How to read this Bach family tree
Read the Bach family tree from the top down, one generation to a row, with children hanging from the union of their parents. Johann Sebastian is the centre. The marks follow the genogram symbols.
A portrait is a person
Six people have a portrait that is free to use. A silhouette stands in for the rest.
The plate names the person
It gives the years and the post the person held.
A double ring is the centre
Johann Sebastian is the centre of the chart.
Two marriages
Maria Barbara stands to one side of him and Anna Magdalena to the other.
A red bar marks a condition
The loss of his sight in his last years is the one condition on the chart.
A town musician and an orphan
The Bach family tree opens with Johann Ambrosius Bach, a town musician of Erfurt and then of Eisenach, where he was also a musician of the court.1 His wife, Maria Elisabeth Lämmerhirt, was the daughter of a furrier and councillor of Erfurt.1 The family came from Wechmar, and its Eisenach branch later lived in the house that is now the Bachhaus.5
Their son Johann Sebastian was born at Eisenach in 1685.5 His mother died in 1694 and his father in 1695. The boy went to Ohrdruf, where his elder brother Johann Christoph was organist.51 In 1700 he went on to the school of St Michael at Lüneburg, and in 1703 he became organist at Arnstadt.1
Johann Ambrosius BachTown musician of Eisenach.
Johann Sebastian BachThomaskantor at Leipzig from 1723.
Wilhelm Friedemann BachOrganist at Dresden and Halle.
Carl Philipp Emanuel BachBerlin and Hamburg.
Johann Christoph Friedrich BachThe Bach of Bückeburg.
Johann Christian BachMilan and London.
Maria Barbara and Anna Magdalena
Sebastian moved from court to court. He was organist at Mühlhausen, court organist and chamber musician at Weimar from 1708 and Kapellmeister at Köthen from 1717.1 His first wife, Maria Barbara, was his second cousin, and they had seven children.1
On 3 December 1721 he married Anna Magdalena Wilcke, a singer of the court and the daughter of a court trumpeter. She bore him thirteen children.1 The Bachhaus records that she was painted at Eisenach in 1732 by Johann David Herlicius and that the portrait is lost.5 On the Bach family tree she has a silhouette for that reason.
The sons who made music their trade
The lowest row of the Bach family tree holds the children who reached adulthood. Four sons became musicians of note, two from each marriage, and between them they held posts in six cities.
| Son | Mother | Posts |
|---|---|---|
| Wilhelm Friedemann | Maria Barbara | Organist of the Sophienkirche, Dresden, from 1733. Organist at Halle from 1746 to 1764. Berlin from 1774. |
| Carl Philipp Emanuel | Maria Barbara | Court harpsichordist to Frederick II, Berlin, 1740 to 1767. Music director of the five main churches of Hamburg from 1768. |
| Johann Christoph Friedrich | Anna Magdalena | Chamber musician at the court of Bückeburg, then concert master from 1758. |
| Johann Christian | Anna Magdalena | Organist of Milan Cathedral from 1760. London from 1762, music master to Queen Charlotte. |
Wilhelm Friedemann, the eldest son, was born at Weimar on 22 November 1710. He gave up his post at Halle of his own will in 1764 and lived by concerts and teaching in Berlin, where he died in 1784.2
Carl Philipp Emanuel had Telemann for a godfather. He served Frederick the Great for almost thirty years and then followed Telemann at Hamburg.3 Johann Christoph Friedrich, born at Leipzig in 1732, spent his working life at Bückeburg, and the Neue Deutsche Biographie calls him the Bach of Bückeburg.4
Johann Christian, the youngest son, was born at Leipzig on 5 September 1735. After his father died he studied with Emanuel in Berlin and then in Italy. In 1764 he met the eight-year-old Mozart and taught him composition for five months.6 He died in London on 1 January 1782, in debt, and Queen Charlotte paid the costs of his estate.6
Thomaskantor at Leipzig
In 1723 Sebastian was chosen Thomaskantor and director of music at Leipzig, and he held the post until his death.1 The younger children of the second marriage on the Bach family tree were born at Leipzig, among them Gottfried Heinrich, Elisabeth Juliana Friederica, Johanna Carolina and Regina Susanna.
Sebastian died at Leipzig on 28 July 1750.1 Of his children, Johann Gottfried Bernhard had died in 1739 and Catharina Dorothea, the eldest, lived until 1774. Anna Magdalena survived him by ten years.
A timeline of the Bach family tree
Johann Sebastian is born
At Eisenach.
He goes to Ohrdruf
Both parents have died.
Weimar
Court organist and chamber musician.
The second marriage
To Anna Magdalena Wilcke.
Leipzig
He becomes Thomaskantor.
Johann Sebastian dies
At Leipzig.
Emanuel goes to Hamburg
He follows Telemann.
Christian dies
In London.
Friedrich dies
At Bückeburg.
Questions about the Bach family tree
Who is on the Bach family tree
Sixteen people in three generations, from the parents of Johann Sebastian to the children who reached adulthood.
How many children Bach had
Twenty, seven with Maria Barbara and thirteen with Anna Magdalena. The chart draws those who reached adulthood.
Which sons of Bach were composers
Wilhelm Friedemann, Carl Philipp Emanuel, Johann Christoph Friedrich and Johann Christian.
Where the Bach family came from
From Wechmar in Thuringia. Johann Sebastian was born at Eisenach.
People and sources
A page of its own lists all 16 people on the chart, each with a short note and the sources for it, and the six numbered sources this article cites. It also gives the credits of the portraits and this page as a reference in the APA, MLA, Chicago and Harvard styles, ready to copy.