Brass Over Bridges Records Johann Sebastian Bach’s Contrapunctus 9

Johann Sebastian Bach's Contrapunctus 9 is one of my favorite pieces to play. Recording Contrapunctus 9 with Brass Over Bridges was a lot of fun for me and the whole quintet. As a brass quintet, we love having the opportunity to play baroque music, particularly the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. Thanks to technology, we’ve been finding new ways of making music together, even when we’re apart.

Contrapunctus 9 is a part of Johann Sebastian Bach’s famous collection of fugues, known as “The Art Of The Fugue” or in German, “Die Kunst der Fugue”. Contrapunctus 9 is a double fugue, meaning that it contains two dependent subjects. 

The instrumentation of Contrapunctus 9 was unspecified by Bach. Though it is commonly played on keyboard instruments, Bach composed this piece in an open score format, meaning that each voice of the fugue was written on its own staff. This adaptation of Contrapunctus 9 for brass quintet was arranged by John Glasel.

The members of Brass Over Bridges are Matt Ebisuzaki and Ari Micich on trumpet, with Margarite Waddell on french horn. Esther Armendariz plays tenor trombone and Lucas Jensen, bass trombone. Brass Over Bridges performs concerts throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.