Johann Caspar Ferdinand Fischer (1656–1746)
Music director to the Margraves of Baden, Fischer is known for his Ariadne musica, a series of preludes and fugues in many keys that foreshadows Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier.
Johann Caspar Ferdinand Fischer was born in Bohemia, probably around 1656; little is known of his youth. From the 1690s he served as music director at the court of the Margraves of Baden, which later moved to Rastatt, where he died in 1746.
He was one of the first German composers to embrace Lully’s French taste fully: his Journal du printemps (1695) collects orchestral suites in the French manner.
His Ariadne musica (1702) contains twenty short organ preludes and fugues in nineteen different keys, plus ricercars on chorales. The idea of travelling through many keys, and even some of its fugue subjects, reappear in Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier; Bach knew the work.
He also published harpsichord suites, notably in the Musicalischer Parnassus, nine suites each named after one of the Muses. His concise, elegant music is ideal for approaching fugue through short pieces.
Piano sheet music (2)
- Erato Praeludium · level 5
- Erato Allemande · level 6