Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714–1788) was a German composer and keyboard player, and the second son of Johann Sebastian Bach. After serving Frederick the Great at the Prussian court in Berlin, he became music director in Hamburg in 1768, a post he held until his death. A major figure in the mid-eighteenth-century transition from the Baroque to the Classical era, he is closely associated with the empfindsamer Stil, or “sensitive style,” marked by sudden changes of mood, unexpected pauses, and freely shaped phrases. His keyboard music, written for instruments such as the clavichord and harpsichord, combines delicate expressive detail with adventurous harmony and helped point toward the later development of piano music. His sonatas, including the Prussian Sonatas and Württemberg Sonatas, as well as his collections of keyboard pieces for connoisseurs and amateurs, played an important role in the evolution of eighteenth-century keyboard writing. His originality also influenced composers such as Haydn and Mozart.