J. S. BACH Jonathan Berkahn - Victoria University - Victoria ...

meanest capacity’—some of his commercially-oriented publications are as elementary
as anything printed during the eighteenth century—but at other times (even within the
same opus) he could strike a note of high seriousness comparable to Beethoven
himself. In later life he seems to have become more selective about what he published,
and followed Beethoven’s example by working and reworking his music—sometimes
for decades.
His name had also been associated with J. S. Bach from quite early in his
career. Born in Rome in 1752, he was something of a prodigy who wrote an oratorio
Martirio de’ gloriosi Santi Giuliani, e Celso (now lost, unfortunately, apart from its
published libretto) at around the age of twelve. Two or three years later occurred the
major disjunction in Clementi’s life; he was ‘bought’ 86 by an English gentleman named
Peter Beckford who sequestered him at his estate in rural Dorset, where he spent the
next seven years practising the harpsichord eight hours a day and providing occasional
musical entertainment for his master.
As a patron, Beckford was no musical philanthropist like Baron van Swieten.
He appears to have acquired Clementi as a relatively inexpensive source of domestic
music: today one might import high-end stereo equipment from Germany; before the
age of mechanical reproduction one imported musicians from Italy for much the same
purpose. There is nothing in Beckford’s writings to indicate an especially profound or
passionate interest in music (and enough to suggest a more-than-typical suspicion of
the licentious proclivities of professional musicians; the fruit of his experience with
Clementi?) 87 He made no attempt to further Clementi’s musical education, leaving
him much to his own devices. In Rome, Clementi had benefited from a thorough and
well-established pedagogical tradition, receiving instruction in counterpoint and
thoroughbass from Antonio Buroni, Cordicelli, Giuseppe Santarelli, and Gaetano
86 Beckford’s own description: Plantinga, Clementi, p.3.
87 Ibid., pp.35-6.
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