How many children did Bach have?

Johann Sebastian Bach had 20 children. He had seven with his first wife, Maria Barbara, and 13 with his second wife, Anna Magdalena. Ten of the 20 lived to grow up. Four of his sons became well-known composers, and for a time two of them were more famous than their father.

The short answer

	Children born	Lived to grow up
With Maria Barbara, married 1707	7	4
With Anna Magdalena, married 1721	13	6
Total	20	10

Why so many died young

Ten of Bach’s children died as babies or small children. That was common in the 1700s. Families had no vaccines and no modern medicine, and illnesses that doctors can treat today were often deadly.

Bach knew loss from both sides. His own parents died before he turned ten. His first wife, Maria Barbara, died in 1720 while he was away on a trip with his employer. He came home to find that she had been buried.

The ten who grew up

Name	Lived	What they did
Catharina Dorothea	1708 to 1774	The oldest. She sang in the family’s concerts at home.
Wilhelm Friedemann	1710 to 1784	Organist and composer, famous for making up music on the spot
Carl Philipp Emanuel	1714 to 1788	Composer. He played the harpsichord for the King of Prussia.
Johann Gottfried Bernhard	1715 to 1739	Organist. He died at 24.
Gottfried Heinrich	1724 to 1763	A gifted keyboard player who was cared for by his family all his life
Elisabeth Juliana Friederica	1726 to 1781	She married one of her father’s students.
Johann Christoph Friedrich	1732 to 1795	Composer at a small German court
Johann Christian	1735 to 1782	Composer in Italy and London
Johanna Carolina	1737 to 1781	She lived with her mother and sisters in Leipzig.
Regina Susanna	1742 to 1809	The youngest, and the last of the children to die

The four composer sons

Wilhelm Friedemann Bach. The oldest son. His father wrote a book of keyboard lessons for him when he was nine. He was a brilliant organist who found it hard to keep a job.

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. The most famous Bach of his day. He worked for the King of Prussia for almost 30 years and then led the church music in the city of Hamburg. Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven all admired his music.

Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach. He spent his whole career at the court of a count in the small town of Bückeburg.

Johann Christian Bach. The youngest son, known as the “London Bach.” He moved to Italy, and then to England, and wrote operas and symphonies in the new style. In London, he met Mozart, who was eight years old, and the two made music together.

A house full of music

The Bach home in Leipzig was crowded and loud. The children sang and played, students lodged with the family, and visitors came and went. Bach wrote that the family could put on a concert by themselves, with voices and instruments.

Anna Magdalena was a professional singer. She copied out a great deal of her husband’s music by hand. The family kept a notebook of pieces they liked to play at home. Read who wrote the Minuet in G.

What happened to the family

When Bach died in 1750, he left no will. The older sons took in the younger ones. Anna Magdalena lived another ten years with little money.

The youngest daughter, Regina Susanna, was poor in her old age. In 1800, a music magazine asked the public to help her, and Beethoven was among the musicians who offered to raise money.

Bach’s last grandson to carry the family name died in 1845. Two years earlier, he had been a guest when the first monument to his grandfather was unveiled in Leipzig.

One Bach who is not real

P. D. Q. Bach is a joke. An American composer named Peter Schickele made him up, and called him the last and least of the Bach children. Schickele wrote funny pieces under that name for many years.

Things to do together

Twenty at the table. Set out 20 buttons. Move ten to one side for the children who grew up.

Draw the family tree. Put Johann Sebastian in the middle, with his two wives beside him and the ten grown children below.

Father and son. Play a piece by Johann Sebastian, and then a piece by Carl Philipp Emanuel. Ask which sounds older.

Family band. Count how many people in your family can sing or play. Put on a two-minute concert.

Find the cities. On a map, find Leipzig, Hamburg, Bückeburg, and London, where four of the Bachs worked.

Questions to ask

• What would a house with that many musicians sound like?
• Why would a son write in a different style from his father?
• Which of the Bach children would you like to meet?

Print and play

Print the Bach fact sheet. Read Bach for kids, Bach facts for kids, and musical families.

For more composers by era, see classical composers for kids.