Perhaps some of the native genius rubbed off on Telemann; perhaps too, Telemann’s origins in the bourgeoisie (rather than in the sort of musicianly guild that the Bach family dynasty represented) conferred a view of music somewhat different that of the pious Bach, for whom music was meant to glorify God and educate his neighbor. At any rate, by the time Telemann published Musique de Table, he had close to two decades of successful publishing under his belt. His publishing was a very substantial source of income, and that income was necessary for the raising of his children and the pleasures of his spendthrift second wife, Maria Christina Textor. In a letter to a friend (J.R. Hollander, a merchant in Riga, and one of the subscribers to the Musique de Table) Telemann noted (in verse): Mein Noten-Kram kann mir, bey vielen Kindern, / Für deren Auferzien ich manchen Thaler gebe, / Die Sorgen guten Theils vermindern; / Er ist mein Acker und mein Pflug, / Wovon ich lebe: / Das ist genug. (My trade in printed music can relieve / the worries about the many thalers / I spend in raising my children; / It it my field and my plow, / wherefrom I live; / That is enough.”)
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One might think of the collection as a counterpoint to the Brandenburg Concertos of Bach
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He also asked Hollander to talk up his publications wherever Hollander’s business might take him, and most especially the Tafelmusik, which Telemann was diligently trying to sell subscriptions for in advance. The Musique de Table boasted a list of no fewer than 206 subscribers, each of them paying in at least eight dollars (post-subscription copies were sold at an even higher price). Thus Telemann’s gross for the publication was at least sixteen hundred dollars, this at a time when Bach’s annual income in Leipzig was less than half that figure.
The Musique de Table stands out from Telemann’s other publications in a number of ways. Most of Telemann’s published music was for chamber music forces, whether solo keyboard music, duets, trio sonatas, or quartets. In general the publications were not dedicated to wealthy patrons, but to performers like those who might expect to buy them, for example, the early Kleine Cammer-Music of 1716, dedicated to three well-known professional oboists, François le Riche, Peter Glösch, and Michael Böhmen, or the duets of 1727, dedicated to two flutists, George Behrmann and Pierre Diteric Toennies. Telemann produced hundreds of orchestral suites, most of them early in his career, when he was employed at the court of Count Erdmann II of Promnitz at Sorau (now in Poland), but of these the only ones to be published were those included in the Musique de Table and the Six Ouvertures à 4 ou 6, published in 1736, and now lost. The ambitious orchestral works included in the Musique de Table meant that this was an especially splendid production—perhaps Telemann already had in mind his triumphal visit to Paris in 1737/8.
The subscription list printed in the music included, in addition to the wealthy merchants and amateur musicians of Hamburg, an impressive roster of nobility from all over Europe, full of Princes, Margraves, Comtes Regnants, Dukes, Marquises, Barons and so forth. The civil service is also represented with Chevaliers, Intendants, and Conseillers. As far as the musical nobility of the time was concerned, one finds the names of Hendel, Docteur en Musique, Londres; Quantz, Dresden; Pisendel, Dresden, six copies; and Blavet, no fewer than twelve copies. No Bachs are represented; perhaps the price was too high? Included among the subscribers are a substantial number of women. Geographically, the subscribers hailed from as far afield as Copenhaben, Odense, Christiania in the North, London to the West, Cadiz to the south, and Riga to the East.
The work is divided into three productions, each containing an orchestral suite in seven parts opening the production; next a quartet for three treble instruments and continuo; then a concerto, again in seven parts; a trio sonata; a solo sonata; and finally a conclusion, for the same forces as the suite which opened the production. The three productions appeared in installments, the first being issued at Ascension (late spring), followed by Michaelmas (early fall), and Christmas.
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