126 ❧ chapter twelve
modern harpsichord. I wonder if as many ridiculous things could have been
perpetrated had the revival of the modern harpsichord been dedicated to a
really idiomatic harpsichord composer. The fact that most of Bach’s harpsi-
chord writing isn’t harpsichord writing to start with, I think, permitted a much
wider fl ight in these aberrations.
And so, as I have perhaps said here on other occasions, it has been Bach’s
fate totally to falsify the course of musical history in the eighteenth century.
Musical history will take centuries to recover from the disproportion of evalu-
ation and the actual distortion of presentation of factual material that he has
caused in the history of music. I predict that in less than a hundred years, all
music history will have to be rewritten to correct this disproportion and that all
standard works dealing with the eighteenth century will be irrevocably obso-
lete, all because of Bach. And so Bach has falsifi ed, through no fault of his
own, of course, not only music history but the aesthetics of eighteenth-century
music, and especially of eighteenth-century keyboard music.
Now let’s leave these debatable ideas that I have thrown out—I’m sure
they have not been heard without opposition—and undertake some practical
experiment with two examples of instruments. We are privileged here to have
one of the most important eighteenth-century German harpsichords in play-
ing condition in the world. I will explain the tenuousness of its possible con-
nection with Bach presently. And the other part of our experiment will deal
with the modern clavichord, whose equally tenuous relationship with Bach I
will also have an occasion to discuss. This instrument was made by one of the
Haas family in Hamburg. It bears a date which cannot possibly be accepted,
- Much more likely, given the materials of its keyboards and the similar-
ity of its decorations to late Haas clavichords, the 1710 is a misreading or an
alteration of 1770. It is, like many of the other Haas harpsichords, gadget-
ridden and experimental. It has an 8-8 and 4-foot to which a separate sound-
ing board and bridge for a 16-foot have been added, and in the lower part of
the instrument, some of the murk created by the 16-foot is lightened by the
presence of two 2-foot stops currently not in working order. I should say that
my decision to use this instrument today has taken this instrument somewhat
by surprise, and winter is the very worst season for harpsichords, so it isn’t in
as perfect regulation as it is capable of being. Some of my demonstrations
may have to be taken on faith. I have known this instrument for about thirty-
fi ve years. I vastly admired it; one is always impressed with instruments that
have more of everything, and I suppose that this instrument had a good deal
to contribute to one of my major and most long-lasting aberrations. Having
started out with a perfectly good instrument of classic disposition with 8 and
8 and 4 tutti, the instrument was, I may say, a little weak in concert halls. I had
been led to believe, along with a great many other people, that an increase
in equipment on the part of the harpsichord would also give it an increase
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