What We Do
William H. Scheide Research Grant
The William H. Scheide Research Grant was made possible by a gift from William H. Scheide, one of the founding members of the ABS and its first major benefactor. Awards are made annually in amounts ranging from $2,000 to $10,000 for research projects related to Bach or figures in his circle. Although preference will be given to doctoral students, junior faculty, and independent scholars, senior faculty are also encouraged to apply, especially when institutional research support is limited or unavailable. Awards will normally go to citizens or permanent residents of the United States or Canada. Applicants must be a current member of the Society.
Applications should include a research proposal of no more than three double-spaced pages, a curriculum vitae, a detailed budget, and one letter of support (submitted with the application).
Applications must be submitted to vicepresident@americanbachsociety.org.
Deadline is November 15.
Grant recipients will be notified by January 15.
Scheide Research Grant Recipients:
2025
2024
2022
2021
2018
2017
No grant awarded.
Sashi Ayyangar, to support archival research into cantata compositional methods of key J.S. Bach predecessors and contemporaries; and Hélène Papadopolous, to support archival research into the role of Rosalyn Tureckin Bach reception.
Ruth Eldridge Thomas, to enable archival research toward dissertation completion. Topic: J. S. Bach in late-nineteenth-century England
Arlan Vriens for work on F. W. Rust’s music for unaccompanied violin
Derek Stauff for research into the political context for the Lutheran biblical motet and sacred concerto during the Thirty-Years’ War; and Geoffrey Burgess for research into the confluence of botany and music in eighteenth-century Germany
Matthew Hall to assist the completion of his dissertation, which explores
the early manuscripts of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Leipzig apprentices as a
window into Bach’s compositional pedagogy.
2016
Michael Eisenberg for his research on “Virtuosity in Transmission:
Engraving in the Opus of J. S. Bach and His Circle.”
2015
Daniel Boomhower for his work on the transmission of Bach’s music in the
late 18th and early 19th centuries; and Julia Dokter for a study on
“Codified Tempo Changes in German Baroque Organ Music.”
2014
Rebecca Cypess for a study of the music in Sara Levy’s salon; and Evan P.
Cortens for his work on “Networks of Musical Exchange in Eighteenth-
Century Germany.”
2013
Moira Hill for a study of the parody and pasticcio techniques in Carl
Philipp Emanuel Bach’s passions; and Nik Taylor for research on Georg
Philipp Telemann’s printed church cantatas.
2011
Mark Peters, research on the Magnificat cantatas of Bach and his
contemporaries; and Markus Rathey, research on the musical sources and
cultural contexts for Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248.
2009
No grant awarded.
2007
John Koster, research on a harpsichord at Colonial Williamsburg; and Russell Stinson, research at the Arnold Schoenberg Center in Vienna
2005
James A. Brokaw, II and Russell T. Stinson, “Brahms reading Bach:
Brahms’ Annotations to the Organ and Harpsichord Works in His Library”
2003
Tanya Kevorkian, “Religious Practices and Society in Leipzig,
1650–1750”; Jason Grant, “Concert oratorios by Georg Philipp
Telemann”; Raymond Erickson, “Source-Critical Studies in American Bach
Sources”; Russell Stinson, “The Reception of Bach’s Organ Works.”
2000
David Schulenberg, “A Study of the Development of Bach’s Weimar
Compositional Style in the Context of Repertory Associated with Dresden.”
1998
Stephen Crist, “Originality and Convention in the Arias of J. S. Bach.”
1996
Melvin Unger, “The ‘Theologia Crucis’ in J. S. Bach’s Cantatas.”
1992
Russell Stinson, “Bach the Teacher: A Study of his Pupils and Pedagogical
Methods.”