Johann Gottlieb Goldberg

[1][2] Little is known for certain about his childhood, other than that he was an exceptionally talented performer,[citation needed] attracting the attention of Hermann Karl von Keyserling, the Russian ambassador to Saxony, around 1737.

Keyserling's favorite chamber harpsichordist was the 14-year-old Goldberg, whose technical accomplishments were so spectacular that they made it possible for him to perform a work of such extraordinary difficulty.

According to Forkel, writing in 1802, sixty years after the event: ...[the count] ... often stopped in Leipzig and brought there with him the aforementioned Goldberg, in order to have him given musical instruction by Bach.

... Once the count mentioned in Bach's presence that he would like to have some clavier pieces for Goldberg, which should be of such a smooth and somewhat lively character that he might be a little cheered up by them in his sleepless nights.

Bach thought himself best able to fulfill this wish by means of Variations, the writing of which he had until then considered an ungrateful task on account of the repeatedly similar harmonic foundation.

Some of his last works, especially the concertos, use a sophisticated harmonic language akin to that of Bach's son Carl Philipp Emanuel, and were probably written for the musicians of Heinrich von Brühl.