This play is a wonder: Bach & Sons at the Bridge Theatre reviewed

Bach & Sons opens with the great composer tinkling away on a harpsichord while a toddler screeches his head off in the nursery. The script becomes a broader portrait of a richly creative and competitive family where everyone is bright, loud, witty, inventive, good-natured and affectionate. Bach teaches the elements of composition to his gifted sons. ‘Rules provoke expression. They challenge your ingenuity.’ And the audience is unobtrusively schooled in the elements of counterpoint by four actors singing ‘Frère Jacques’. Bach considers Carl’s work good but workmanlike. Wilhelm is better, a wayward, inspired and anarchic talent. When Carl hears this verdict he falls into a jealous rage but it doesn’t last. The boys remain friends and they like to joke about their workaholic dad. ‘He writes a lot of stuff about death in G major.’

The second act opens in a new era, the age of reason. Powdered wigs and embroidered long-coats are the style. Bach has moved to Leipzig and remarried after his wife’s death. The talented Wilhelm has turned into a hopeless drunk while Carl, the plodder, is making a fortune composing music at the court of Frederick the Great. This is a terrific play about families and ambition. It’s also a fascinating lesson in history, musicology and religion. More than that, it’s a dissertation on creativity. Bach sees himself as a simple tradesman who exchanges his skills and expertise for cash. He doesn’t pose as a ‘tortured genius’ because he toils in the service of God rather than his ego.

Simon Russell Beale seems personally similar to his subject — modest, friendly, sensitive, blazingly intelligent but good enough to keep that to himself. He plays the role with an engaging, cynical ordinariness. He could be Bach.