page_title: Six Sonatas for Violin and Harpsichord, BWV 1014–1019
section_title: England
hierarchical_section_title: Six Sonatas for Violin and Harpsichord, BWV 1014–1019 / Reception and legacy / England
caption_attribution_description: English: Samuel Wesley
context_page_description: The six sonatas for violin and obbligato harpsichord BWV 1014–1019 by Johann Sebastian Bach are works in trio sonata form, with the two upper parts in the harpsichord and violin over a bass line supplied by the harpsichord and an optional viola da gamba. Unlike baroque sonatas for solo instrument and continuo, where the realisation of the figured bass was left to the discretion of the performer, the keyboard part in the sonatas was almost entirely specified by Bach. They were probably mostly composed during Bach's final years in Cöthen between 1720 and 1723, before he moved to Leipzig. The extant sources for the collection span the whole of Bach's period in Leipzig, during which time he continued to make changes to the score.
context_section_description: I am in the utmost Distress, & there is no one on Earth but yourself can help me out of it. Dr. Burney is stark staring mad to hear Sebastian's Sonatas, & I have told him all how & about your adroit Management of his Music in general. He was immediately resolved on hearing you on the Clavicembalum & me on the fiddle at them. He has appointed Monday next at 12 o'Clock for our coming to him ... The triumph of Burney over his own Ignorance & Prejudice is such a glorious Event that surely we must make some sacrifice to enjoy it. I mentioned Kollmann as quite capable of playing the Sonatas, but you will see [...] that he prefers you. Pray comply in this arduous Enterprize. Remember our cause, "Good Will towards Men" is at the bottom of it, & when Sebastian flourishes here, there will be at least more musical "Peace on Earth."
  — Letter from Samuel Wesley to Benjamin Jacobs, September 1809
  The sonatas BWV 1014–1019 figured prominently in the "English Bach awakening" that took place at the beginning of the 19th century, largely due to the efforts of Samuel Wesley. In 1809, while arranging the future publication with Charles Frederick Horn of the Well Tempered Clavier (sold by subscription in four instalments), Wesley began to stage performances of Bach's works in London with the help of Horn, Vincent Novello and Benjamin Jacobs, organist at the Surrey Chapel, Southwark. The public concerts included keyboard works—with some of Bach's organ works arranged for piano three hands—and often one of the sonatas for violin and harpsichord, with the German violinist  Johann Peter Salomon as soloist and Wesley at the keyboard. For the first concerts, when Salomon was unavailable, Wesley played the violin part himself, although somewhat out of practice. Prior to the first public concert with organ accompaniment in the Surrey Chapel in November 1809, Wesley and Jacobs had also given a private performance of all six sonatas to Charles Burney, a venerable Handelian, recently converted to Bachism by Wesley.
  Salomon was already familiar with Bach's compositions for violin through Bach's son Carl Philipp Emanuel whom he knew from his period in Berlin, where he had served from 1764 to 1780 as director of music to Prince Heinrich of Prussia, the younger brother of Frederick the Great. In 1774  Johann Friedrich Reichardt had reported on Salomon's performances of the "magnificent violin solos by Bach without accompaniment" in Berlin, praising "the great power and sureness with which Salomon presented these masterpieces." In London thirty years later, at Wesley's 1810 benefit concert in the Hanover Square Rooms, Salomon again performed one of the unaccompanied sonatas together with one of the sonatas for violin and harpsichord, with Wesley at the keyboard. More of the sonatas BWV 1014–1019 were included in subsequent concerts featuring Salomon: two were played for the first time in 1812 in a Surrey Chapel recital with Jacob at the organ.
caption: Samuel Wesley
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