Author: John Chivers via YouTube
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A slightly different musical project than usual, this is a rock arrangement of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 5, Part 1 (Allegro) – BWV 1050.2.
Thanks to younger brother, Peter, for helping out with the photos. Between his and my photos, the accompanying footage comprises snapshots of the capital of the modern German state of Brandenburg, Potsdam, where I lived several months as a student in late 1992/early 1993. Potsdam, which is adjacent to west Berlin, but for 40 years was part of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) between 1949 and 1990, but prior to that was royal seat for former Prussian royalty – notably Frederick the Great. As such, it contains some beautiful palace buildings and gardens – notably the famous Sans Souci, though I was always more impressed by the Neues Palais.
Potsdam was also the centre of the German film industry and Babelsberg Studios has once again become a world-renowned part of the movie industry. Babelsberg was where I lived as a student of politics, in the park area, and some of the photos capture that area, overlooking the Glienicker Bridge, which once marked the crossing between East Germany and West Berlin and was where spy swaps took place.
I can’t take the credit for performing all this. I took a MIDI file version (details below) and then assigned the various tracks to different VST virtual instruments in Cubase 11. That in itself took a while.
Then I added an original bass pedal part to the solo section towards the end..
Next, came the hard work. I went through the whole thing section by section and added my own drum part, performed on an Alesis Crimson 2 electric drum kit, triggering Superior Drummer 2 samples. That was rather a labour of love, working through the piece and devising sympathetic parts which served the particular section, and frankly was the fun challenge in this project.
Finally, I added the Roland CR-78 drum machine section.
So, a fair bit of effort went into it, given it’s ten minutes long, even though I can’t take credit for performance of the main parts.
That credit goes to Michel Rondeau. Original MIDI file is at https://imslp.org/wiki/Brandenburg_Concerto_No.5_in_D_major%2C_BWV_1050_(Bach%2C_Johann_Sebastian) and its use is covered by the Creative Commons Licence 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandenburg_Concerto_No._5 for further information on the piece.
As is clear from that article, Bach himself didn’t visit Brandenburg, but dedicated the concerto in 1721 to Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg.