Edward Roth- stein, in The New Republic (June 24, 1985), 1220 19th St. N.W., Washington,
D.C. 20036.
The lives of musical geniuses are supposed to be filled with drama: bril- liant outbursts undermined alcoholism, mania, and syphillis. Or so the legends go.
But Johann Sebastian Bach, whose 300th birthday the world cele- brated this year, is a genuine exception, contends Rothstein, music critic for The New Republic. "Bach's life is considered stupefyingly ordi- nary," although his work...