Johann Sebastian Bach died on July 28, 1750 in Leipzig after a period of worsening health. He passed quietly in the company of his family, and was buried in St. John’s cemetery in Leipzig. He left as a respected, locally known church musician, and was placed in a simple coffin and lowered into the ground, likely in a shared or unmarked grave plot, with no permanent marker.
Bach’s modest reputation receded further after his death. Compared to the novel simplicity and elegance of the Classical era, Bach’s command of complex counterpoint and polyphony was considered “old-fashioned.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau indicated the change in musical taste, deriding contrapuntal music writing as “remnants of barbarism and bad taste, like the portals of our Gothic churches.” Bach disappeared from public view.
