There are many great composers but when it comes to contenders for the title "Father of Western Music", Johann Sebastian Bach is way ahead of the rest.

During his lifetime Bach was regarded first and foremost as a superb organist and music theorist but after his death in 1750 it gradually dawned on musicians and music-lovers that Bach's works - and there are nearly a thousand of them - are unique in their unfailingly superb quality, be it a tiny keyboard prelude or a massive passion setting with soloists, choir and orchestra.

How did the modest, God-fearing, overworked kantor living in small German towns, father of 20 children, perpetually at odds with his employers, achieve all this? Mark Lowther traces Bach's life.

Bach's Life and Work
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This programme first broadcast on 23-24 December 2005.