… Somehow I don’t think those things are what made him a great composer

That title is completely wrong. They started with the assumption that Bach is a great composer and want to understand what it is people like about his work.

Ah yes, the best way to critique art: with math

“First, the researchers translated each composition into an information network by representing each note as a node and each transition between notes as an edge.”

So… sheet music. They translated the music back into sheet music.

Now let’s ask mathematicians to compose music.