, my guess is you were listening to it in the wrong way from the beginning. Sometimes we think we intuitively grasp things just because they have watered down and become too familiar. It takes a little knowledge to relate adequately with works from such distant past
He could speak on almost any topic in the arts, knew the classical music literature intimately, and had a fantastic knowledge of German and French literature from the later 18th and early 19th century. His powers of extemporization were legendary. I remember being with a group of students at a restaurant in Chicago's Chinatown where he was talking about how the Romantic musical ideal was related to the interest in classical ruins all over Europe; that works by Schumann, for example, sometimes resemble shards. I asked what he thought about the start to the Brahms Rhapsody Op. 79 no. 2, where the opening seems to start "in medias res." Charles took a paper napkin and scrawled out the chord symbols and chord degrees to show how the opening played into the tonality of the whole piece, then laughed as he remarked that Beethoven had gotten some heat over his first symphony because the first chord was a dominant 7th. (I still have the napkin--it's a bookmark for my copy of "The Romantic Generation.")
Agreed
I learned more watching this video than I learned in6 years at Juilliard thank you so much for this illuminating presentation by Charles Rosen
Yes this way of explaining the reception and use of JS Bach's music is so vivid, and the explanation of style and fugue is also the clearest. I haven't been to Juilliard, but have a Masters in Musicology and feel that the way music-"science" was approached was tinted by a romantic-psychological way of seeing art as the unfolding of genius which we must adore (or even worship!)
❤
This is wonderful. I did not know that Charles Rosen had died, and am saddened. He had anrazor sharp intelligence, as this video shows. His voice will be missed by many, without doubt.
Truly excellent! Anyone else noticed how eerily different Bach looks in every portrait? It’s like completely different people. His eyes, mouth, everything changes from one to the other.
Impressive intellectual display. I have never heard anybody speaking about JS Bach so brilliantly, and playing the music on top of that.
Rosen is one of my favorite intellectuals. Supposedly he could not be turned off -- he was a spigot of erudite commentary on the arts, so much that he ruined at least one dinner party with his enthusiasm from the perspective of the host, a famous modernist composer. His appetite for the high arts was prodigious and his professorial but unpretentious commentary continue to edify. Sincerely looking forward to reading THE CLASSICAL STYLE one day. RIP sir!
Thank you for your interesting touching comment!!
The Classical Style and The Romantic Generation are wonderful! It's a shame Roosen didn't get to write a similar book on modernism. But he did write a great little book on Schoenberg
The classical style is an amazing book!
I also recommend the romantic style, and his many interviews by David Dubal available here on RUclips
The Classical Style oppcupies a prominent place on my bookshelf. Most of my 300 other books are in boxes right now. Much of what I know about Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven are from Rosen - and of course the professor who directed us to the book. I'd forgotten that he had passed away.
Amazing - I did not realise that Rosen was such a great pianist in his own right.
His memory is astonishing.
I was privileged to hear Charles Rosen in the early eighties in Hamilton , Ont. Canada where h played some Schumann and Beethoven. I was able to speak to him after at a post concert reception and mentioned that I was learning the Stravinsky Serenade in A for piano, inspired by his recording of that piece. He was so accommodating and generous and , just like this video shows, completely unpretentious in his manner. I will always treasure the memory of my encounter with this great musician and human being.
I hope with all my heart that this music and level of intellectualism never gets forgotten by future generations. We seem to be entering a period of 'idiocracy' among artists and audience. There's no money in classical music and fewer people are studying and playing 'proper' instruments.
I played many years ago for Charles Rosen in a piano workshop in college. He was very complimentary and I appreciate that more than the years I spent at the University.
A first class mind and brillant educator.
A great pianist too
I could listen to this man talk about bach/music/composition/harmony for a long time. My ignorance is immense.
Wonderful. How sad that at a certain point such wonderful people such as Charles Rosen are gone. Thankfully, videos such as this one captures their brilliance and humanity to be seen later by others.
What a brain! Charles Rosen, lucidly Inhabits Bach's brain and shares his genius. One Genius communing with another.
I read quite a few articles by Charles Rosen in the NY Review of Books, but had never heard/seen him. Indeed, he lives up to his reputation. What a delight.
Fantastic demonstration of Bach’s compositional genius.
I have just encountered this wonderful person and you say he is already gone from our world. I am heart broken. Such a fine teacher. thank you for this opportunity to have briefly met this wonderful person.
This is a wonderful document, so many interesting historical, technical facts given to us by a very knowledgeable and generous Charles Rosen!!. Excellent video!; thank you.
Can we please give Goethe some credit?
(I found out about that during my own research. Here is a summary by ChatGPT)
Yes, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the renowned German writer and polymath, played a role in Mendelssohn's discovery of Bach's music. Mendelssohn's encounter with Bach's "St. Matthew Passion" was indeed facilitated by Goethe. In 1829, Mendelssohn visited Goethe in Weimar, and during his stay, Goethe suggested that Mendelssohn perform Bach's "St. Matthew Passion" in Berlin. Goethe was familiar with Bach's music and recognized its significance, and he believed that Mendelssohn, with his talent and enthusiasm, could help reintroduce Bach's works to a wider audience.
Mendelssohn took Goethe's suggestion seriously and organized the performance of the "St. Matthew Passion" upon his return to Berlin. This event marked the beginning of Mendelssohn's lifelong dedication to promoting Bach's music and cemented his own reputation as a leading figure in the Bach revival movement of the 19th century. So, while Mendelssohn's rediscovery of Bach's music was his own initiative, Goethe's encouragement and support were instrumental in making it happen.
The quodlibet of the Goldbergs is exactly as Rosen describes- whatever you please (Latin). It is an incredible variation that has one of the most pleasing, “popular” tunes of Bach’s own inception. It is the first one my son has tried to play, from hearing all my attempts at a collection of these master inventions.
Very interesting. I learned several things from this very informative video.
Wow, way too short. Are there more videos of him talking? I have been playing Bach for 50 years and learned so much from this half hour. So many interesting facts I never knew, the Italian Concerto and French Overture were related, I wondered why they seemed apart from the other works. I knew every piece he played after 3 notes and still learned so much. The final of the Matthew Passion is a serenade??? Wow that is just mind blowing, I love Virgil Fox playing it on the organ now I must find a piano transcription. I think I must just listen to it again, I love stories of Bach, he wrote so much for every instrument with such genius. I just discovered the cantatas 6 months ago after years of knowing Bach I thought. I am just floored with them, sometimes on a walk I just stop and listen to this greatness even though I don't understand the German it is like I still know what it is about, joy, pain, etc. After years of not answering the question of who is the greatest composer, I would say there are a lot of great composers, I now know Bach is the greatest and the real question is who is the 2nd greatest?
A sarabande, not a serenade
Thoroughly enjoyable and illuminating, I could listen to that for hours. RIP
Wow, I could just listen for hours. Thank you so much for sharing!
My mind's blown watching him talk and then demonstrating as if it was nothing. You don't just play Bach's complex Art of Fugue at a drop of a hat. It's unnatural. He must have had amazing memory. The note at the end made me sad. We no longer have a great musical mind like his, or Bernstein anymore.
The organist Marie-Claire Alain recorded Bach’s complete organ works _3 times,_ as more organs were restored or made available to her, such as when East and West Germany re-unified, and she had the majority from memory. I saw her give masterclasses when she would jump onto the organ bench to demonstrate something, and she never glanced at the score, but looked at the students as she played to emphasize point or to see if they understood. This was often in the middle of a 5-voice fugue! I say this to demonstrate that there were/are several “minds” like this (Glenn Gould and Andras Schiff are only two) to amaze us, and they’re online, to watch for free!
Wonderful video, many thanks.
Fantastic lecture, and it shows to which enormous extend Bach influenced all successive composers and western music in general.
I attended a private concert in Winnipeg where Rosen played the Hammerklavier. What an honor and delight.
I saw him play Beethoven’s Sonata 29 and Diabelli Variations. He spoke about each piece to any listeners who came up to piano at intermission. Very interesting.
This is wonderful, thanks a lot
Outstanding!
Vielen Dank !
What an amazing video - what an amazing mind.
Incredibly interesting post, although the title is a bit misleading. Mendelssohn's involvement and bringing back to the public takes perhaps 30 seconds of the entire post. But Bach's importance as a pedagogue both in his lifetime and until Mendelssohn is quite remarkable and interesting
Plus Samuel Wesley did just as much as Mendelssohn and isn't mentioned at all :(
Hi; there is a Bach, Mendelssohn and the Saint Matthew Passion, it is quite interesting!. Take care.
@@guscox9651 True. For England, Samuel Wesley was Bach's gateway, kind of.
Does anyone happen to know which portraits of Bach are authentic besides the Hausmann? I am referring to: 14:40 and 15:52.
Wunderbar.. Todah rabbah
Vivat Herr J.S.Bach !
Rosen said the 6-voice fugue must have been written for the piano. He didn’t really explain why/he tried to but I was still confused. If anything I would suggest it was quite the reverse: proper voicing of a 6-part fugue is generally beyond anyone for two-hand keyboard.
I wish I could have spoken with him (the more I heard the more I wished to hear). The fugal (interval voicing) insights he presented are an example of his musical sense because I haven’t heard them before. The Black Pearl. How precious is one life.
Watching it again I now think his point was that Bach didn’t write the parts in an impossible range for two hands. Right. Well, to achieve proper independence I’m still not surprised that most directors prefer to hear it with an ensemble.
It puts me in utter awe of the genius of Bach! And pisses me off at the same time!
Glenn Gould did some amazing performances of Art of Fugue on the piano. Moscow in 1957 for one.
Brilliant!
I got to presume that this interview were made about the time Mr. Rosen wrote the book called "The Romantic Generation "(1995). I actually quit surprise to find a Video on RUclips when he talked, and played Bach, which in books written by him that i got. Mr Rosen only written always on Classical, and Romantic Composers.
Double counterpoint! sounds complex!
Beethoven playing the WTK at 13 (So, around 1783) was an enormous achievement.
Bravo!
I have problem understanding “Bach didn’t understand the human rot”? What is he saying, help please 🙏🏻
The human HEART.
Was that Schiff’s Goldbergs at the start?
Is C m (minor).equal to E flat major, then? Can C minor be Harmonic or Melodic? Or does it even matter?
What is the piece in the beginning?
27th Golberg Variation
Help! I cannot listen to music and speech at the same time, especially when it’s Bach playing in the BACKGROUND. Something is wrong with my brain.
Agreed :( I keep having to rewind because the music is sort of a bit too interesting
Did they have 6 8 time back then.in JS Bach's time?
Riveting - I have long kept his apercus from The Classical Style to apply in all sorts of situations
During his life, Bach was famous as a composer and virtuoso violinist and organist, then forgotten until his works were rediscovered and revived by Mendelssohn.
Bach was never famous for his compositions during his lifetime. Outside of the towns where Bach was in charge, it is fair to state that nobody knew his works. You need to know that only about 30 of his more than 1500 known works were published while he was alive. So the musicians of his time had access to not even 0.7% (!) of the total of his body of works - if they ever had bought the notes, as notes were expensive. Pupils of Bach made copies of some pieces, however, and copies of copies spread around among insiders. Later, those have become precious sources for the reconstruction of lost original manuscripts.
Bach's music, actually, was rather frowned upon by the public (which was people in the church and the authorities as in Bach's time one did not yet hold public concerts like some 100 years later when music spread to an ever bigger and wealthier social stratum). It had never gained the popularity of his fellow Telemann, and in the second generation it was his son C.P.E. Bach who became what one can call "famous", while the father already was nearly completely forgotten.
❤
ruclips.net/video/eSYZ0rXFrAQ/видео.html @ 46:22 miinutes it gets interesting ....... Bartholdy also a great composer and "explorer" of this great composer "J.S. Bach!!!!!!!!!!!" This movie is very special! And ... it seems forbidden in germany - but friends from southamerice seems to share it.
It starts in this video with one of the last Goldberg variations.....
Counterpoint isn't easy!
Fascinating and enlightening. And yet despite his expository gifts Rosen as a pianist never quite convinces me. I know this is recorded near the end of his life but I find the same thing in recordings from his prime. There is something unfocussed in his playing. I don't mean I want him to play metronomically. But his rhythm is lax rather than flexible.
Shhhhhhh
Charles rosen
Following his performance of a cocerto the conductor (adolph busch--his father in law), the enthusiastic applause called for an encore. What shall I play he asked Busch. Play the The Goldberg Variations, was the reply (probably not serious) and he did! It is said that by the😅 end there were only a few people remaining, one of whom is said to have been Einstein.
50 years after his death he was published… not before?
Take note all composers out there… just keep going; don’t depend on fame. Integrity will out.
hi
He had 20 children in total, I heard.
Was the late Mr Rosen Jewish or German or both? RIP Charles Rosen.
A complete misnomer as this is not about Mendelssohn's role at all, he is hardly mentioned,
Mozart was Austrian from Salzburg
Mozart was and his entire family were German.
He is wrong about one thing though. The Ricercare a 6 is magnificent on the organ. ruclips.net/video/hwftBG1VLf8/видео.htmlsi=chCm9I5tbDkXRd4L
Well, surely, God calls on us to participate in his everlasting art of… in time, Bach did ‘some work’ to project some of it, I believe… influenced by M Luther u.a., so this vid. is of high importance, educ.
H?
Very good🇺🇸✡️✝️
It is false that Bach was rediscovered Mendelssohn when BEETHOVEN wrote many fugues in his pieces and said "Bach is my daily meat."
This was already addressed in the video, did you watch it?
Bach es la forma en que Dios nos dice que el resto de humanos somos una criaturas miserables e insignificantes.
How Mendelsohn brought Bach back. .. : Charles Rosen (8/04/21)
How Mendelsohn brouet Bach. back : Charles Rosen (8/04/21)
Wonderful !!indeed !! In clear. : if this « second tank musicien « ..
had not been ... Thé greatest western Genius ... Musician ...
THAT IS BACH ..
should havé Never. Been Known ... !!!
- Wonderful « révisionnist. Talmudiq. .. fable ....!!
Sionist Propaganda !!
reject tonality, interesting? Regarding his first comment BS obvoiusly
Say it five times fast:
"Brought back Bach" 🐓🐔🐓🐔🐣
...Zack and Brock brought back Bach by buying sacks of stock in blocks of wax and chalk...
Very informative but it ruined my love of Bach. It is like teaching history as series of dates and people. Music is a highest art, not a series of technicalities
Do not let anything or anybody ruin your love for Bach; (no Bach, no classical music!). Of course music is a highest art!... music history has many aspects and elements, take what you like and are interested in, it may be the origin of concertare, the rules at composing a symphony or the complexities of a composer’s life; enjoy and keep loving Bach forever! Take care.
Unfortunately you can't get to the art without thousands of hours of scales, arpeggios and theory.
I have been studying and loving Bach's music since 1970 and I'm afraid it is a series of technicalities. You don't get to build a bridge without engineering, and you don't get to write the Matthew Passion without counterpoint.
If knowledge worsens your experience of the music, my guess is you were listening to it in the wrong way from the beginning. Sometimes we think we intuitively grasp things just because they have watered down and become too familiar. It takes a little knowledge to relate adequately with works from such distant past
not a word about mendelshon,siǃly