Priceless Bach works return to Germany

The 250th anniversary of Bach's death was marked last year

By arts correspondent Jo Episcopo

A collection of manuscripts by the German composer Johann Sebastian Bach and his sons is to be returned to Germany by Ukraine after a long battle for custody of them.

The archive was taken by the Soviet Union's Red Army at the end of World War II. The decision to return the music was announced to coincide with a visit by Ukraine's President Leonid Kuchma to Germany.

Leonid Kuchma: Keen to strengthen ties with Germany

President Kuchma formally presented the German Chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder, with the first manuscript on Friday.

The Bach archive is described by musical scholars as priceless and irreplaceable.

The collection includes unpublished work by JS Bach himself, although much of it is by two of his sons, one of whom - Carl Phillip Emmanuel - was himself a noted composer.

Scholars say the work provides an important dimension to the study of 18th Century music.

Spoils of war

The story of the Bach archive reads like a Cold War novel. It was moved by the Germans from the famous Berlin Singakademie to Silesia, now part of Poland, to save it from bombing campaigns during the World War II.

JS Bach

1685: Born in Eisenach, Thuringia (now Germany)

1700: Began career as a musician

1708: Appointed court organist to the Duke of Weimar

1723: Became musical director of St Thomas' choir school, Leipzig

Fathered 19 children

1750: Died 28 July in Leipzig

But in 1945 the Soviet Red Army took the archive as a war trophy, in compensation for the looting the Germans had carried out in occupied Russia and Ukraine.

The documents then fell into the hands of the KGB - the Soviet secret police - and were feared lost for more than 50 years. They were unearthed two years ago in Ukraine's state museum.

The decision by the Ukrainian authorities to return the archive to Germany is controversial.

President Kuchma, dogged by domestic corruption scandals, is keen to forge connections with Western Europe, and particularly Germany, as it is the country's biggest foreign investor.

But many Ukrainians are unhappy about it. A lot of cultural treasures were taken from Ukraine by German troops during World War II. But some have been returned to Russia instead, and Ukrainians argue that they would like to see their art treasures returned to them first.