Song 60 ( Johann Sebastian Bach - BWV 565 Toccata and Fugue in D-Minor )

This is one of my all time favourite pieces of music and simply put is amazing. Almost everyone has heard it; even if they do not know it, especially around this time of year.
BWV 565 is thought to have been composed around the year 1705, which is right in the center of the Baroque period of music. J.S. Bach is the most recognizable of the 70, or there about other Bachs that are published composers; a very prolific musical family. Funnily enough during his life he did not get the appreciation he deserved; it wasn't until the Romance Period when the composer Felix Mendelssohn found his work and gave J.S. Bach the recognition he deserved that he became famous.
The musical form this uses is first: the Toccata, which is basically a piece of music written for the keyboard which is written to showcase the ability of musician playing; Bach was considered to be one of the best keyboardists of his time. Think of this as a flashy guitar solo at the beginning of a song. The fugue, on the other hand is just as difficult if not more difficult. In this part there are four independent "voices" going on at once, in some fugues it can be five. The piece introduces and reintroduces the theme in many different way, henceforth "fugue." I cannot even count the amount of times I have heard this song playing in background of horror flick, video games, and/or haunted houses on Halloween, which is one of the reasons I picked it today so close to Halloween.

Here is an amazing performance of the piece by Karl Richter on YouTube.
Here is a performance by Kurt Ison on the Sydney Town Hall Pipe Organ on YouTube. I love the sound of that low D.

There are a plethora of other excellent live performances available on YouTube.

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