Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March 1685 – 28 July 1750) was an influential German composer, organist, harpsichordist and violinist. He is globally seen as one of the most important composers of all time. He is admired for the intellectual depth, technical command and artistic beauty of his works, including famous compositions such as "The Brandenburg Concerto's", "St. Matthew Passion", "St. John Passion", "Air on a G. String", "The Well-Tempered Clavier", his six "Cello Suites", "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" and "Toccata and Fugue in D minor" to name just a few. Bach was able to be profoundly creative despit the limits of what the authorities allowed him to do in his commissioned pieces. His productivity is amazing. For decades, Bach composed weekly (!) new pieces for each church service on Sundays.
Bach remains very popular and one of the most performed composers on the planet.
In 1977, Carl Sagan included three pieces by Bach (Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, Partita for Violin Solo No. 3 and The Well-Tempered Clavier (the latter in Glenn Gould's rendition)) on the Voyager Golden Record, a special record sent into outer space featuring sounds and music that would give potential extraterrestrials an idea of life on Earth. Sagan even considered sending only music by Bach, but admitted: "That would be boasting."
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Zappa about Johann Sebastian Bach
Bach was one of the composers before the 20th century whom Zappa respected:
"Bach is more interesting. (...) I just like the way it sounds. The same reason I like Varèse. I like the way it sounds. But I wouldn't go out of my way to attend a Bach concert or buy an album of that kind of music. To me, of that period, that is the most tolerable of the material to listen to. I don't start getting interested in so-called classical music until the early 20th Century." (Frank Zappa in The Mother Of All Interviews (Part 2)
I wonder if a classical composer such as Bach would have utilized the synthesizer in the way you are describing.
Frank Zappa: "Oh, I think he probably would have loved it because he had to grind it out once a week. (...) I haven't studied Bach, and I'm really not that crazy about his music. I don't hate it, but it's not something I would go out of my way to listen to. I respect it and I realize there's a lot of terrific math going on there and it works, which is the best thing about it. And out of all those old guys, I'd probably be more disposed to his music because of the logic that's involved in it than I would to Beethoven or Mozart. I don't really care for those guys." (Frank Zappa, 84/11)
"lf you know where the melody is going to go, how long it takes to get there and what it's going to do when it gets there, then why bother to listen to it," he says. He makes an exception of Bach, but only if it's played by Glenn Gould, because he "twists the stuff so that at least there's a question mark inserted into the composition". Gould's "mutation" renders it tolerable for Zappa to listen to." (Nigel Leigh in Zappa Plays On)
Others about Zappa and Bach
"But his self-deprecation was deceptive. He talked about fooling around with music, not letting you know how deeply he was into Bach, Mozart, and the classic tradition." (Daniel Schorr in Zappa, City paper, 94-1)
"As we got into talking about it, I realized this man knew an enormous lot about Bach, Mozart and the classic tradition." (Daniel Schorr about Zappa in Frank Zappa, Musician, February 1994)
Nigey Lennon also confirms in Being Frank - My Time With Frank Zappa that Zappa appreciated Bach. Moon Zappa writes in her autobiography, Earth to Moon: A Memoir that Frank Zappa once showed her his record collection, which included Bach's Goldberg Variations. [1]
