When is js bach birthday

Bach is March 21 on Julian Calendar, which was adopted in Eisenach those days, ii but that date was March 31 on Gregorian Calendar, which had been adopted in the Roman Catholic Church in , and iii this year, March 21 on Julian calendar corresponds to April 3 on Gregorian Calendar.

There can be three ways to celebrate Bach's birthday on Gregorian Calendar. I do not know which is the most appropriate date. I can only offer material of the fact of the calendars. When Bach's birth took place a day or two later, after the Vernal Equinox OS, the Sun, they thought, would be at about 1 degree of Aries; however, a reliable astronomer would have informed them that it the Sun had already reached a position of 11 degrees Aries.

Just as the exact time of the arrival of Spring varies from year to year by a matter of hours due to leap-year calculations, likewise the precise moment when the Sun reaches 11 degrees of Aries does not remain entirely fixed or constant. Generally, however, March 31 will come the closest to providing what we call a birthday: when the Sun returns to the spot where it was when we were born.

Santu de Silva wrote March 23, : At the risk of contributing to a protracted controversy, let me make the following observations. This is particularly interesting to me this semester, since one of my students if preparing a presentation about the mathematics of leap years, and both of us know only a little, but we will shortly know a lot more--at least we continue to hope so.

At the very worst, we can simply look up the facts, without trying to understand any of it. It is a charming thought that if Bach's family had continued to remain ignorant of the new calendric thinking, they would celebrate Great-Uncle Sebastian's birthday in April, or whatever, but it does not make much sense. Bach is March 21 on Julian Calendar, which was adopted in Eisenach those days, ii but that date was March 31 on Gregorian Calendar, which had been adopted in the Roman Catholic Church in , [Therefore, celebrate the birthday on:] b March 31 on Gregorian Calendar.

Bach 12 days after the Vernal Equinox each year, which will be a better choice than to select a particular date, since the Gregorian calendar may be proved to be 'defective' some day. It has; this year there was a leap second, as everyone knows, to compensate. Still, we have every expectation that the Gregorian Calendar will be maintained in synchronization with the seasons with appropriate corrections.

This is provided Fumitak Sato's information and calculations were accurate and reliable, which is a fact that is easy to establish one way or the other. My thanks to this list member for helping to settle the issue at least to my satisfaction! His sources are at his home, and he well tell me the date tomorrow. This is particularly interesting to me this semester, since one of my students if preparing a presentation about the mathematics of leap years, and both of us know only a little, but we will shortly know a lot more--at leawe continue to hope so.

Or, to point out in public how I should have written it better. Or, to castigate me for not going ahead and typing whole chapters from the aforementioned books, instead of recommending the books. Pretend that you are looking at the calendar on the wall in the house where Bach was born the same day in Eisenach , Germany. The following facts pertain: 1. The calendar shows March 21, This calendar is off by 10 days. The position of the Sun and Earth relative to each other would show that on this date the Vernal Equinox had not yet taken place for this particular year.

The calendar on the wall was 'ahead of itself' by 10 days. Had the calendar correction been made on the day of Bach's birth it took about a decade or two for this to occur officially in the regions where Bach lived and worked , the results would have been the same as they would be even for us today: Ten days had to be subtracted from the calendar they simply disappeared , in other words, the Bach family had to play 'catch-up' to attune themselves with the reality dictated by the movement of the earth in its orbit around the sun and the measurements of the Sun's position as seen from the earth.

Now Bach's new, astronomically much more correct, birth date was and continues to remain 'in tune' with the celestial motions that surround us. The position of his Sun, as corrected by the NS calendar, was and remains essentially at 11 degrees of Aries. This is what a birthday entails: the day on which the Sun once again reaches the same position in the sky that it had when the birth occurred.

This is what happens every year on March 31 for Bach whose birth occurred when the Sun was at 11 degrees of Aries not April 3 when the Sun is at 14 degrees Aries and not March 21, a date which does not account for the loss of 10 days due to a significant calendar change and a date on which the Sun was still at 20 degrees of Pisces.

Summary : March 31 is the only reasonably correct day on which to celebrate Bach's birthday. The Sun's position on Bach's birthday in although the local Old Style calendars indicated that the date was March 21 was really at 11 degrees of Aries, the same position which is repeated each year under the New Style calendar on March Bach in Then celebrate his birthday by determining the date which has exact difference from the Vernal Equinox every year.

This may be fine, but the difficulty lies in determining the exact hour minute, second birth in the day March 21, Julian Calendar. Vernal Equinox: Solar Longitude.. Summary: March 31 is the only reasonably correct day on which to celebrate Bach's birthday.

That concurrence is surely as rare as any astronomical phenomenon: that not a single nit has been picked against my posting, but rather four resounding several affirmations! The moon and planets don't care what a "month" is. But Bach missed that one; he had to wait until he was 19 months old until one occurred. Oh well, it was fun to look it up, on the hunch that maybe Bach was born under a blue moon.

Guess not. All that remains is reasonable speculation using rectification methods already alluded to and these can never be entirely definitive.

Consider that the Sun is at 0 degrees Aries point the precise beginning of Spring in the Northern Hemisphere , but that a day later a son born in the Bach family when the Sun had advanced one degree to 1 st degree of Aries. This one degree Aries position is only possible under NS calendar reckoning which has been used up to this point. Now it is absolutely necessary under NS to drop or strike completely from the record 10 days in order to make the correct adjustment to and away from the calendar date which the Bachs observed on that famous birth date.

In order to make the OS calendar date agree with the NS date, we need to add 10 days to the now fictitious OS calendar date on the wall in Eisenach in in order to make it agree with the astronomical method of reckoning the correct date and time for the beginning of Spring. Adding these 10 days to March 21, OS, we now obtain the correct date for Bach's birthday: March 31, and March 31 every year thereafter.

Yes, there are minor fluctuations that occur every year due to the attempt to incorporate the problems caused by leap-year. April 3 or March 21 as choices for celebrating Bach's birthday are unreasonable as long as we abide by the standard definition of a birthday: A birthday occurs when the Sun comes back to the same position it had when the individual was born.

This is usually on the same date of a specific month, but strictly speaking it might sometimes be a day earlier or later. This is comparable to the earth celebrating its birthday at the Vernal Equinox which tends to occur each year within a limited time span surrounding the 20 th sometimes 19 th , sometimes 21st of March each year.

Since the time of day of Bach's birth is unknown, it matters even less just how precisely Bach's birth date can be defined. But within a fair degree of certainty, Bach's birth took place when the Sun was at 11 to 12 degrees of Aries measured from the O Aries point defined by the entrance of Spring in March of in Eisenach , Germany.

And it also shows that the difference between the date-time of the birth of J. Bach and that of the Vernal Equinox cannot determine the Bach's birthday in the later years unless the exact time of the birth of J. Bach was determined. Calendrical caluculations cannot be determined by simple addition-subtraction-multiplication-divisions.

The case is very similar as with that of musical tuning! As someone who used to work in this field, I would like to add these comments: As Mr Braatz writes, there is no way to know the time of day Bach was born. Therefore there is a degree is slack in planetary placement and in the angles the planets in the chart bear to each other knows as aspects.

There are other features of the birth chart that Astrologers look at : Planetary pattern - there are 7 planetary patterns - each gives a coloration to the reading of the chart The faster moving planets - Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury - cannot be precisely placed without a reliable birth time - hence some aspects could be missed Finally, without a reliable birth time, there is no Ascendant - one of the most important features of a chart - and one which most personalizes a chart.

Further, the distribution of the planetary pattern referred to above will not be precise because we don't know how the houses should be placed on the wheel. It is OK to print paragraphs of the qualities of planets in signs - but we are missing the qualities of planets in houses - one of the twelve "slices" - another important feature. Anyway, thanks again for the rundown.

Santu de Silva wrote March 24, : I think I'm converging towards an acceptable compromise for a day on which we can celebrate the birthday of Johann Sebastian Bach. As has been mentioned numerous times, because of the unreliable way in which birth records were entered and maintained in the 17th century, there is almost a week's uncertainty of the date, March 21, , recorded in the outdated 'old style' calendar.

As Tom Braatz and Fumitaka Sato have informed us with absolutely no room for confusion, the Spring Equinox occured around midnight at Greenwich between the 19th and the 20th in that year, according to our present Gregorian Calendar. The Julian Calendar--again as both list members Braatz and Sato point out--was out of phase 10 days, and so, working backwards, the true Spring Equinox would have been at midnight between March 9th and 10th, [Julian, or Old Style].

That would put his birthday It remains to settle on a single day for the Spring Equinox. Again, as explained, the Equinox creeps around anywhere from a little after noon on the 19th in some years to a little after noon on the 21st in other years. Why talk about his birth time in Greenwhich Mean Time? Because we'd like to pick a central, neutral time zone relative to which to compute his birthday, otherwise we'd have to make the 1-hour or 2-hour adjustment all the time.

The Germans, of course, have it easy; they can use their local time. The rest of us have to worry that if Bach happened to have been born early on March 21, whatever calendar, it would have still been March 20th where we residents of the USA live, even if no one was around to care back in except for a few harassed native Americans and even fewer distracted colonials.

These give us a rough means for settling on an "average" Spring Equinox Day. The envelope, please JSBach was born 12 days and 6 hours by hypothesis afterwards, which would bring us to NOt a bad birthday at all. In Great Britain and the American colonies, the calendar change didn't happen until That year, Sept. By official proclamation, the very next day was declared to be Thursday, Sept. Today, we celebrate George Washington's birthday on Feb.

But for the first 20 years of his life, Washington observed it on Feb. Thomas Jefferson's birthday is remembered today as falling on April But the scrupulously accurate amateur scientist had his tombstone list his birth date as April 2, O.

The discrepancy between countries has led to some unusual observances. Two of the greatest of all Renaissance writers, Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare both died on precisely the same date — April 23, But they didn't pass away on the same day. Cervantes died in Spain after the adoption of the Gregorian calendar, but Shakespeare passed away in England under the Julian calendar.

He was even well enough to travel and perform, visiting Frederick the Great, the king of Prussia in He played for the king, making up a new composition on the spot. In , Bach started a new composition called "The Art of Fugue," but he did not complete it.

He tried to fix his failing sight by having surgery the following year, but the operation ended up leaving him completely blind. Later that year, Bach suffered a stroke. He died in Leipzig on July 28, During his lifetime, Bach was better known as an organist than a composer. Few of his works were even published during his lifetime. Still Bach's musical compositions were admired by those who followed in his footsteps, including Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven.

His reputation received a substantial boost in when German composer Felix Mendelssohn reintroduced Bach's "Passion According to St. Musically, Bach was a master at invoking and maintaining different emotions. He was an expert storyteller as well, often using melody to suggest actions or events. In his works, Bach drew from different music styles from across Europe, including French and Italian.

He used counterpoint, the playing of multiple melodies simultaneously, and fugue, the repetition of a melody with slight variations, to create richly detailed compositions. He is considered to be the best composer of the Baroque era, and one of the most important figures in classical music in general.

Little personal correspondence has survived to provide a full picture of Bach as a person. But the records do shed some light on his character.

Bach was devoted to his family. In , he married his cousin Maria Barbara Bach. The couple had seven children together, some of whom died as infants. Maria died in while Bach was traveling with Prince Leopold. They had thirteen children, more than half of them died as children. Bach clearly shared his love of music with his children.

Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach and Johann Christian Bach, sons from his second marriage, also enjoyed musical success. We strive for accuracy and fairness. If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us! Subscribe to the Biography newsletter to receive stories about the people who shaped our world and the stories that shaped their lives.

Austrian composer Johann Strauss surpassed his father, Johann Strauss the Elder's popularity and productivity, becoming known as the "Waltz King. Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist who wrote symphonies, concerti, chamber music, piano works and choral compositions.