Editing Goldberg Variations (section)

=== Variatio 30. a 1 Clav. Quodlibet ===
{{listen|type=music|help=no|filename=Goldberg Variations 31 Variatio 30 a 1 Clav. Quodlibet.ogg|title=Variatio 30. Quodlibet. a 1 Clav.|description=Performed by Kimiko Douglass-Ishizaka on piano}}
[[File:Quodlibet.jpg|right|thumb|235px|The [[Quodlibet]] as it appears in the first edition]]
The final variation is titled after the ''[[quodlibet]]'' tradition, in which multiple popular songs are played at once or in succession. According to Forkel, the many musicians of the Bach family practiced this tradition at gatherings:

<blockquote>As soon as they were assembled a [[chorale]] was first struck up. From this devout beginning they proceeded to jokes which were frequently in strong contrast. That is, they then sang popular songs partly of comic and also partly of indecent content, all mixed together on the spur of the moment. ... This kind of improvised harmonizing they called a Quodlibet, and not only could laugh over it quite whole-heartedly themselves, but also aroused just as hearty and irresistible laughter in all who heard them.</blockquote>

Though Bach never noted the sources of Variation 30,<ref name="Alpha">{{Cite AV media notes |title=Variations Goldberg |first=Jean-Paul |last=Combet |others=[[Céline Frisch]] |date=2001 |type=booklet |publisher=Alpha Productions |id=Alpha 014 |location=Paris}}</ref> Forkel's anecdote led to the belief that it is composed from German [[Volkslied]] melodies, as if to evoke the Bach gatherings.<ref>{{harvnb|Kirkpatrick|1938|p=viii}}</ref>

Since folk tunes commonly shared melodies, music alone does not identify the songs intended.{{sfn|Williams|2001|p=90}} For example, part of Variation 30 traces back to the melody of the Italian [[Bergamask]] dance,<ref name="Alpha" /> which not only gave rise to compositions by many musicians (such as [[Dieterich Buxtehude]], under the title of ''La Capricciosa'', for his thirty-two partite in G major, BuxWV 250{{sfn|Schulenberg|2006|page=[https://archive.org/details/keyboardmusicjsb00schu/page/n395 387]}}), but is even sung to various words in regions such as Iceland today.<ref>{{cite news|last=Allen|first=David|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/20/arts/music/vikingur-olafsson-goldberg-variations.html|title=The Pianist Vikingur Olafsson on 'History's Greatest Keyboard Work'|work=[[The New York Times]]|date=October 20, 2023|access-date=2024-04-23}}</ref>

A handwritten note found in a collector's copy of the ''Clavier Ubung'' claims that Bach's student, [[Johann Christian Kittel]], identified two folk tunes making up Variation 30 by their first lines. [[Siegfried Dehn]] of the Prussian royal library later appended purported full texts to this note:
* ''Ich bin solang nicht bei dir g'west, ruck her, ruck her'' ("I have so long been away from you, come closer, come closer") and
* ''Kraut und Rüben haben mich vertrieben, hätt mein' Mutter Fleisch gekocht, wär ich länger blieben'' ("Cabbage and turnips have driven me away, had my mother cooked meat, I'd have opted to stay"), ascribed to the Bergamask theme.<ref name="CrossAccent">{{cite magazine |last=Marissen |first=Michael |date=Fall–Winter 2021 |title=The Serious Nature of the Quodlibet in Bach's 'Goldberg Variations' |url=https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Articles/Marissen-Quodlibet-Goldberg.pdf |magazine=CrossAccent |location=Valparaiso, Indiana |publisher=Association of Lutheran Church Musicians |access-date=April 23, 2024}}</ref>

Dehn's texts, though unsourced, stand as the only historical evidence for the provenance of Bach's Quodlibet and are commonly quoted.  Today, the identity of "Kraut und Rüben..." is uncontroversial, since multiple versions of the text, including some explicitly set to the Bergamask theme, are preserved.<ref name="Alpha" /> In contrast, the "Ich bin solang..." text is much more obscure,<ref name="Vikingur">{{Cite AV media notes |title=Goldberg Variations |first=Víkingur |last=Ólafsson |others=[[Víkingur Ólafsson]] |date=2023 |type=booklet |publisher=[[Deutsche Grammophon]] |id=486 4553 |location=Berlin}}</ref> and these words have not been found in any Volkslied archives.<ref name="Alpha" />

Other bars of Variation 30 can be heard as incipits of yet more songs, though none have been identified.{{sfn|Williams|2001|p=89}}