Does this sound familiar?

[Dorsetmike]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fChTgURmt44

If so who copied who?

[wljmrbill]

interesting.. sure sounds like old JSB "Jig "for sure.. good question. THanks for clip.

[Marc]

If the 'Jig Fugue' BWV 577 is really JSB (some scholars have raised doubts ), then Bach must be inspired by Buxtehude, and not the other way around. Buxtehude was a main inspiration for Bach. He walked f.i. over 200 miles to meet the maestro. YEAH!

BTW: both works are part of the famous Andreas Bach Buch, a large collection of various keyboard works, copied by JSB's elder brother and teacher Johann Christoph Bach, together with his son Johann Andreas Bach.

So, the explanation might be: teacher Christoph makes a copy of Buxtehude's BuxWV 174, and then orders his pupil JSB to write a more or less similar thematical fugue in gigue-rhythm. Hence BWV 577, again copied by proud brother and teacher Christoph.

[Dorsetmike]

I've noticed a few more strong similarities recently, I'd not listened to much Buxtehude but I now have a 6 CD set of his organ works, so getting more familiar.

[Krummhorn]

Interesting the similarities between the two "jigs" ... and interesting to note that the BWV 577 is considered a spurious work on IMSLP.

The video one is definitely Buxtehude, having played it many times myself.

Being of Danish ancestry, I dearly love to play the works of Buxtehude ... dare I say sometimes I favour Buxtehude over Bach ... I know, I know, perish the thought of that , but, well, maybe because everyone does and plays Bach more than the other composers of organ music in that era.

As the late E. Power Biggs often said, "There are the three B's of organ literature ... Bach, Buxtehude and Sowerbee."

[Marc]

Being of Danish ancestry, I dearly love to play the works of Buxtehude ... dare I say sometimes I favour Buxtehude over Bach ... I know, I know, perish the thought of that , but, well, maybe because everyone does and plays Bach more than the other composers of organ music in that era.

Best Buxtehude can still be better than Less Best Bach.

As the late E. Power Biggs often said, "There are the three B's of organ literature ... Bach, Buxtehude and Sowerbee."

I thought he was to say:

[....]
Bach, Buxtehude and Power Bee,
the latter being me!

[Marc]

I've noticed a few more strong similarities recently, I'd not listened to much Buxtehude but I now have a 6 CD set of his organ works, so getting more familiar.

Bach was influenced by loads of composers, from all countries. Copying, learning, incorporating it in his own composing style, et cetera. When organ composing is concerned, he most certainly was inspired by Reincken, Böhm, Buxtehude, Pachelbel, De Grigny, Couperin, Frescobaldi, Vivaldi plus all the others I forget to mention.

Also: we have to realize that most of the melodies of his organ works are not by himself. The chorale works (preludes, fantasias, partitas et al) are all based on original Lutheran hymns. And for a lot of free works he treated church & folk tunes together with inspiring tunes from other composers in the same way. This being quite common in those days .... but isn't it still?

(Post scriptum: one of Bach's most famous Fugues, the 2nd part of BWV 542 in G minor, was based on a Dutch folk song called Ick ben gegroet [= I am saluted]. In Bach's time, this song was also well-known in the northern parts of Germany, like Hamburg. Hence the suggestion that it was composed for and played during Bach's application in Hamburg, where Dutch composer Johann Adam Reincken still had great influence.)