J. S. Bach: Oboe Concertos

We can’t be sure that Bach wrote any concertos specifically for the oboe aside from the C minor concerto BWV1060 – in which it’s partnered by the violin in an exercise of pathos out of all proportion to the modest dimensions of the work itself. The other concertos here come down to us as harpsichord concertos, in which guise they do not sit entirely happily, and it seems more than likely that Bach, as both unhappy Kapellmeister of the Thomaskirche in Leipzig and far more content in his role supplying music, musicians and concerts to Zimmermann’s coffee house in the city, would have been glad to take advantage of the soloistic potential of a resident oboist to craft these Italianate concertos that exploit both the instrument’s origins in pastoral idiom (notably BWV1053, in the ‘pastoral’ key of F major, and its gently swaying siciliano middle movement in 6/8), as well as more urbane and learned counterpoint of which he was undisputed master among his peers.