University of Sydney professor finds no argument to prove Anna Magdelena’s compositional authorship.

Having several times carefully perused the 430 pages of Martin Jarvis’ thesis (2007), I can find therein no argument to prove compositional authorship, put plenty of forensic discussion, with examples, about the authorship of his thesis’ claims regarding the compositional authorship of the Bach Cello Suites.

Why does Jarvis imply (but not really discuss with proof) that the “copyist” is (or, must be) the “author”? And especially a copyist who made so many silly and forgetful errors. I wonder how “ecrite par son spouse” (written by his wife) can come to mean “compose…”, when ‘to write’ and ‘to compose’ are not synonymous verbs.

I find it impossible to contemplate that someone as intrinsically honest as Johann Sebastian Bach would allow this kind of deception, especially as his obituary, composed by his son C.P.E. Bach and Johann Agricola, refers to his father’s outstanding solo pieces for violin and cello. As neither C.P.E. Bach nor his older brother W.F. Bach, the sons of Barbara Bach, were particularly fond of their stepmother Anna Magdalena Bach, it is hardly likely that C.P.E. Bach would refer so warmly to these works if...