ACCORDIONIST DISCOVERS BACH "POLKA"
by George Belanus, Staff Writer
Wheeling, W.Va.--A West Virginia
accordionist claims to have discovered a polka written by the great music
master of the eighteenth century--Johann Sebastian Bach.
Concert Accordionist, Henry Doktorski,
said he accidentally discovered the work while studying the original manuscripts
of Bach's Cantatas. He has recorded the piece, along with other Baroque
works, in a 40 minute cassette tape entitled "Music by Bach and Handel".
Classical music connoisseurs might
be surprised that the composer of "Mass in B Minor" and the Passion According
to Saint Matthew" had also written such an earthy and scandalously sensual
work as the polka. Scholars are divided as to whether the piece in question--titled
simply "duetto" by Bach--is actually a polka or not.
Jan Kleeman, professor of Ethnomusicology
at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, said that the music/dance
form known as the polka first appeared in southern Poland in 1830, and
that Bach could not have written a work in that genre, since he died eighty
years before the polka was invented.
Doktorski and his supporters, however,
claim that Bach, like many geniuses, was a century ahead of his time, and
that it was he who actually was the original creator of that wild and breezy
two-step which spread like wildfire across the globe in the 1840's, and
which still is being performed today. Historians tell us that the polka
became so popular in the mid-nineteenth century that it was danced by Queen
Victoria in Buckingham Palace, by American Indians in Arizona, by Africans,
Russians, Australians and Indonesians. The Polka even became the national
dance of Paraguay.
Hannsdieter Wohlfarth, Professor
at the Musikhochschule in Freiburg, West Germany and internationally renowned
Bach scholar, provides a solution to the problem of the apparent paradox
of the common authorship between Bach's inspiring religious works and his
danceable "Polka".
Wohlfarth said, "Throughout Bach's
entire life, he never wavered from the conviction that his music was an
act of worship, an integral element in the service of God. His works are
timeless and touched by God. Yet, curiously enough, Bach made little distinction
between sacred and secular music or even sacred and secular vocations.
When composing secular preludes solely for his children, he prefaced them
with "in nomine Jesus," just as he added "Soli Deo Gloria" as a colophon
to his religious scores."
Doktorski explains the origin of
Bach's "Polka" and his concealed affinity toward the dance, "While it is
true that Bach was a deeply religious man, it is also true that he had
a jest (zest) for life which was not always appreciated by his more conservative
church
leaders. He was reprimanded for letting a woman sing in the choir loft,
he fathered more than twenty children and enjoyed informal parties and
family gatherings where he and his musician friend sand relatives would
improvise songs--quodlibets--with "off-key" lyrics."
Johann Nikolaus Forkel, Bach's first
biographer, wrote in his treatise on Bach's life, "They sang popular songs,
the contents of which were partly comic and partly naughty...and not only
laughed heartily at it themselves, but excited an equally hearty and irresistible
laughter in everybody that heard them.
Doktorski theorizes that the "Polka"
was born at one of these gatherings and that Bach later secretly incorporated
one of his polkas in Cantata #78.
Doktorski said, "In his work for
the church Bach often felt restricted by the oppressive regulations imposed
upon him by the Lutheran clergy. Music resembling secular dance forms were
prohibited in church. Therefore, Bach sometimes had to cleverly disguise
his music to pacify the clerical censors."
Joseph Macerollo, professor of Musicology
and music Theory at the University of Toronto and the Canadian Royal Conservatory
of Music, (and an accomplished virtuoso Concert Accordionist), confirms
this theory: "It was common practice among Baroque composers to alter titles
of their pieces when they were to be performed in church. The "sonata da
camera"--secular sonata, and the "sonata da chiesa"--church sonata, were
often different only in name."
In addition to the "Polka" from
Cantata #78, Doktorski performs various other works by Bach and Handel
on the recording, including selections from Bach's "Art of Fugue" and the
Handel organ concerto #4 in F Major. The latter recording is unique, in
that Doktorski plays the organ part on the Concert Accordion, and the orchestra
parts are played on the pipe organ.
Despite the initial shock
of the novel concept of playing Bach and Handel on the accordion, when
one actually listens to Doktorski's performance, one is surprised and delighted
by his amazing ability to perform two, three and even four voice counterpoint
on the instrument with subtle phrasing and expressiveness that an accomplished
harpsichordist or organist would envy.
AW: We reviewed
your cassette tape--Music by Bach and Handel--in our Winter issue and your
music video in our Spring issue and we enjoyed them both very much. How
did you become an authority on the music of Bach and Handel for the accordion?
HD: By studying and practicing
for many years.
AW: When did you begin?
HD: When I was seven years
old, a traveling salesman knocked on our door offering a free music aptitude
test. My mother thought I had some talent so she invited him in. Before
an hour had passed she had signed me up to take accordion lessons from
the local music studio.
AW: Did you study classical
music?
HD: No. My teacher taught
me essentially how to play standard dance tunes--Satin Doll, Misty, Beer
Barrel Polka, etc.--for gigs at wedding receptions, parties, lounges, etc.
I didn't discover classical music until high school.
AW: What happened?
HD: A friend convinced me
to join the choir and we sang Handel's "Halleluiah Chorus" from the Messiah.
This music was intriguing! I had never heard anything like it before. It
was an eye-opening experience for me. My high school music director suggested
I study classical piano and my choir director recommended a fine teacher.
I began with Bach's Two Part Inventions and progressed rapidly through
his more difficult Partitas.
AW: Did you continue studying
music in college?
HD: I majored in Piano Performance
and Music Education at Park College in Kansas City, Missouri. I also studied
composition at The University of Kansas City Conservatory of Music and
conducting at Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey.
AW: Did you study the accordion
during this time?
HD: No. I dropped it at age
fourteen when I discovered that the girls in my high school preferred to
date pianists! I didn't pick it up again until fifteen years later when
I acquired a fine Titano Victoria free bass instrument and discovered that
it was possible to perform Bach and Handel authentically on the accordion.
I was overjoyed! The accordion was my first love and Baroque was my favorite
music. It's been a happy marriage ever since!
AW: Did you discovered a
polka written by Bach?
HD: Yes, while studying Bach's
Cantatas I came upon a piece that I am convinced is the world's first polka,
written nearly a century before the Polka was supposed to have been invented.
AW: Do scholars recognize
this piece as a Polka?
HD: I have corresponded with
several distinguished professors of ethnomusicology around the country,
but not one will admit that Bach wrote the first Polka. One scholar simply
dismissed my theory by saying that the polka first appeared in southern
Poland in 1830, and that Bach could not have written a work in that genre,
since he died eighty years before the polka was invented.
AW: I thought that Bach was
a very religious man. How could the author of the Mass in B Minor and Saint
Matthew's Passion write such an earthy and sensual dance as the polka?
HD: While it is true that
Bach was a deeply religious man, it is also true that he had a zest for
life which was not always appreciated by his more conservative church leaders.
He was reprimanded for letting a woman sing in the choir loft. He fathered
more than twenty children and enjoyed informal parties and family gatherings
where he and his musician friends and relatives would improvise songs with
"off-key" lyrics.
In the eighteenth century, Bach's
first biographer, wrote, "They sang popular songs, the contents of which
were partly comic and partly naughty...and not only laughed heartily at
it themselves, but excited an equally hearty and irresistible laughter
in everybody that heard them." I believe that the "Polka" was born at one
of these gatherings and that Bach later secretly incorporated one of his
polkas in Cantata #78. He titles it simply "Duetto."
AW: Why did Bach have to
hide his Polka?
HD: Bach was restricted by
the oppressive regulations imposed upon him by the Lutheran clergy. Music
resembling secular dance forms were prohibited in church. Therefore, Bach
sometimes had to cleverly disguise his music to pacify the clerical censors.
It was common practice among Baroque composers to alter titles of their
pieces when they were to be performed in church.
AW: Why haven't music scholars
recognized this for so many years?
HD: There is an old saying,
"It takes one to know one." Who can recognize a polka better than a person
who plays the polka? My early training on the accordion prepared me more
for this discovery than all my years in the conservatory!
AW: There's something about
an accordionist!
HD: Right you are!
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