🔗 Share this article

Newly discovered musical pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach have been revealed and executed in Germany for the first time in three hundred twenty years.

Germany's Minister of Culture Wolfram Weimer described the finding of the pair of works a "significant occasion for the global music scene".

They initially attracted notice of Peter Wollny in the early nineties when he was cataloguing Bach manuscripts at the Royal Library of Belgium.

The musical compositions - the Chaconne in D minor and G minor composition - were dating unknown and anonymous. Mr Wollny spent the following three decades working to confirm the authorship of the pieces.

Historic Performance

They were performed at the St Thomas Church in Leipzig, where Bach is buried and where he worked as a church musician for 27 years.

The pair of works were played by Dutch organist the renowned organist, who said he was proud to be able to perform them for the premiere in three hundred twenty years.

He said the works were "remarkably sophisticated" and would be "an important addition for organists today, as they are also well-suited for more compact instruments".

Historical Significance

They are believed to have been created early in Bach's career, when he was working as an organ teacher in the municipality of the German town in the German region.

Mr Wollny, who is now the leader of the Bach research center in the city, said they displayed several features unique to the artist.

"Stylistically, the compositions also contain characteristics that can be found in the composer's creations from that time, but not in those of any other composer," he said.

They are considered to have been transcribed in the early eighteenth century by Bach's apprentice, the musical student.

At a revealing of the compositions, the expert said he was "99.99% sure that Bach had composed the two compositions" and they have now been included into the authoritative listing of his musical output.