Lot 2: BACH, JOHANN SEBASTIAN.

BACH, JOHANN SEBASTIAN. EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY GERMAN MANUSCRIPT OF THE FRENCH SUITE NO.5, BWV 816, with the title page "G Dur 1 Clavier Suite bestehend in Allemanden, Couranten, Gavotten etc: von Johann Sebastian Bach. hochfürst[lichen] Anholt Cöthnischen würck[lichen] Capellmeister und Directore Chori Musici Lipsiensis", comprising seven movements, the Gavotte placed third (Allemande, Courante, Gavotte, Sarabande, Bourée, Loure, Gigue), notated for keyboard in dark brown ink on six two-stave systems per page, with a few later annotations in light brown ink, the title-page possibly in a different hand from the music 11 pages, folio (c .32 x 23.5cms), 12-stave paper, title and music annotated in another early hand, including the price ("[Mk]1.8"), [Hamburg, second half of the eighteenth-century (before 1785)], original stitching, browning to leading edge of title page

This is an important unrecorded source for Bach's French Suite no. 5, written around a quarter of a century before its first appearance in print. This manuscript probably dates from the 1770s or 1780s, but certainly before 1785, when it was listed in the catalogue of the Hamburg music copyist Johann Christoph Westphal (where the asking price matches that on the present title-page). The copyist also wrote many other Bach pre-publication scores, and may indeed be J.C. Westphal himself. The title has been altered by a slightly later hand with musicological information about the French Suites, including the alteration of "1 Clavier Suite" to "5te Clavier Suite". The text contains readings deriving from the earliest manuscript sources of the French Suites, whereas the annotations, include some decorations known from other slightly later sources. The Fifth Suite BWV 816 was first published by Hoffmeister of Vienna in about 1801-1803. We are most grateful to Dr Peter Wollny for his assistance in our cataloguing of this manuscript.