CHRISTOPHER HOGWOOD
10 September 1941 – 24 September 2014
Conductor
Musicologist
Keyboard player
C.P.E. Bach's Sonatas für Kenner und Liebhaber
January 6, 2010
In addition to being the Chairman of the Editorial Board for the publication of the complete works of C.P.E. Bach, Christopher also undertook to edit the six collections of keyboard music für Kenner und Liebhaber which Bach issued between 1779 and 1787.

Together these collections constitute C.P.E. Bach's largest-scale publishing venture and the preparation and sales (it was a 'Selbstverlag' operation) occupied much of his energy for the final ten years of his life.

These collections have now appeared in two volumes (CPEB:CW Series I, vols 4.1 and 4.2) at the amazingly low price of $20 (£12.50) a volume (thanks to the support and subvention of the Packard Humanities Institute — would that more complete editions had such enlightened patronage).

In them you can find a mixture of Bach's most famous sonatas, rondos and fantasies suitable for both the clavichord and the forte-piano (and one alternative rondo movement included in the collection for the first time).

The aim of the edition as a whole is to have the complete works in print (some 109 volumes) by 2014, the 300th anniversary of Bach’s birth.

kenner-and-leibhaber.jpg
Title page of first collection of "Kenner und Leibhaber", Wq 55
(University of Michigan, Music Library, M23 B12 S55)

Click here to read an article from ClassicsToday.com on why it is so important to be celebrating C.P.E. Bach, and how this publication facilitates that celebration.