[Music illustration:  “Bible” Sonata, No. 2.  KUHNAU.]

[Music illustration:  Collection I., Suite 7, Ouverture.  HANDEL.]

[Music illustration:  “Bible” Sonata, No. 6.  KUHNAU.]

[Music illustration:  Collection I., Suite 7, Passacaille.  HANDEL.]

[Music illustration:  “Bible” Sonata, No. 6.  KUHNAU.]

[Music illustration:  Collection I., Suite 7, Passacaille.  HANDEL.]

It should be noticed that the three Handel quotations are all from the same suite.  We do not mean to infer that the above passages from Handel are plagiarisms, but merely that the Kuhnau music was, unconsciously, in his mind when he wrote them.

C.F.  Becker, in his Hausmusik in Deutschland, has suggested that these sonatas were known also to Mozart, and begs us to look on this picture, the opening of a Vivace movement in Kuhnau’s 6th Sonata:—­

[Music illustration]

and on this, from The Magic Flute:—­

[Music illustration]

Faisst, however, justly observes that though the harmonic basis is the same in both, with Kuhnau the under-part is melody, whereas with Mozart it is the reverse.  He also accuses Becker—­and justly, as readers may see by turning to the passage in the Zauberfloete—­of not having represented the passage quite honestly.  Reminiscence hunters need to be very careful.

In these sonatas, as compared with the one in B flat, the thematic material is of greater importance; and so, too, in the slow movements the writing is simpler and more melodious.

The rapid rate at which they were composed deserves mention.  Kuhnau seems to have had the ready pen of a Schubert.  In the preface to these “Frische Fruechte” he says:  “I wrote these seven sonatas straight off, though attending at the same time to my duties (he was juris practicus, also organist of St. Thomas’), so that each day one was completed.  Thus, this work, which I commenced on the Monday of one week, was brought to an end by the Monday of the following week.”

Kuhnau’s second (and, so far as we know, last) set of sonatas bears the following title:—­

Musikalische Vorstellung
Einiger
Biblischer Historien
In 6 Sonaten
Auf dem Klavier zu spielen
Allen Liebhabern zum Vergnuegen
Verfueget
von
Johann Kuhnauen.

That is—­

Musical Representation
of some
Bible Stories
In 6 Sonatas
To be performed on the Clavier
For the gratification of amateurs
Arranged
by
Johann Kuhnau.