Research on J. S. Bach and Dieterich Buxtehude
Vincent Pérez Benítez, PhD, DMA
Professor of Music (Theory), The Pennsylvania State University
“Buxtehude's Passacaglia Principle.” Rivista di Analisi e Teoria Musicale 20, nos. 1–2 (2014): 77–98.
Forward, Susanna Pasticci, editor
Another crucial theme that we had indicated in our call for papers concerns the relationship between the passacaglia and the ciaccona, interlaced in a complex web of subtle similarities and differences (Silbiger 1996). This is the aspect on which Vincent Benitez concentrates in his essay dedicated to Buxtehude’s organ music, which he examines within the context of seventeenth-century Northern German keyboard music. In particular, Benitez analyses a passacaglia and two ciacconas by Buxtehude, from which he gleans a general hypothesis concerning the stylistic norms that regulate the use of ostinati in keyboard pieces.
“Musical-Rhetorical Figures in the Orgelbüchlein of J. S. Bach”
When I was studying for my DMA degree in organ performance with Robert Clark at Arizona State University, I assisted him with his work as editor of Concordia's edition of Bach's Orgelbüchlein (1984). I was employed to hand-copy every chorale prelude, which were then sent to the edition’s engravers. I based my copying on the facsimile of the autograph score as well as various editions of the Orgelbüchlein. This work spurred me to write my DMA research paper at ASU on musical-rhetorical figures in the Orgelbüchlein and then an article on that same topic for the Bach journal (see my c.v. for details).
On this web page is a sample of my work, the first chorale prelude, “Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland,” BWV 599 (© Copyright 1984 Vincent P. Benitez. All rights reserved.)