Johann Sebastian Bach: Life and Work 0151006482, 9780151006489

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l^b t.

work to appear polished:

"O when

incorporated the melody of the chorale

Gottes unschuldig" into the opening chorus

as well as

he wrote out the text of the Gospels sung by the Evangelist and the soloists.

When

the

thirteen pages were

first

several years

them by gluing lengthwise

before his death, he carefully repaired strips to the

damaged

margins, which had apparently become

illegible,

and

rewriting the missing notes.

We thus gain the impression that Bach himself may have already viewed the turies

—

St.

Matthew Passion

as a

work that would

outlast the cen-

likev^se the "great CathoUc" B-Minor Mass, which he was

determined to complete and capture in a score during the of his

life,

a task that cost

him

great effort.

serve the sacred cantatas for the Sundays siastical year,

which he arranged

in

last years

He also took pains to pre-

and

feast days

of the eccle-

annual cycles. If today the

existence of only three complete cycles can be proved, although the

obituary mentions

five,

the natural process by

the explanation

may

involve

more than

just

which things disappear; Bach scholars have

given serious thought, though without resolving the matter, to the possibility that

Bach

actually left only four cycles. Transmission of the Works

25

Whether Bach wrote considerably more can reconstruct today caution.

As

a question that

is

secular cantatas than

we

must be approached with

occasional compositions based

on

texts that could hardly

be used again in other situations, such works had limited usefulness.

The many works

in this category that have disappeared

comparable

essarily represent a

Bach often reused texts or rewrote

of his secular cantatas in other con-

several stages, so

were probably preserved in

at least

most of these compositions

one form. The example of the

how much

Christmas Oratorio shows secular

terms of musical material.

loss in

large portions

them in

do not nec-

it

mattered to him that

music survive beyond the day and the occasion of its

first

this

per-

formance: he worked into this six-part series of cantatas for the

Sundays and three

feast days

during the Christmas season the music of

"drammi per musica" composed

sen,"

BWV

BWV 214;

215.

He

house of Saxony:

BWV 213; "Tonet, ihr Pauken! Erschallet,

Hercules at the Crossroads,

Trompeten!"

for the ruling

and "Preise dein Gliicke, gesegnetes Sach-

confidently labeled the entire opus an oratorio, a

term not commonly in use lation indicated that the

at the time.

The

work belonged

solemnity of this appel-

in the

same category

as the

passions and the great mass. It is difficult to

orchestral manuscripts left

been

how many of the chamber music and among Bach's papers at his death have

determine

lost. It is striking, at

any

rate, that

the surviving works in these

genres are not numerous. Although Bach had ample opportunities

and occasions during

his years as kapellmeister in

director of a collegium to

musicum

compose such works, we have

compose that much

in his

Cothen and

middle period in Leipzig

several indications that

in these categories.

When

tant orchestral compositions in particular,

it

he did not

one surveys the ex-

seems

likely that

was preoccupied with these works over long periods; they in several different versions and/or in

as the

Bach

exist either

forms through which one can

recognize older versions.

One may conclude tral

music not

26

Approaching Bach

that

Bach viewed the composition of orches-

as a routine task

but as an opportunity to give shape

to

and develop particular conceptions and models through a limited

number of exemplars and

new

context as

would be unlikely

that such a

them

to present

needed. If we accept this premise,

model would not have "survived"

it

in at least

in a

one version. The survival

of the Brandenburg Concertos supports

this hypothesis:

handwritten dedication copy had been

lost,

sions

would provide

until

to be

may assume

he was not a perfectionist when

and cataloguing

have been more important

would continue

We

behind an extensive but not complete col-

left

lection of his compositions; to preserving

the

if

other sources and ver-

access to five of the six works.

Bach

that at his death

even

his oeuvre.

him

to

As he

got older,

came

seems to

that a series of paradigmatic works

performed and discussed

Haydn and Mozart

it

it

after his death.

Not

did the idea take hold that a composer

should keep track of his oeuvre as consistently and completely as possible with the help of lists

— not

least

of all for purposes of assert-

ing ownership, a consideration that had not yet acquired

portance in Bach's day. For Beethoven prestige to have each of his

it

would be

much im-

a question of

works receive an opus number and be

printed as soon as possible. Bach's scores are not listed in the inventory sions

upon

heirs

ahead of time.

his death.

They seem

Two

works were distributed.

from Bach's

first

in the family;

It is

have today come

his

how

the

Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Philipp consistent with their strong position

for this theory

mosdy from

is

that the manuscripts

the collections of these two. But

also possible that the musical materials all

posses-

conceivable that the two eldest sons

lion's share,

what speaks

made of his

been divided among

theories can be formulated as to

marriage,

Emanuel, took the

to have

we

it is

were divided equally among

those entided to inherit, as were the household items listed in

the inventory.

The two

sons from the second marriage, Johann

Christoph Friedrich and Johann Christian; the widow dalena; the daughter Liesgen, married to nickol; as well as the

inherited substantial

Anna Mag-

Johann Christoph Alt-

two unmarried daughters would have then

amounts of musical

material. If this second

Transmission of the Works

27

theory

is

true,

many

original manuscripts

must have been

lost, for

the surviving manuscripts include only a few from the holdings of these heirs.

Whatever the

case, the inheritance

of Carl Philipp Emanuel

is

the best preserved. Supplemented over time through the gift or pur-

chase of the works inherited by his siblings, so that eventually

it

in-

cluded aU the surviving significant oratorical works, this collection

was

carefully preserved

use.

As

and small portions of it even put

director of sacred music in

performed in 1770, sich ein Streit,"

1776,

and

BWV 19,

Hamburg, Carl Philipp Emanuel

178 1 the

for

to practical

Michaelmas cantata "Es erhub

which he replaced the two

new ones of his own composition

with

arias

— presumably because of the

old-

fashioned style of the originals. For one of his Easter cantatas, probably performed in 1778, he used the opening chorus of the Christmas Oratorio, "Jauchzet, frohlocket," as the

opening movement.

In 1768 Carl Philipp Emanuel included in the program of a public

concert the Credo from the

B -Minor Mass,

to

which he had

added a brief instrumental introduction. Also performed cert

in this con-

were two popular movements from Handel's Messiah, and

his

own Heiligy to be performed by a double choir. This concert, which received much acclaim from the Hamburg audience, is significant in the history of music. It marks the moment when Johann Sebastian ^

Bach's vocal works were

first

used outside the standard choral reper-

tory for church services; at the same time characteristic excerpts of these works were ennobled as indestructible classics of sacred music.

Furthermore, this concert shows that in Protestant musical art" cal flinction

is

Germany a

being established, an art that has outgrown

and

its liturgi-

being cultivated to arouse reverence

is

"holy

at special

concerts and, increasingly, in singing societies organized specifically for this purpose.

After the death of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, most of the priceless collection

of his

father's

manuscripts that he had amassed

passed to his pupil and successor. Christian Friedrich Gottlieb

Schwencke,

a respected

composer and Bach interpreter on the organ

and keyboard. Partly by way of Schwencke, partly 28

Approaching Bach

directly

from the

estate,

Georg Poelchau

Bach

collectors

— the most important among

— acquired

the private

of Carl Philipp

portions

significant

all

Emanuel's collection. This private scholar, born in 1773 near Riga, re-

Hamburg from

siding in

had the means

— not

collect printed

least

1799

till

1813

and from then on

through recourse to his

and handwritten musical works

in Berlin,

wife's fortune

in large

with the intention of establishing an "archive of musical

—

to

numbers,

art."^

Abraham Mendelssohn, Felix MendelssohnBartholdy s father, who served as an intermediary, a substantial portion of Poelchau s Bach manuscripts found their way to the library of Thanks

to

the Berlin Singakademie, with which Poelchau was involved from 1814

on

as

an active

member and

later also as its librarian.

works from Carl Philipp Emanuel's

significant

The most landed

estate finally

in Berlin's Konigliche BibHothek, survived the evacuations necessi-

tated

by the Second World War, and

in the

meantime have been

united in the Staatsbibliothek's building at

number

8

re-

Unter den

Linden. Today about 80 percent of the surviving Bach autographs are archived there, including

mann

many once owned by Wilhelm

Friede-

Bach.

This

son's

treatment of his paternal heritage was by no means as

irresponsible as the older

Bach's death,

Bach

literature

would make

Wilhelm Friedemann was probably

perform the vocal works to any great extent:

it

seem. After

the only one to

as the organist

and mu-

of the Frauenkirche in Halle, he needed a large supply

sical director

of church pieces, and therefore liked to draw for his Sunday and feast

day performances on works by his

He

had a

ments

particular fondness for the large, elaborate choral

— such

cantata

as the chorale

"Ein

feste

Burg

ist

move-

unser Gott" from the

BWV 80.

Finding himself in financial

was forced

some of

to sell

seems to have done for instance those

from

father, carefully revising the parts.

whom

they

difficulties,

Wilhelm Friedemann

his father's scores

his best to

make

around 1760, but he

sure they landed in

good hands,

of the cantor in Oelsnitz, Johann Georg Nacke,

made

cant collection of the

their way,

Bach

by various detours,

lover, singer,

to the signifi-

and friend of Mendelssohn Transmission of the Works

29

Franz Hauser. According to more recent scholarship, Wilhelm

Friedemann kept not

insignificant portions of his holdings together

until his death.^

Wilhelm Friedemann has been one of his

father's

having presented

criticized for

works, the organ concerto

BWV 596, after Vivaldi,

own on the handwritten title page and for later passing off some of his own vocal compositions as his father's. It has meanwhile as his

come

to light that the father

joindy,

and that the

tributed pieces to

and

composer

actual

someone

composed

his sons

in that

Since

else.

how,

it is

group occasionally

better to leave the

profit

appears likely that

when

found herself in financial

also

Thomas School most of the

at-

Bach's widow,

from

in

life.

Anna Magdalena,

she turned over to the

straits,

his

whole question

the semidarkness that surrounds the last years of Bach's It

of works

sorts

we have no way of knowing

whether Wilhelm Friedemann naively hoped to "forgeries" and, if so,

all

St.

manuscripts she had inherited. Thus

the citizens of Leipzig occasionally had the pleasure of hearing a cantata by

Johann Sebastian Bach performed during

under the direction of one of

vice

a

church

More

his successors as cantor.

frequent were performances of the motets, which had early

ser-

become

Thomas Choir. In 1789, no less a visitor to Leipzig than Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart enjoyed one of these per-

showpieces for the

St.

"^

formances. If Bach's unmarried daughters inherited any of the uscripts,

it is

possible that they sold portions of their holdings to the

publisher and music dealer Johann Gottlob

who

Immanuel

Breitkopf,

in his catalogue, first issued in the 1760s, listed all sorts

manuscripts for

The

of Bach

sale.

collection of

Bach items

began assembling around

Anna Amalia of Prussia,

that

Johann Philipp Kirnberger

1758 for his sovereign

and

pupil. Princess

consisted in part of copies offered for sale

by Breitkopf 's publishing house. Kirnberger, one of Bach's

was

man-

especially interested in pieces that revealed

counterpoint and

"strict style," as a father

Today this portion of what came

Bach

of German

to be called the

as a

pupils,

master of

classical music.

Amalia Library be-

longs to the Staatsbibliothek in Berlin. Recently another strand of 30

Approaching Bach

the Berlin

Bach

come

tradition has

to be associated with the

name

of the musician Johann Friedrich Hering, whose collection grew out of Hering's contact with the composer's two eldest sons. This collection passed into the possession of the counts of Voss-Buch

and today

can be found in Berlin, along with the holdings of Joseph Fischhof, a representative of the important Viennese

Bach

tradition.

In his memoirs, Adolf Bernhard Marx, the music scholar from

whom we Bach's

St.

have learned of the rediscovery, by Felix Mendelssohn, of

Matthew Passion, recounts an anecdote according

to

which

Mendelssohn's teacher, Carl Friedrich Zelter, "obtained the score of that immortal

work from

a cheese shop,

wrapping paper. "^ In the preface

to

where

it

was being used

volume 6 of the old Bach

as

edition,

one can read that gardeners in the service of Count Sporck used old music manuscripts, perhaps including works by Bach, "to wrap

tree

trunks."^

The

"recollection" about the St.

unmasked

as

for the cantata

documented. For instance, the original

BWV

9,

"Es

ist

das Heil uns

in 1971 at a construction site near

music lover

Passion can easily be

Marx's self-aggrandizement. Yet even recentiy various

oddities have been

found

Matthew

who happened

music sticking out of a

details

picture: although Bach's

been kept together

was

Street.

of construction debris and received

conic permission from the nearest

Such amusing

New York's Water

her,"

A

to be passing by noticed a piece of sheet

pile

score but the rubble with

kommen

flute part

workman

la-

to take not only the

it! 7

should not be allowed to distort the larger

handwritten compositions

after his death, they

in all directions; a considerable

great respect, then preserved

may

not have

were certainly not scattered

number of them were gathered with

and handed on. The

archival preserva-

tion of Bach's manuscripts provides evidence of greater recognition

of the composer's stature than the Zeitgeist of various periods might suggest. True, here

and there

a lovely piece

even a sequence of compositions or two

may be

may

irretrievably lost,

have disappeared with-

out a trace. But the losses are probably not so significant as to distort

fundamentally our picture of Bach the composer. Transmission of the Works

^i

Now surface,

that

we can no

we need

longer reasonably expect

to find a sensible solution for

new

sources to

an urgent problem:

the Berlin manuscripts are threatened by creeping deterioration.

As

early as the 1930s, important manuscripts in the Staatsbibliothek

were covered with transparent sheets of silk chiffon. The musicologist

Hans Joachim Moser, noted

in his time but given

rushing into print, viewed the manuscript of the in 1959

and made the reverent observation that

St.

sometimes to

Matthew Passion

for this

had apparently "bought the most expensive paper

work Bach available

in

Athens-on-the-Pleisse, to emphasize the solemnity of what he was leaving for posterity"!^ Efforts are currendy under

ink from devouring the paper, and dividual pages

and

insert a layer

and back.

32

Approaching Bach

it is

way to prevent the

even planned to

split

the in-

of acid-free paper between the front

PART ONE

THE STATIONS OF BACH

S

LIFE

FROM MATINS SINGER TO HOFKAPELLMEISTER At

the end of 1735, Johann Sebastian Bach compiles a genealogy of

the "musical

Bach

patriarch Veit

family." It begins in the sixteenth century with the

Bach and ends with

a reference to

Bach, the composers youngest son, just born. chronicler, not yet

ancestors, a briefer

this clan.

fifty-year-old

account of the family's

one of the

fifty-three other

His narrative includes slighdy more

around to speaking of himself and years his senior.

The

advanced in years but long conscious of family

tradition, offers a rather extensive

known

Johann Christian

Might

this

be the

detail

earliest

members of

when he

Johann

"fratello dilettissimo"

upon whose

departure from the world he composed the piano capriccio 992, a sort of elaborate musical joke,

not

recall

Of

when

moment comes

the

some

the sixteenth century and gary. Into the age

so the

to outline the man's life?

of Luther, the

name might

Veit had

which means

as a

white-bread baker in

German word

Germany

ancestors.

Hun-

bake was bachen,^

He

resumed

rate,

which Protestants were

his trade in the vicinity

a popular instrument. "It

flour,

of Gotha, and

he would pluck the

must have made

From Matins

according to

of the Lutheran religion,"

"for the sake

while the millstone was turning grain into zither,

for

At any

to escape the persecution to

being subjected.

he lived in

well be connected with his profession, provided

German-speaking

Bach, Veit fled to

Johann Sebastian reports

basis in historical fact, that

worked

BWV

and whose date of death he can-

his great-great-grandfather Veit,

vaguely, yet not without

gets

Jakob, three

his brother

a right pretty

Singer to Hofkapellmeister

35

sound! For he

let

the rhythm be impressed

from the rhythm of the

upon him

[that

Bach comments with

mill],"

tained grin, and promptly concludes,

"And

this

learned

is,

a barely con-

may be counted

the

beginning of music amongst his progeny"^

This account sounds waggish when one considers that before he penned

it,

Johann Sebastian demanded that the

five years

city fathers

provide better working conditions for him, arguing that the current status musices before, the art

is

entirely differentfrom

what

it

was

having increased greatly, the gusto having changed

wondrously, for which reason the sort oflS/hisic heard hitherto

no longer pleasing

Commingled

our

to

ears.^

here with respect for his ancestor

of a fifth-generation Bach

is

who

is

the self-confidence

has achieved the status of court

kapellmeister and cantor of the Thomaskirche. His distant ancestor

was a

lay musician; his great-grandfather,

Hans, continued

his fa-

thers trade but also took on the role of a traveling "minstrel"; his grandfather, Christoph,

and

was employed

and

later in Arnstadt;

his father

as

town musician

was appointed

in Erfiart

director of Eise-

nachs town orchestra.

Over many sicians,

here.

generations, the family tree displays

nothing but musicians,

One

many more than have been named

can see the poindessness of asking whether "musicality"

innate or learned. sition, or is it the

tian to feel

Does

it

result

from

music-saturated

from the

only as a musician?

no means

numerous mu-

first

He

a particular genetic predispo-

air that

moment

is

causes

little

Johann Sebas-

that in this world he will thrive

did thrive, even

circumstances were by

if the

easy.

In 1668, Bach's father, Johann Ambrosius, at twenty-three a violinist

hirt,

with the

Erfiirt

the daughter of a respected

two daughters. Active able prominence.

born on March in Eisenach.

36

town musicians, marries Elisabeth Lammer-

The

fiirrier,

who

bears

in Eisenach since 1671,

him

1685

The two

sons and

he achieves consider-

Johann Sebastian, the youngest of his

21,

six

and baptized two days

children,

later at St.

is

George's

godfathers are the musician Sebastian Nagel

Stations of Bach's Life

of Gotha and the forester Johann Georg Koch of Eisenach.

Bach House on the Frauenplan, today

The

a much-visited historic site,

can no longer be considered the house where he was born; possibly the birthplace was located on Fleischergasse,

more

on the

precisely

now occupied by number 35 Luthergasse. The life of the Bach children can be reconstructed

spot

Johann Christoph, the

He

bastian in age.

as a Stadtpfeifer

vice of Sweden

we

flirt.

him

later.

closest to

We have

Johann Se-

apprenticed to his father's successor and trains

(town musician). Later he enters the military

as a

ser-

musician and sees duty on European battlefields

as far east as Turkey. Eventually

a court musician.

shall return to

Johann Jakob, the brother is

partially.

eldest of the surviving brothers, will play an

important role in Bach's youth; already mentioned

only

The

sister

he

settles for

good

in

Stockholm

Marie Salome marries and moves

Johann Rudolf, Johann

as

to Er-

Johann Jonas, and Johanna

Balthasar,

Juditha die young.

EISENACH In retrospect

town with first

it

seems fortunate that Bach was born in Eisenach, a

a population of six thousand at the time,

eleven years of his

down

life

The town

there.

life as

home of the town

musicians' corps.

journeymen,

it is

Bach becomes

The

what

all

fession that, so far as

these parts. ""^

very young age

kinds of wind and string instruments

qualities are required

of a municipal music di-

we can

Of course,

and journeymen.

father's

he has "proven himself so qualified in his prorecollect,

as leader

It will

be

we have

not seen his like in

of the town music corps, he remains

an active town musician himself

music

at a

town council of Eisenach expressly recognizes his

abilities, attesting that

as the

Thronged with apprentices and

with music every day, and

familiar with

learns early

rector.

filled

adult.

would become the

His parents' house serves

content of Bach's

and

offered in a microcosm,

to the smallest detail, the elements that

an

and spent the

— the master over the apprentices

left to his

son to

director, overseeing the musicians

rise to

the position of

but not performing.

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

37

At

the

main church,

George s, Johann Sebastian gains

St.

hand knowledge of the organ, the

who would

students

town

hall

sing in the streets for money).

Johann Sebastian

then

when

sound of courtly

of high

And from

the

surely also accompanies his father

his father presents himself at the

and

suites, concerti, sonatas,

quality, reaches his ear.

Georg Philipp Telemann where French

Wartburg, the

Duke of Saxony-Eisenach. There

residence of the reigning tant

and Currende (music

he can hear the brass players sounding their horns from the

tower. Little

now and

figural choir,

first-

From

the dis-

cantatas, probably

1709 on, the family friend

will serve as director

taste prevails; in this period.

of music

Bach

is

at the court,

"merely" court or-

ganist in the neighboring state of Weimar.

Throughout

his

world of his childhood, ony.

His

Bach

life,

remain

will

faithful to the musical

he will to the region of Thuringia and Sax-

as

travels will never take

him

farther than to Liibeck

in the north, to Carlsbad in the south,

and

and Berlin

to Kassel in the west.

Eisenach not only provides his musical world but also

of his upbringing and education:

the

site

town of Martin Luther, who

the

it is

is

learned the elementaria two hundred years earlier at the same Latin

school to which Bach are

now

is

admitted. In the sixth form, the pupils

supposed "to have learned the Catechismus Lutheri and in reading,

both in Latin and in German, to have made such progress that they have a good beginning

at

introduced to writing."^

The

ticular psalms,

must be

accomplished reading and have also been catechism, as well as a canon often par-

recited

word

fectly secure in reading

and writing;

read the text and copy

it

vestibulum sive primi

which provides simultaneous

ploy traditional to generation

a

The

based on the Latinitas

Amos Comenius,

German and

The primary

and pictures

Latin, with the

objective

to transmit,

is

to

em-

from generation

minimum of reflection, basic knowledge and

In 1693 Bach enters the

38

is

by Johann

training in

truths regarded as theologically

been enrolled previously

to pupils not yet per-

after that they are expected to

aditus

columns.^

texts, songs,

and with

word

out. Instruction

ad Latinam

texts arranged in parallel

for

and

fifth

socially essential.

form, which means he must have

in another school, since schooling

Stations of Bach's Life

was man-

datory from the age of five years on. Perhaps his parents sent

him

to

who lived on German school did a

the master turner and schoolmaster Franz Hering,

nearby Fleischgasse.7 Since the pupils great deal of their learning

had ample opportunity to

at this

from the hymnal,

dw^ell

little

Bach must have

on the emblematic depictions of the

of Christ and his disciples in the Eisenach hymnal of 1763. Their

life

graphic and symbolic vividness later found specific equivalents in his compositions: exposure to these early images no doubt influenced the

way he would join music and theology throughout

The hymnal,

the catechism, Latin texts

nated the early education of young Bach. they appealed to

him

as

much as

tively.^ Is

—

or

sical

the

is

he taking

more

96, 59,

performances? At any

five- to ten-year-old.

is

is

who pore over

and 103 times, respec-

he helping his father with Eisenach

rate, life in

There

may wonder whether

from the constant pressure,

refiige in sickness

—

domi-

us that in the three years at

tell

marked absent

likely explanation

We

life.

these elements

music. Bach scholars,

every available biographical detail, the Latin school he

—

his

no childhood

is

as

mu-

not easy for this

we understand

it

today; this applies to other children as well, but they do not yet have all

the music he has in his heart

dustrious; he

when

asked

who

is

— and on

industrious goes

his back! "I

the adult

far,"

"how he undertook to become such

His answer must be understood not

had

Bach

replies

a master in his art."9

modesty but

as false

to be in-

as

an ex-

pression of his involuntary striving to attribute a higher purpose to

the harsh challenges he experienced in childhood.

OHRDRUF At

first

May

the challenges multiply, and there

1694, Bach's

mother

is

is

no meaning

in sight: in

buried, and in February of the next year

his father follows her, barely twelve

weeks

after remarrying.

The

orphan, not yet ten years old, moves into the house of his eldest brother,

Johann Christoph,

Ohrdruf As

in nearby

Michael's, Johann Christoph receives so is

forced to

become

little

a schoolteacher, against

all

organist at St.

income that

in 1699 he

his natural inclinations.

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

39

He also has too little room in his house. Thus the other young brother, Johann Jakob, who has come along prenticeship in Arnstadt. he, stays

— he has no

year Latin school

Johann Sebastian, three years younger than

choice.

whose

to Ohrdruf, soon leaves for an ap-

He is sent to the lyceum,

pupils usually

go on to the

a respected sbc-

university, unless

they have dropped Latin and Greek before finishing their secondary education.

Bach

receives a scholarship,

a singer of iigural

carries

with

duties as

it

and Currende music. In the summer of 1695 the

school records already note that he

is

the fourth best pupil, and by the

become the top student

following year he has

March 1700 he

which

in the third form. In

graduates and leaves for Liineburg. His school years

have brought crucial educational and musical experiences.

Here we

are

concerned with the

Bach may have received ther

and

casual instruction

his first insight into the art

hann Christoph, himself most

likely

it

was not

latter.

While

on the

in Eisenach,

still

violin

from

of composing from his uncle Jo-

a not entirely insignificant composer.

until

Johann Sebastian came

was

a

Johann Christoph, who now assumed the

student of Pachelbels and a competent

know whether

this brother also

But

Ohrdruf that

to

he began systematic lessons on the keyboard and organ his brother

his fa-

—

role

organist.

after

all,

of father,

We

do not

composed, but we owe to him the

compilation of two very important collections of keyboard and organ music, which include early works by Johann Sebastian Bach: the Andreas

Bach Book and the Moller Manuscript. Johann Christoph did not

begin putting together these volumes until after Johann Sebastians

time in Ohrdruf, so

it is

possible that

some of the works

were given to Johann Christoph by Johann

Sebastian,

in

them

who had

en-

countered them in Liineburg.

When we older brother,

seek to establish what young Bach learned from his

we can draw on

the famous passage in the obituary:

Johann Sebastian Bach was not yet

ten years of age

when he

found himself robbed ofhis parents by death. He betook himselfto Ohrdruffto his

eldest brother^

Johann Christoph, organist

in that

town, and under his instruction laid the foundation for playing

40

The

Stations of Bach's Life

the clavier. Already at this tender age^

uncommon

displayed an his

own free

given him

famed which

love for music. In a short time he

was

Pachelbel,

refused to him, despite all his

commit thefollowing innocent deceit.

lay in a cupboard

ings. Accordingly,

had gone

he pried

hands and

and he

safely in his hands.

and with

roll

copied light.

whose doors consisted merely ofgrat-

it

out of the cupboard at night,

it

up the book, which was bound only in

by the light of the moon, for he did not

After six months' time this musical booty was

He was attempting to make use of

it,

secretly

extraordinary devotion, when, to his great sorrow, his

brother became

aware of it, and

had made with so much

wouldfeel ifa ship sank on talers

its

belonging to him,

little Johann

mercilessly took from

effort.

him

Ifwe imagine how a

the

miser

way to Peru with a hundred thou-

we

how downcast

can picture

Sebastian Bach felt at this

our

loss.^°

If this anecdote contains any truth, the older brother

mined

when

for he could reach through the grating with

to bed,

even possess a

sand

and

who knows what reason. His eagerness ever to improve

The book

copy he

had

a book full of clavier pieces by the most

to learn. Yet

his brother possessed,

his little

had of

will mastered all the pieces that his brother

his playing inspired him to

paper,

Johann Sebastian

masters of those times, Froberger, Kerle,

pleas, for

all

little

know

that his younger brother should not

was deter-

the works of

Johann Pachelbel and two other composers whose works Johann Christoph liked to hold up to his pupils

as exemplary,

Johann Jakob

Froberger and Johann Caspar Kerll. Recent scholarship indeed ascribes to Pachelbel a smaller influence

came customary

on the young Bach than be-

after Spittas biography."

the influence of the organ chorales

Attention has shifted to

composed by Bach's uncle

in

Eisenach, also Johann Christoph, and by Bach's brother in Gehren,

Johann Michael.

The eminent Bach quite possible that

expert Jean-Claude

Zehnder considers

Bach began composing while

still

in

it

Ohrdruf; he

points in particular to the genre of the choral ricercare. If an organ

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

41

"Vbm Himmel

chorale like

back to

tually goes

komm ich her," BWV 700,

this early period,

traordinary technical

it

would

At

new

Bach

barely fifteen

cantor, Elias

ac-

give evidence of ex-

the fruit of thorough instruction, though

skill,

without a single note suggestive of the

also

St.

hoch, da

is

later flowering

of genius.

— presumably by the Liineburg —

recommended

Herda, previously a bass singer in

to

Michael's Cloister in that town, where there are not only openings

for "matins singers" but also positions offering free

The move

to Liineburg, 350 kilometers away,

room and

board.

not undertaken

is

without reason. Have Johann Christoph's living quarters become

more cramped with the places in

Ohrdruf

arrival

of offspring, or has the number of

offering free dining privileges shrunk? Perhaps

Bachs voice has begun

to change,

which may have

led to the loss of

his scholarship.^^

But then the fifteen-year-old would have been

cruited as a bass

and not "because of his uncommonly beautiful so-

re-

prano," which, according to the obituary, he did not lose until he

was

in Liineburg.^^

At

all

on foot

events, he sets out

Ohrdruf lyceum, Georg Erdmann, weeks

earlier,

released

in

March 1700

His classmate

at the

from the school

several

for Liineburg, to arrive there before Easter.

may have accompanied him.

LUNEBURG St.

Michael's Cloister should be pictured not as a monastery in the

usual sense but rather as a

handsome complex

consisting of a church,

known

a boarding school for the youth of the nobility

Academy,

cloister has

choir."

similar to a university.

According

"The poor singing

scholars," as they

performing the elaborate

of matins money for

sum of twelve The

bylaws, the

its

May

figural music.

1700,

members

On

Bach appears

groschen; three singers on the

Stations of Bach's Life

were called

earlier,

not

vespers but also participate in the

"chorus symphoniacus," whose twenty-odd

42

to

about a dozen scholarships for members of the "matins

only do "daily duty" at matins and

for

and the Collegium

a Latin school for the burgher class,

Academicum,

as the Knights'

the

are responsible

list

of recipients

in ninth place

list

with a

receive a taler,

and

two others sixteen groschen. Altogether twelve names well as two

We

unnamed

do not need

how meagerly

to engage in complicated calculations to see

these singers are paid. It

scholarship recipients live in the

men

at the Knights'

are listed, as

"expectants. "^^

is

no coincidence that the

same building

as the

Academy; by performing small

young nobleservices,

they

can earn some pocket money. Nonetheless, the move to Liineburg has great significance for Bach: cal apprenticeship

but can "study" instead and thereby acquire the

become indispensable when he

sition at Leipzig's

is

applies for the cantor's po-

Thomaskirche.

In Liineburg's musical history, the Bach's time

not sign up for a musi-

of an academically educated cantor, qualifications that

qualifications will later

now he need

that of the master organist

name most

associated with

Georg Bohm.

Specialists are

perhaps even more interested in the impressive music collection belonging to

Michael's,

St.

scores, unfortunately

had

which consisted of well over one thousand

now known

to us only

from

daily access to the manuscripts themselves,

sixteenth-

The

inventories.

and therefore

Bach to the

and seventeenth-century tradition of sacred vocal music.

collection included

works by the great Heinrich

Schiitz, the

Johann Rosenmiiller of Wolfenbiittel and Wolfgang

kapellmeisters

Carl Briegel of Darmstadt, the cantors Joachim Gerstenbiittel of

Hamburg and

Sebastian Knupfer of Leipzig, and

forget both older

whose

settings

worship

and more recent

of Latin

services.

texts

Italian

many others,

enjoyed considerable favor in Protestant

Of particular

interest to

Bach may have been the

passions by Christian Flor and Friedrich Funke, considered for their time

We large, or

and thus

typical primarily

modern

of northern Germany.

do not know which of the many works

calling for small,

very large ensembles were actually performed and which

were merely collected.

And we

fifteen-year-old matins singer

the library,

can only speculate

was allowed

rummage around among

Schiitz's Kleine geistliche

sume

not to

composers of sacred music,

—

as to

and wanted

whether

—

to

sit

a in

the scores, and perhaps take

Konzerte up to his room.

It is

enough

that as a singer, copyist, listener, or eager student

From Matins Singer

to as-

Bach had

to Hofkapellmeister

43

contact with at least a small portion of the cloister's holdings and that that contact shaped his understanding of sacred vocal music just

he spent

as decisively as the later years

as organist in

Arnstadt and

Miihlhausen.

There

Bohm

is

recenf conclusive proof that Bach studied w^ith Georg

as early as 1700.

Two

handwritten copies of organ music by

Dietrich Buxtehude and Johann

Adam

Reinken, which had been

written out by Bach when he was somewhere between the ages of thirteen

and

were discovered

fifteen,

Library in August 2006.

in the

Duchess Anna-Amalia

The Reinken copy seems

to have

been a

of apprentice work under Bohm's tutelage. Bach's early famil-

sort

iarity

with Reinken's music

states:

"From Liineburg he

hear Johann

Adam

St. Catherine's.

is

confirmed by the obituary, which

traveled occasionally to

Hamburg

Reinken, famous at the time as the organist

to at

"^5

A certain Simeon Metaphrastes, whose real name was Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg,

describes in his Legends of Several Musical Saints

(1786) a small miracle that

Liineburg from Hamburg.

Bach experienced on the way back

Hungry yet too poor to

take proper lodg-

ings at an inn, he grabbed a couple of herring heads that

tossed from a "a

wdndow onto

to

had been

the street, and lo and behold, he found

Danish ducat hidden within

each."^^

We do not know who or what induced this generally sober man, who knew and

gready admired Bach's work and had authored a

learned "Essay on the Fugue," to surround the young Bach's head

with cult

this litde halo.

— of genius

Therefore

"the

we

shall leave this early instance

Lord does not abandon

the reason for Bach's trip to

his

own"

Hamburg. Despite the

—

to

of the

examine

date given in the

obituary, this trip cannot have taken place earlier than the spring

of 1702,

when Bach

finished his schooling in Liineburg with a

university-entry certificate but had not yet found employment. ^^

Bach's purpose in

making

this study trip

was most

likely to ex-

perience the distinguished organist Reinken and thus gain "direct access to the

doubt 44

main repertory of north German organ

also to expose himself to a master

The

Stations of Bach's Life

music,"^^ but

of the pure, indeed

no

strict,

—

style

of composing,

cus for three string

report that

as

Reinken revealed himself in

instruments and figured bass.

Bach learned the

art

his Hortus musi-

The

obituary does

of composing "largely through ob-

servation of the works of the famed and skilled composers of the

time and through earnest reflection of his own."^9 If he took the occasion of a longish visit to

the opera at Gansemarkt,

Bach was

career into the dramatic style as

Germany The

it

Hamburg

to attend

able to gain insight early in his

was beginning

to take shape in

obituary provides explicit information on encounters

with modern orchestral music:

From

here

[Luneburg] he

had an opportunity

also

quently to an orchestra maintained by the sisting in the majority establish his mastery

something entirely

Bach need not overture, with

on.

The

palace,^^

new

style,

this

he could

which in those lands was

at the time}°

encounter the French

travel to Celle to

which he

Duke ofCelle and con-

of French musicians; from

ofthe French

to listen fre-

will

be preoccupied from his

style

of

Weimar period

"French" occasionally perform at Liineburg's municipal

and one of them

lives

under the same roof with Bach

Thomas de la SeUe, violinist and dancing master at the Knights' Academy which, in consideration of its noble clientele, places less importance on the humanist educational tradition than on

French conversation and "penning charming in dancing, riding,

What

and

letters,"

skill in

and of course

fencing.^^

matters to Bach, however,

theological educational offerings.

is

The

the cloister's humanistic and

curriculum for the

first

form,

geared to the standards of the university, covers the following subjects: Latin,

which includes grammar instruction and reading of Ci-

cero's orations against Catiline

translation of the

New

and

Vergil's Aeneid;

Greek, with

Testament; theology, taught from Leonhard

Hutter's strictly orthodox

Compendium locorum

theologicorum,

whose

questions and answers are to be learned by heart; logic, for which the text

is

Andreas Reyher's Systema logicum; and rhetoric from a com-

pendium by Heinrich Tolles. Furthermore,

there are introductions to

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

45

philosophy and the art of poetry, as well

as offerings in projection

and mathematics. ^^

theory, arithmetic,

We do not know the extent to which Bach immersed himself in these subjects, there

is

on top of

his musical obligations

no doubt that the Latin schools

and

interests.

Yet

Ohrdruf and Liineburg

in

helped him develop the framework for a humanistic and theological

worldview that would enable the older Bach to become a musicus doctus,

educated in and committed to traditional values, even without

the corresponding university studies.

When Johann his

Nikolaus Forkel was conducting the research for

book on Bach and submitted

Emanuel, the

Weimar.

Today we

are

he

may

of questions to Carl Philipp

in

no

1775 to question

what way he got from Liineburg

wiser. If

Bach

left St.

have gone to

Hamburg

to

Michael's in the

met the matriculation requirements

spring of 1702, having university,

list

responded succinctly in January

do not know]

3: ''nescio [I "^"^

latter

a

for a while

for the

and then

re-

turned to the region of his youth. In later years he provided a hint as to his

whereabouts

for his son

at the time: in

November

Johann Gottfried Bernhard with

1736 he intercedes

a city councilor

from

Sangerhausen in Sachsen-Weissenfels, remarking that "almost thirty years ago" he himself

was elected unanimously

as organist at St.

Jacob's but not appointed because the local prince objected. ganist's position in

Sangerhausen was in

The

fact available in July 1702,

and nothing would argue against Bach's having explored the bility

or-

possi-

of working there.

According to what we know today, Bach

is

seventeen

when he

applies for his first position. In this connection, a brief look at his

contemporaries' careers seems in order.

What

petitors for the cantor's position at Leipzig's this age? at

Georg Philipp Telemann

twenty and three years

rector at the

New

later

Church

are Bach's later

com-

Thomaskirche doing

at

enters the University of Leipzig

becomes the organist and music

in Leipzig.

di-

Christoph Graupner attends

school and the university in Leipzig for several years before taking a position at the

46

The

German Opera

Stations of Bach's Life

in

Hamburg

at the age

of twenty-

Johann Friedrich Fasch

three.

musicum

Leipzig, directing a collegium

This brief overview council will later elect

also begins his studies at nineteen at

same time.

there at the

may help us understand why the

Leipzig city

Bach cantor of the Thomaskirche only

the three other prominent applicants have withdrawn from the petition:

training.

What

matters here

Bach's

is

own

plan for his

although he chooses advanced schooling and an education over

an apprenticeship, thereby keeping important doors open, he

much greater degree than the man, one who

set his sights

to achieve his goal.

and

com-

he does not come from Leipzig and, unlike the others, has

no university life:

after

wdll

to a

is,

three other kapellmeisters, a self-made

high early on and

is

willing to

work hard

This ethos grows out of the craftsman's approach

inform that of the educated

With Franz Mund, we may see

artist.

the years before Bach's Arnstadt

period as conforming to the traditional guild system: upon his depar-

from

ture

comes burg. will

The

house in Ohrdruf, Bach's apprenticeship

his brother's

to an end. It

is

followed by two journeyman years in Liine-

brief employment at the court in

Weimar, of which more

be said soon, might be interpreted as a half

year's "ripening

time," a waiting period before certification as a master. ^5 Yet Bach's career soon shoots

beyond

this craftsman's concept,

which he may

have inherited from his family: he early comes to see himself as an artist or, to

put

it

more

concretely, as a

keyboard virtuoso and mas-

ter organist.

ARNSTADT background, the respect young Bach enjoys in these

Against

this

years

astonishing and unusual, as are the liberties he takes in

is

awareness of this respect. as

From March

to

September 1703 he

is

paid

"Lackey Baach" from the private treasury of the coregent of

Weimar, Duke Johann Ernst, and employed this

is

in July

no more than an of the same

year,

assistant's position.

he

is

as a musician;

probably

Yet during this period,

allowed to "try out the

From Matins Singer

new organ

to Hofkapellmeister

in

47

Arnstadt and

strike

it

for the first time,"

thirteen groschen, an

and

amount worthy of

Arnstadt authorities assign him

is

paid eight gulden and

a "court organist"

— the

this title to distract attention

from

his youthful age:

where would one normally find an eighteen-year-

old organ expert?

The

precise configuration of the

Wender organ he examined there were

is

not known, but

Johann Friedrich

we may assume

that

few deviations from the design laid out by the Miihlhausen

organ builder: ^^

Great

Swell 8'

Principal Viol'

Pedal

Principal

Di Gamb

Quinta dena

i6'

Grobgedackt

8'

8'

4

Stillgedakt Spielpfeiffe

Quinte

Principal Bass 8 8'

Sub Bass

4

Posaunen Bass Cornet Bass

3'

Quinta

6'

Sesquialtera 2fach

Octava

4

Nachthorn

Cymbal Trompet

On

4'

8'

2fach 8'

9 August,

Bach

whose organ he has just

installed as organist at the

is

evaluated. It

is

same church

New Church, which oc-

the

cupies third and last place in the Arnstadt hierarchy. It that his Arnstadt relatives,

They may

stipend for

also

some

influence

on the

have made sure that he was

room and board comes from

bezzlements."

The

office

salary

filling

of this po-

paid decently: a

little later this relative

"on account of many inaccuracies and em-

comes from the

collection box, as well as

from the brewery tax fund, into which the so-called beer paid. After receiving 27 gulden

court of Weimar,

48

The

possible

the budget of St. George s

Hospital, overseen by a relative of Bach's; a

was removed from

is

some of whom were themselves highly re-

spected musicians, exercised sition.

i6'

2'

MLxtur 3fach

MLxtur 4fach

Gemshorn

i6'

and 9 groschen

fees are

as a lackey at the

Bach now earns 84 gulden and 6 groschen per

Stations of Bach's Life

annum; by

contrast, his successor in this post, his cousin

Ernst, will have to

All in

all,

an impressive

Gobel created it

make do with 40 gulden and start.

1/^2

pecks of grain. ^7

The Bach monument

in 1985 for the Arnstadt marketplace

shows the young

confident pose.

is

that

Bernd

appropriate:

looking relaxed, legs crossed in a

artist

One need

Johann

self-

only think of Bach's behavior toward Su-

perintendent Johann Gottfried Olearius before the consistory, the local

church governing body, which had

Here

ious complaints.

are

some

excerpts

Sebastian Bach, Organist at the travels

lated

summoned him

New

and Neglect of Figural music"

to face var-

from the dossier "Re: Joh.

Church, concerning lengthy (a

few Latin terms

are trans-

and abbreviations interpreted):

Actum the

The

21st oiFebr.

1706

New

organist of the

Church Bach

where he has been so long of late and from

is

interrogated as to

whom he received per-

mission therefor. Ilk [he]:

He

has been in Liibeck to understand various things

in his art, but requested permission

beforehand of the Superin-

tend[ent].

The

Superint.'^

He

requested such for only four weeks, but

probably stayed away for four times as long. Ilk:

He trusts the organ-playing has in the meantime been at-

tended to by the person he recruited for that

no complaint can be

Nos

[we]:

Respond

this

purpose in such a way

raised.

that

up

to

now he

has introduced

strange variationes into the chorale, admixed

many

many

strange tones,

such that the congregation has been confundiret [confused] thereby. In future

when he wishes

to bring in a

tonum peregrinum

[presumably: modulate into a distant key], he should stay with

and not erto,

fall

into another too quickly, or, as has

to

his

wont hith-

even play a Tonum contrarium [presumably a dissonant ac-

companying chord]. In addition up

been

it

now no music-making

to that,

it is

most troubling that

has taken place at his instigation.

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

49

seeing as

how

he does not wish to comportir with the pupils, for

which reason he should explain whether he figural as well as choral

him with

for us to provide

do

works with the

is

pupils.

willing to play both

For

it is

not possible

a Kapellmeister. If he does not wish to

he should simply say so categorice, so that other arrange-

it,

ments may be made and someone Ille:

would

If they

who

would only provide

will

for

him

do

this

may

be hired.

a proper Director he

certainly play.

Res. [resolution]:

To be pronounced within

a week.

Rambach

Eod. [on the same matter]: Pupil

appears and

is

likewise reprimanded for the Disordres that have previously oc-

New

curred in the Ille:

The

Church between the

pupils and the Organist.

Organist Bach has up to

now

played somewhat

too long, but after the Herr Superintendent called his attention thereto, it

he has

fallen

too short.^^

This document veals

promptly into the other extremum, and made

is

as interesting as

it is

of the historical period and Bach's

ganist expresses himself very freely

astonishing for what

life:

to a church

authority w^ho occupies a position far above him. Apparently it is

re-

the twenty-year-old or-

and self-confidently

not trouble Bach in the slightest w^hen

it

it

does

suggested that he seek his

fortune elsewhere in light of the criticisms brought forward against

him.

He

seems to know where he can find a new position, or

that one exists.

Did he undertake

at least

the long trip to Liibeck with the

intention not only of "listening to" the famous Buxtehude, as the

obituary states,^9 but perhaps also of inheriting his position at some later date?

Word may have reached him that Johann Mattheson,

years his senior, earlier,

four

was offered such a position-in-waiting some time

whereupon he went

to Liibeck,

admirer George Frideric Handel, to

accompanied by

feel

his

devoted

out the situation. But ac-

cording to Mattheson's later autobiographical account, he had not "the slightest desire" to enter into a "marital obligation."

Mattheson and Handel

travel

"make many double fugues" 50

The

Stations of Bach's Life

While

by coach and during the journey

to pass the time,^°

Bach undertakes the

long

"on foot"

trip

this case

—

according to the obituary,^^ which in

at least

does not seem entirely trustworthy.

Even

Bach was merely

if

things in his art," a paid furlough

intent

on understanding "various

seems rather audacious for a beginner to exceed

it

by two or possibly three months

—

the documents

allow both interpretations. Bach's reply, that there were no plaints about the substitute

any

better; rather,

good enough

he engaged, does not make the situation

for the people

to loftier things.

anyone

reveals, all too clearly, that in his eyes

it

com-

Those who

is

of Arnstadt, whereas he himself aspires find fault with his organ playing

do not

deserve him!

On

this point, the

arguments of the superintendent, a

man

ex-

perienced at organizing sacred music, by no means betray pettiness.

Although tise

his formulations are a little

when he

showy

ambiguous, they show exper-

Bach accompanies the church choir

in too

a manner. If one listens to Bach's harmonization of the

hymn

explains that

"Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns wend" in the organ chorale

composed around by

his superiors:

four-part setting distracts

this time,

Bach

—

one can understand the objections raised

playing with the chromatic possibilities of a

is

like a

Max

Reger before

his time

one from the cantus firmus more than

The young hothead Non

has his

own

hominibus sed Deo (not for

Buxtehude used

as the

BWV 726,

motto

for

it

—

in a

way

emphasizes

that

it.

understanding of the old saying

men

but for God), which Master

one of his learned canons: he prac-

tices his profession

not to serve an apathetic congregation or supe-

riors stuck in the

mud

potential of his

This attitude emerges

art.

reaucratic transcript,

Bach.

The

of convention but to

which furthermore

from the dry bu-

reveals flashes

of defiance in

on him, saying

that

Bach intention-

played too briefly after being reprimanded for playing the organ

too long. But

"on Sunday is

distinctly

student and choir prefect Johann Andreas Rambach, four

years Bach's senior, has tattled ally

realize the highest

Rambach then must answer

last

warned not

he went to the wine

to create any

four times two hours in

cellar

charges himself, because

during the sermon."

problems himself, and

is

He

punished with

jail.

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

51

As can be first

nor the

last

To be

minutes, this

will receive for not playing ^^«-

employment contract

the reigning imperial count,

issued

Bach

supposed to "ply the organ

is

on

August

9

in

Anton Giinther von

Schwarzburg und Hohnstein, Lord of Arnstadt, that

neither the

is

other words, for not performing vocal

or, in

sure, the

name of

the

official

reprimand Bach

church,

raliter in his

music.

seen from other

etc.,

mentions only

suitably,"^^ yet that

does not

exclude the performance of small liturgical concertos and cantatas

with an ensemble made up primarily of soloists. This type of musical

performance in conjunction with the worship service

modern, and

at least in

northern

Germany it

to be

is felt

tends to compete with

The

performances by the student choir that the cantor conducts. musicians perform in the organ the choir

ally sings in

modern

the

stalls

while the student choir gener-

loft,

or in a separate

young Bach's day seems not

practice in

Germany

In central

loft.

been

to have

widespread; the Eisenach rector Christian Juncker considers novelty in 1708 first

when

the

it

new ducal music ensemble performs on

day of Christmas "in the organ

loft,

a

the

with only instruments and

a tenor solo."^^

Since the early cantatas by Bach, written during his time in Arnstadt or Miihlhausen, in part represent such organ music,

to grasp at first activity in

why he

refuses so obstinately to

Arnstadt in this way.

gladly participate in

were there"

—

Initially

expand

hard

it is

his field

of

he indicates that he would

making vocal music,

"if

only a Director musices

in other words, a conductor. Although the super-

intendent has already stated clearly that they cannot provide "a kapellmeister,"

time he

is

Bach

also

taken to task.

to "express

it

demands

The

a "proper Director' the second

third time around

Bach merely intends

in writing," since the reproaches are

threatening: "If he considers

it

no shame

to be with the church

to accept payment, he should likewise not be

music with the pupils the intention fiil

52

for

is

as

ashamed

to

and

make

ordered and until otherwise indicated. For

that the latter should practice, so as to be

music making in the

The

becoming more

Stations of Bach's Life

fiiture."^"^

more use-

—

On The

closer examination,

organist has

the pupils.

'^the

Bachs behavior

more understandable. good

reputation of not having

relations

with

According to the testimony of the pupil Johann Hein-

"^

rich Geyersbach,

Bach

another occasion,

when Bach

called

him is

he, confronts

him

On

a '^rapscallion of a bassoonist.''

crossing the street "with his tobacco

pipe in his mouth," this same student,

tifies

is

— and Bach draws

who

is

three years older than

his sword.

Bach for his part tes-

that "rather late at night" Ge}'ersbach with six other students as

backup "followed him over the market square and attacked him with a cudgel" so that he

probably a

relic

Whether

was forced

from

his days in Liineburg.^-^

the incriminating term "rapscallion of a bassoonist"

(zippel Fagottist)

meant

is

tion plays the bassoon,

to suggest that

sounds

it

he has eaten green onions, flict

to defend himself with his svvord

like

when

the person in ques-

someone breaking wind

we cannot be certain. But clearly the con-

grows out of Bach's professional concerns: he has trouble with

the students,

make

ing to

is

dissatisfied

with their musical

v^ocal

music in Amstadt

dents assigned to him.

Amstadt

abilit};

consistory

is

He

is

not will-

now and

Among

does organize performances of

then

the

— although not with the

many

know whether

the

criticisms voiced

stu-

by the

the charge that "not long since he brought a

strange damsel into the choir and let her

young woman was

make

We do not

music. "3^

his relative

Maria Barbara Bach; but that the cantata "Nach mich,"

and

the effort needed to raise standards in a position that he

views as merely a springboard.

dir,

and

later wife

Herr, verlanget

BWY 150, may have been performed with a splendid soprano

and an inadequate bassoonist is a matter to which we return chapter.

At any rate,

the record of the consistory meeting

Bach occasionally looked outside the student body But back

to the

organ plaving. Bach's duties in

demanding. The organist services

on Sundays and

for vespers

He

after

is

tells

us that

for performers. this area are

not

expected to appear for the main worship

holidays, for the prayer service

on Wednesdays, and

must provide,

in a later

for the early service

on Thursdavs.

as the occasion requires, a prelude

From Matins Singer

on Mondays,

and posdude

to Hoflcapellmeister

53

and

a choral introduction

accompany the choir during Communion. Such

vise or

ample time

leaves

He must also impro-

and accompaniment.

reflection enabled

for his

him

fugue," Carl Philipp

own

to

studies. "Already in his youth, simple

become

and strong master of the

a pure

Emanuel Bach comments, writing

1775, in a variation

on

he names Bach's

"favorites,"

a schedule

to Forkel in

his formulation in the obituary. In this context

who were

all

"strong masters of the

fugue": Froberger, Kerll, Pachelbel, Frescobaldi, Fischer, Strungk, "several excellent old French" organists, and, last but not least, the

German

north

Bruhns fited

is

masters Buxtehude, Reinken, Bruhns, and Bohm.^7

already dead, and as far as

from hearing

Liineburg.

That

Bohm

we can

tell.

Bach already bene-

and Reinken during

leaves Buxtehude,

who

his early

time in

possesses the additional ad-

vantage of being not only a great master of the organ but also a significant

composer of vocal music and the

initiator

of the famed

Liibeck evening concerts, at which the almost seventy-year-old of-

wealth of musical delights, from solo cantatas somewhat influ-

fers a

enced by early Pietism to vocal performances with a large ensemble,

and multipart

oratorios.

Since these performances always take place in

December,

Bach

it is

November and

hardly a coincidence that after two years in Arnstadt

finds himself drawn to Liibeck in late faU.

He does not want to

return to Arnstadt before experiencing two "extraordinaire" evening

concerts

on

composed

2

in

and

December

1705, featuring

modern madrigal form with

arias in the spirit

grand

3

works Buxtehude has

choruses, recitatives, and

of an oratorio with allegorical

flineral piece for Kaiser

Leopold

tion piece for his successor, Joseph

I,

figures.

One

is

a

the other a festive corona-

L Music "by

all

the choruses and

organs," several choirs, twenty-five violins playing in unison,

muted

and unmuted trumpets and trombones, drums, French horns, and oboes

— such

to Bach.

And

a

mass of performers may well have been

"various things about his art" in Liibeck.

The

new sound

there seems to be a slighdy ironic undertone in his ex-

planation to the consistory in Arnstadt that he

54

a

Stations of Bach's Life

came

to understand

For Bach

it is

worthwhile to undertake the long journey and to

look for lodgings and possibly some source of financial support in a strange

city,

a remarkable display of initiative

aged by the superintendent. To be

sure, the decision to

did not come out of the blue: in 1703 a

Bach,

is

living in Liibeck.

— of the kind encour-

He is the

relative,

go

to Liibeck

Johann Christoph

son of that organist in Eisenach,

Johann Christoph Bach, whose acquaintance we made

in the context

The

eldest brother,

of Bach's early training.

Johann Nicolaus, who

father has died,

and the

the organist in Jena,

is

is

trying from there to

persuade the authorities in Eisenach to engage young Johann Christoph, seven years his junior, as the father s successor; the latter is

on

his

way there now

for a possible audition.

make

Because the town council instead wants to ary himself the

new

to stay in Liibeck,

organist,^^

hand, he

is

Johann Christoph may have decided

which would put him

later to take in a relative

back home by

the intermedi-

named Johann he can

1705,

in the position

Sebastian.

two years

on the other

If,

at least serve as a

good source

of familial advice, perhaps even making the crucial point that Liibeck is

always worth the

well documented that the Bachs had

trip. It is

wedding medley (Quodlibet),

festive family gatherings; the

524, that

young Bach wrote, probably

in collaboration

BWV

with another

family member, gives musical expression to the jollity and imaginativeness characteristic of such reunions.

But from

for

now Bach

is

his visit to Liibeck.

still

in Arnstadt, processing impressions

He

cannot yet apply what he heard and

learned there to his vocal music, but to his organ music yes. Here

can

literally

we

put our hands on the influence of Buxtehude. This bi-

ographical chapter, however,

is

not the place for a discussion, general

or specific, of Bach's compositions for the organ during his time in

Arnstadt and Miihlhausen. Although ing from this period about his

mentioned

The

life,

we have few documents

the ones

dat-

we do have must be

here.

earliest

composed no

autograph score

later

still

extant was in

all

likelihood

than 1705 and bears the watermark of an Arnstadt

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

55

paper

stern,"

the

organ chorale "Wie schon leuchtet der Morgen-

mill. It is the

BWV 739. The script looks juvenile but already has some of

handsome

scripts

flourishes that will be so impressive in the

of the violin

solos:

it is

manu-

remarkable that an intellectual com-

poser like Bach should have the most beautiful, flowing hand in the history of music.

Even Richard Wagner, with

ful, almost calligraphic scores,

The

must take

preservation of this autograph

from the

Orgelbuchlein, hardly

a

is

his likewise

back

wonder-

seat to Bach.

a stroke of luck, for aside

any manuscript with keyboard or organ

music in his hand has survived from the Arnstadt, Miihlhausen, and

Weimar

periods.

sure,

many important works have been

made by music lovers and pupils of Bach.

served in copies able

To be

though they are, they hardly help us when

original works.

They

D Minor, BWV 565,

the organ

—

if

indeed

comes

Indispens-

to dating the

also raise questions as to the authenticity

given piece or the reliability of the copy. cata in

it

it is

pre-

A good example

is

of a

the Toc-

perhaps Bach's most famous piece for

by Bach.

In recent times, the authenticity of this piece, generally considered an early work, has been challenged because of its parts, excessive use

The

of harmony, and paucity of contrapuntal

transmission of this

work

the most important version

is

is

entire generation after

inconsistent.

Bach and

A number of features in this

But would we consider Bach the

BWV 992— of which more later — if the

evidence were weaker? Instead of simply expressing doubts,

would do

better to consider the origins of the work: could

have developed out of a violin composition'^^ sibly,

from

To

later copies,

we have

three important manuscript collec-

their precise dating

cannot be established,

sufficiently to allow us to designate the

as "early" or written at the latest

The

BWV 565

perhaps more plau-

a toccata for the keyboard?

Although

narrowed

56

or,

we

bridge the gap between the missing originals of individual

works and tions.

of

Johannes Ringk, generally a reliable

therefore not a contemporary witness.

composer of the capriccio

effects.^9

in fact questionable: the copyist

and knowledgeable source, but an

showy piece seem

many unison

Stations of Bach's Life

during the

first

it

can be

works they contain period in Weimar.

The

Moller Manuscript and the Andreas Bach Book, both

named

for

temporary owners but put together by Bach's brother Johann Christoph, have been mentioned."^^

The

third in this group

the

is

Plauen Organ Book, largely written just before and around 1710 and extant today only as a photocopy.

Such

collections

served practical purposes; thus the Plauen

Organ Book contains chorale preludes by Johann Pachelbel, Friedrich

Wilhelm Zachow, Johann Michael Bach, Johann Sebastian Bach

(BWV 720, 735a, The

and

739),

and

others.

compilations by Johann Christoph have additionally, and

primarily, the character of private collections. Utterly unsystematic,

they contain, often in no particular order, whatever the compiler considered important and entertaining in the genre of contemporary

keyboard music.

The

made from

scores can be copies

printed or

handwritten versions, but there are also personal notes by composers

and even tabular

When

it

lists

comes

of ornaments.

to

Johann Sebastian, these

to glimpse the context in

which

were experienced by him.

It

his early

collections allow us

compositions appeared and

speaks for itself that he

is

the only

mem-

ber of the Bach family to be extensively represented in both volumes.

In the Moller Manuscript, the cally:

name Bach

is

even inscribed symboli-

the fragment of a composition, which another source allows us

to identify as a "capriccio

on

BACH

mistakably displays these tonal

and thus constitutes the to the

first

by Joh. Andreas

un-

Bach,""^^

end of the composition

letters at the

evidence of a conscious musical allusion

name:

^j^^^*^^ ^^^ r

l^^^l-

CJ TT

±r^

4f= -1

mi ^'

=^fl?i

f^

\j'^

-r '

1

[:

1

i^=±=^=^^^

In both the Moller Manuscript and the Andreas Bach Book, north

German keyboard music of the Buxtehude generation in the

form of

suites, toccatas, preludes,

predominates,

and fugues. Bach,

From Matins Singer

who

to Hofkapellmeister

57

entered compositions in both volumes around 1705 or 1706, thus help-

among other things,

ing shape the collections, would have found there, biblical sonatas

and keyboard

chand

—

The

by Johann Kuhnau, a chaconne by Jean Baptiste

Lully,

by Nicolas Antoine Le Begue and Louis Mar-

suites

later his rival at the

Dresden cembalo competition.

Moller Manuscript contains a copy of the previously men-

tioned choral fantasy

"Wie schon

leuchtet der Morgenstern,"

BWV

BWV 531, 549a, and 896; the canzona BWV 912a; the sonata BWV 967; the suite movements BWV 832; and the prelude and partita BWV 833. The

739; the preludes

BWV 588;

and fugues

the toccata

only work preserved in Bach's the Prelude and Fugue in

own hand deserves particular mention:

G Minor, BWV 535a. The end own hand

but a copy with additions in Bach's

made only his habit

text

a

few years

later, in

1710 or 1711,

of continuing to work over a piece

of his teaching.

The

revision,

missing,

presumably

exists,

and an

is

early

example of

— probably

in the con-

BWV 535, shows a clear tendency

toward making the movement more consistent and the counterpoint

more

disciplined:

whenever

and bizarre

fanciful

effects

cannot be in-

tegrated into a meaningful inner structure, they are banished from

the piece. In retrospect, both versions are valid

way to

—

as stations

on the

early mastery.

Against

this biographical

backdrop, one of the Bach works in

the Moller Manuscript seems worth lingering over: the Capriccio on the Departure of the Beloved Brother,

BWV 992.

Although we have

not been able to establish what necessitates this farewell to a muchloved brother, this brilliant litde piece was certainly written before

of a composer around twenty

1707, providing evidence

sure of himself as he

was

who was

spirited.

The Andreas Bach Book, whose

contents

show

it

to be just a

years younger than the Moller Manuscript, contains the

Johann Sebastian transcribed Fantasia in

C

Minor,

as

in north

German organ

few

only work

tablature: the

BWV 1121 (extended numeration). It has been

identified recently as his

work and

provides striking evidence of his

familiarity with the system of alphabetic notation used often in

northern 58

The

Germany but

far less

Stations of Bach's Life

frequendy in his native region for

transcribing entire works. It would be this particular choice

his older brother:

be

left

good

to

know what occasioned

of transcription; perhaps Bach wanted to

What

I

Germany should not

learned in northern

The composition

out of your keyboard book!

tell

itself clearly

shows the great influence on Bach exercised by the organ works of Buxtehude, Bruhns, and Bohm.

The Andreas Bach Book

also offers us

an early version of the

fa-

BWV 582, as well as the organ fugues BWV 574b and 578; the Organ Fantasia^ BWV 563; the organ chorale "Gott, durch deine Giite," BWV 724; and such keyboard works as the overture BWV 820; the toccatas BWV 910, 911, and 916; the prelude BWV 921, with the final measures in Bach's hand; the Fantasia and Fugue, BWV 944; the fugue BWV 949; and the Aria variata (Variations on a Twelve-Measure Aria), BWV 989. mous

Passacaglia in

The

distinction

C Minor,

between organ and keyboard works made

Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis

is

in the

not entirely unproblematic, since in the

seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries composers often assumed a shared literature for the

two types of instruments. In recent

years,

the "clavier" toccatas in particular have been energetically claimed for the organ,'^^ then equally energetically for the piano, with the argu-

ment

that the figuration in the toccatas

was

clearly intended for the

evanescent notes of the harpsichord and not for the sustained notes

of the organ.^ In conjunction with the keyboard and organ books that provide

such significant information on Bach's early compositions for these instruments, one must mention a source that has only recendy

and represents a

to light

more than 280 organ

its

Plauen Organ Book with

chorales: the Neumeister Collection,

arrangements of chorales.

tains 82

1790,

parallel to the

"^^

Although

it

was compiled

quency, the last with the thirty Unica,

other works. Although

transcriber,

after

was

it

Germany. Johann Christoph, Jo-

hann Michael, and Johann Sebastian turn up with

among

its

which con-

repertory essentially mirrors the organ chorale as

practiced around 1700 in central

come

particular fre-

BWV 1090-95 and 1097-1120,

we do not know what

Johann Gottfried Neumeister, had

originals the

at his disposal,

From Matins Singer

it

may

to Hofkapellmeister

59

be assumed that the collection lating in the

Bach

is

based chiefly on a repertory circu-

A notation in Ernst Ludwig Gerber's 1812

family.

encyclopedia of composers reveals that the genre of the chorale prelude ranked very high with the Bachs: "I have in folio

amounting

contains 201 handsomely and precisely

it

written figured and figural chorales for the organ." posers,

Among the com-

Gerber names Johann Bernhard, Johann Christoph, Johann

Michael, and Johann Sebastian Bach, along with Georg trich

possession a

from the papers of this famous family

to 246 pages

of Thuringian organists;

my

Bohm, Die-

Buxtehude, Johann Caspar Ferdinand Fischer, Johann Kuhnau,

Johann Pachelbel, Nicolaus Friedrich

Vetter,

Johann Gottfried Walther, and

Wilhelm Zachow.^^

The organ

chorales

by Johann Sebastian Bach preserved by

Neumeister certainly belong in the orbit of these masters; written presumably before Orgelbuchlein,

show us

1710, they

a

Bach well on

Although the sources

for our

knowledge of Bach

board and organ virtuoso

may be

sparse, they are telling.

they do not allow us to reach any conclusions as to tual

way

his

to the

BWV 599-644.

body of work from

that period

may

as a

young key-

To be

how large

sure,

the ac-

have been. They also offer

few clues that might allow us to reconstruct in any detail Bach's early career as a composer.

Did

that career already begin in Ohrdruf,

under the watchfijl eye of Bach's older brother, a student of Pachelbel's?

Did

the choirboy compose during his Liineburg period under

the influence of Bohm?

when he was an

Which

of his works belong to the early years

organist in Arnstadt,

which

significant journey to Buxtehude's Liibeck?

to the period after that

What was composed

during the months in Miihlhausen, between Bach's move to

and the composition of the

Weimar

Orgelbiichlein}

Increasingly sophisticated methods of source critique and analysis

are allowing scholars to

While we can

benefit

come up with answers

from

their acuity,

their hypotheses necessarily rest

to such questions.'^^

we should

bear in

on the assumption that

mind

that

a composer's

oeuvre develops in a straight line toward higher quality, at least

within a given genre. This concept of evolution cannot be rejected 60

The

Stations of Bach's Life

we must

out of hand, yet a

ask whether

Bach

legitimate to view

it is

Beethoven type, purposefully setting out to advance

a step

as

from

one work to the next.

Undoubtedly there poser wants to

Bach composed

are technical standards

below which no com-

once he has attained them. But for one thing.

fall

far

composers: often he

more works

for particular occasions than later

may have had

to satisfy the

demands of specific

we do not know to what as limitations, or when and

patrons or conditions of performance, and extent he experienced such requirements

where he made compromises or even incorporated thematically willingness to

compromise

into his compositional strategy. For an-

other thing, he evidently had his

would mature: he often allowed and older notions

his

to inform

own

how

his art

in later

works

conception of

early ideas to live

newer ones.

No

on

how we may we should not

matter

speculate about Bach's "development" as a composer,

new solutions and his

overlook the tension between his desire to find

desire to preserve the achievements of the past.

Once we

recognize that the available material does not permit

definitive answers to all these questions,

we

are free to enjoy the

image that emerges from the existing sources. delves relatively early into

all

It is clear that

Bach

the genres of organ and keyboard music.

He devotes a great deal of effort to arranging choral works from both the central and northern

German

traditions;

he composes toccatas

that have the hallmarks of virtuoso pieces yet are also strict fugues;

he takes up the genres of the canzona, the French overture, the

song variations in the

As Bach

is

Italian style,

suite,

and the program sonata.

the repertory in the keyboard and organ books indicates.

not composing in isolation but in regular contact with other

members of the family

active as

composers and with

full

knowledge

of an extensive repertory of significant works of the most varied character.

what

The Neumeister is

collection

documents

for the organ chorale

probably true for the other genres: Johann Sebastian

in his family but

is

rooted

soon absorbs with avidity an astonishingly broad

repertory of the music of his era; at a relatively

impressive familiarity with

young age he has an

German and European From Matins

styles.

On

Singer to Hofkapellmeister

this

6i

own

foundation he develops his scends the

which more and more

art,

work of his contemporaries

in quality, originality,

and soon gains recognition

tellectual consistency,

Although Bach's epoch

is

not one that

is

tran-

and

in-

as outstanding.

waiting for a genius, the

knowledgeable observers in his familial and regional surroundings sense that a person of greatness is

no other way

developing in their midst. There

is

to explain the professional respect he receives, the

presence of his works in collections, and the growing pupils sent to him. as

much

The

philosopher Hans-Georg

number of

Gadamer

suggests

beginning of his early lecture "Bach and Weimar":

at the

Johann Sebastian Bach

is

a child of Thuringia, not the mysteri-

ous product of a destiny that so often allows a genius to appear

unexpectedly

and

inexplicably in the midst of

world and among an

grew up ily

in

indifferent clan.

in a music-loving

and pious

an

indifferent

Johann Sebastian Bach

region as the son of a fam-

which a solid legacy of musical gifts had been accumulating

for generations and his y

own

sons

still

displayed a goodly portion

of thisfamily heritageA^

MUHLHAUSEN If the musician serving as organist at the

between 1703 and 1707 had been

Wilhelm Friedemann Bach,

New

called not

a biographer

Church

in Arnstadt

Johann Sebastian but

would have noted

with the authorities, unwillingness to adapt, disobedience

would not work out vited in 1746 to

ment next,

for this

become the

man

conflict

—

things

Bach! Wilhelm Friedemann, in-

must

organist in Halle,

fulfill

the require-

— handed down from one generation — he accompany and imposed on

to the

in his contract

his father as well

that

the

congregation's singing "slowly and without particular coloration."'^^

As

"director musices" he

may perform

figural

with whatever coloration he pleases, yet he

is

music in any setting or

reprimanded for lend-

ing out drums without authorization, for exceeding the leave he was

granted for his father's funeral, 62

The

Stations of Bach's Life

etc., etc.

In 1764,

when he

asks to be

relieved of his duties, although he has

inventory

promptly scheduled, which establishes that a violin bow,

is

a flute, a cornet, a

the

no other position lined up, an

trombone, and several strings are missing, whereas

number of trumpets has miraculously increased

recriminations that will

of his

— an occasion

hang over him during the

last

two decades

which he must endure without any guarantees of security.

life,

How

different things

were for young Johann Sebastian! The

wrangling in Arnstadt seems to have had no lasting iU least

for

effects, or at

not to reach the ears of people in Miihlhausen, a good sixty kilo-

meters away, for on

15

June 1707 he

The newly

is

installed there as the organist

of

from the one

at

created position

St. Blasius

s.

Arnstadt s

New Church. Although Miihlhausens stature as a free im-

perial city has declined

At its

self-respect. all

different

is

with the passage of time, the town

for instance, the

tion of the

who

belong to

own worth and how it should be

it

Thus,

music performed in church for the annual inaugura-

new council is

printed not only as a text but also as a score, this period.

the librettist writes the words to the cantata "Gott

mein Konig,"

its

have a

celebrated.

an expensive procedure and therefore unusual during

When

has

head, after the joint mayors, comes a "senate" with

sorts of subdivisions; and the councilmen

keen sense of their

still

BWV

71,

for

which Bach

is

to

ist

compose the music, he

goes beyond the usual practice: not only alluding to the actual occasion but also masterfully combining the "paternal protection"

ready suggested in the printed

new town

title

—

—

al-

exercised by the old and the

"regime" and the "deserving Lord Burgomasters" with

concepts of honor, dovelike innocence, strength, good fortune, and victory.

will

The

texts to Bach's cantatas for the

be more modest: in them

as in the cantata "Ihr

it is

/

and not forget the poor among

Bach

say

chiefly

who

hold for you the laws in trust

/

us."

known

music theoretician.

when

BWV 193, where the text reads,

inherits a not inconsiderable legacy as the successor to Jo-

hann Georg Ahle, tive as a

possible to express a direct request,

Tore zu Zion,"

"Let them flourish and be just

Leipzig council elections

it

comes

The

as a

composer of songs but

also ac-

organist at St. Blasius also has

to the composition

and performance of

From Matins Singer

some

figural

to Hofkapellmeister

63

music, as can be seen from his right to compose the annual cantata for the council elections, the so-called council piece, usually scored for a large ensemble. Yet at his installation,

rated "by

means of a handshake,"5° mention

is

no

is

is

inaugu-

made only of his ob-

on Sundays,

ligation to play the' organ at St. Blasius

other feast days. There

when Bach

holidays,

and

special reference to his taking turns as

the organist at the church of the Augustinian nuns, for

which he

is

to receive separate remuneration. It is

not possible to reconstruct exactly

ganist's position in

on 24 April relative

When

Miihlhausen.

1701, Easter

how Bach

secured the or-

he appears for an audition

Sunday, Johann Gottfried Walther, a distant

and a good friend

in later years,

is

already out of the running.

In expectation of an invitation, Walther sent in two "church pieces" for the Sexagesimae

Sunday

services occurring eight

weeks

earlier in

the liturgical year, but he withdrew his application after learning that his chances

were

slim.

But why would someone submit two complete vocal compositions

when he

is

hoping to become the organist, not the cantor? Can

memory be

Walther's

playing tricks on

cident thirty-two years later?^^

it

may have been

records

show only

Once

the

"Christ lag in Todesbanden,"

room

is

would be more

which

is

interesting to exists;

the

his installation.

town council has promised the position 14

to

Bach on 24

June for a discussion of the contract. Such a

not standard practice, for young candidates had litde

for negotiation.

demands

BWV 4,

played on the organ, but no evidence

May, he appears on procedure

the two

did Bach submit? Scholars believe

plausible but remains a hypothesis. It

know what Bach

recalls the in-

Did he perhaps compose

And what

pieces independently?

him when he

a salary to

But Bach presents himself self-confidendy: he

match the one he received

in Arnstadt,

which

is

about twenty gulden more than his honored predecessor's. Additionally

he asks the council for the same in-kind benefits his predecessor

received: twenty-four bushels of grain,

bundles of kindling:

64

The

two cords of firewood,

— this last "delivered to

Stations of Bach's Life

six

the door instead of to

the field," as he stipulates. ^^ All these terms having been approved,

on 29 June 1707 Bach is able to return to the Arnstadt council the keys to the organ and take up his new position at once. In Miihlhausen Bach's only two manuals. That

new

organ, like the one in Arnstadt, has

may be one of the key

factors

behind the

proposal for an extensive rebuilding of the organ that Bach presents

on

21

February 1708. Jakob Adlung, one of the fathers of organ re-

of the completed project in his stan-

search, provides a description

dard work, Musica Mechanica Organoedi, published posthumously in

From

1768.53

organ

it

we can

glean what Bach considered a well-equipped

at the time:

Hauptwerk

Bnistwerk

8'

Ruckpositiv

Principal 2

Gedackt

Oktave

4'

MLxtur 3fach

Salicional 4'

Oktave

2

Shalmei

Principal

Cymbal

Quinte

2fach

Mbctur 4fach Violdigamba

Gedackt

Terz 8'

4'

I

8'

Spitzflote

iVa'

¥5'

Untersatz 32' Principal 16'

2'

16'

Subbass

Sesquialtera

Oktave

8'

Principal 4'

Oktave

4'

8'

Flote4'

Quintaton

Stillgedackt 8

Quinteflote

Quinte

3'

Oktave

Fagott

16'

Cymbal

Quintaton

Pedal

8'

Mbctur 4fach

2'

Posaune

16'

Trumpet

8'

Cornetbass

3fach

16'

2'

Rohrflotenbass

1

Sesquialtera 2fach

The most cosdy item on will give the

Bach's wish

list is

a

new

Brustwerk, which

organ a third manual. Additionally he makes

many sug-

gestions for small changes: the sound of the bass register should have "better solemnity" {bessere gravitaet)\ a all

sorts

Music."

of

new

inventionibus'

The new

viola

admirably" with the in the as

new

Fagott

16' will "serve for

and "resonate very

da gamba

Salicional ^' in

8' in

delicat

with the

the Oberwerk will "concord

the Ruckpositiv; the Stillgedackt

new Brustwerk should be made of wood

8'

rather than metal, and

such will "accord perfectly with the Music."

From Matins

Singer to Hofkapellmeister

65

These explanations ers'

are probably intended to reinforce the flind-

impression of their organist's competence and underline the

necessity of the project.

Bach must is

feel at the

They

also

convey a sense of the pleasure

thought of the rebuilt organ; a young virtuoso

obviously not satisfied with an instrument that

simply in good

and well balanced; he needs a powerfiil bass and

repair

combinations of sounds such gans.

is

The

as

one could admire

interesting

in the Liibeck or-

"music" to which certain registers would be particularly

suited should be interpreted as vocal organ music,

which Bach

is

ap-

parendy ready and eager to perform. This

is

not to say that during the one year he spent in Miihl-

hausen he performed a good deal of such music and went beyond his official duties to

compose the inaugural music

Only the

council.

for the

BWV

131,

ticular

by the double indication on the original score that

can be unambiguously recognized

performed by the organist Bach pastor

"at

impulses does not prove that tating fire that took place

it

May 1707, before

would have commissioned

penitential service.

Of

Bach's installation,

The music Konig,"

BWV

Communion

for the

71,

town

an in-

a piece of music for an of-

course, the cantata could have

Germany it was not unusual

requests for special

had been

It is unlikely that

performed for an ordinary service during Communion; northern

it

in response to the devas-

and destroyed 360 houses in the lower town.

ficial

organ music, in par-

text expresses penitential

was written

on 30

as

the wish" of the Miihlhausen

Georg Christian Eilmar. That the

dividual pastor

new town

cantata "Aus der Tiefen rufe ich, Herr, zu dir,"

for organists to

been

at least in

accommodate

music.

council's swearing in,

"Gott

ist

mein

performed on 4 February 1708, for which Bach

ceives four gulden

and twelve groschen,

is

re-

his first composition to

bear a distant resemblance to the splendor of the evening concerts in Liibeck.

The

rich instrumentation includes a "choir" of trumpets,

with drums, recorders, violoncello, oboes, and the concertizing voice of the organ.

The

strings, reinforced

vocal choir

is

by

limited to

four voices, which, however, can be differentiated at will into solo

and

tutti.

66

The

Stations of Bach's Life

A Miihlhausen chronicle provides a detailed account of the traaccompanied the swearing

ditional ceremonies that

in

of the

new

council until they were discontinued in 1758:

was conducted as follows. On

This grand ceremony

day the Council Lane was strewn with sand, up

the previous

to the steps

ofthe

councilors

were

church.

On

the day after

elected,

and

the following day the Council accession took place

In the morning between 7 and 8

thus.

sounded all by the

Candlemas the new

town

young

itself;

then the Council

hall into the church.

had

citizenry

to

o'clock the large bell

moved in procession from

The detachment ofriflemen and the

form an

aisle

of honor. The retiring

Council led the procession, followed by the

was brought up by

was

the Council pages.

new

and the end

one,

The gentlemen of the third

Council did not march in the procession, while 2 music ensembles

on the Brotlaube and the Kdmmerei played against one another

with drums and trumpets. The worship service commenced with

a hymn,

be to God, &c., "followed by "O Lord, thy

""Praise

we praise,

&c.,

"

whereupon the regent homily was

homily came music in which the

after the

new

name

delivered,

and

Council was

wished goodfortune vocaliter and instrumentaliter, which lasted

an

entire

hour and was simply called the Small Council

Piece.

This work was always repeated on the following Sunday, in the afternoon, at St. Blasiuss. After the benediction, the

hymn 'Lord

God, thou art eternal, &c. " was performed. Thereupon the newly elected

Council steppedforward and lined up in order of rank in

the church portal, doors,

whereupon they had to swear

which was read

to

tion

new

in the

had come,

except

Council took the

was held at

contribute a cake

the

town

known

of

them by the Syndicus, standing

doorway. The procession thereupon recessed as that the

their oath out

lead.

hall, to

it

Afterward, a great celebra-

which the bakers guild had to

as the Mahlblatz, the Miihlhausen ver-

sion ofMohlplatz.''^

"Jesu Juva"

is

autograph score.

the motto inscribed on Bach's It is

first

precisely dated

followed, in ornamental script, by the tide of

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

67

the work, "Gott

ist

mein Konig," then the instrumentalization, pre-

ceded by the general instruction "ab

i8.

e 22."

At

Here there

i7o8./da Gio: Bast: Bach. Org: Molhusino." for dedications to 'the

town government and

up four- fifths of the

"Gott

ist

its

no need

representatives to

without re-

free to enjoy

is

major and publicly appreciated opus, and the

mein Konig" may carry considerable symbolic

for him, a

is

page, as will soon be the case in the

title

printed version; here the young organist straint his first

find

and the designation of authorship: "Del anno

in Italian the date

take

we

the bottom

man who

all

his life will have difficulties

title

significance

with earthly

authorities.

Although handwritten

pages of the time often display the

title

indication "18. e 22." in this or a similar form, the presence of these

and voice

instructions as to the orchestral

setting of the

work

one pause. In general they indicate that a four-part choir

gives

be

will

used, in addition to fourteen instruments: the tutti sections are to

be sung by eight voices, the solo sections by "voice"

mean

—

is

identical with "part," or perhaps "voice with

it

written notes," or with "singer"? usually interpreted to

mean

To

this day, the directive "4 e 8"

that there

is

is

by no means

refer instead to the actual

That would mean was doubled had

score

ter part

been

in size

unassailable;

might the indications

four to eight singers

of the seventeenth century, at least

and solo

— only when

this practice in fact

when we look

choir,

the

sections. In the lat-

at the

seems to have

new

concert-style

church music, which was "musicked," usually in addition to the ditional choral

this

that a choir normally consisted of soloists and

— from

common,

in this choir are

long tradition,

its

is

number of performers?

specifically distinguished tutti

fairly

and

a choir,

four singers for the solo sections. Yet despite interpretation

But what does

four.

tra-

polyphony or homophony performed by the school

under the direction of the cantor.

Around

1662, the church

composer Augustin

northern Germany, received instructions from

of Mecklenburg-Gustrow

to calculate

what

it

Pfleger, active in

Duke Gustav Adolf

would

cost to put to-

gether a small court music ensemble; he based his estimate on hav68

The

Stations of Bach's Life

ing two boys to sing the soprano parts, as well as one male tenor,

and one

bass.

alto,

one

When the duke then expressed his wish to have

the pupils of the "chorus musicus" included in the church music, Pfleger responded entirely in the spirit of the distinction between the

new church

old and

music: the students could perhaps be used for a

"complete ChoroJ' but "to allow the same to perform in Concerti

my opinion,

would, in

For some years Bach's choir was his

produce a poor

now Joshua

Bach Ensemble allow one

"choir"

Rifkin has maintained that even

made up of soloists. 5^ The numerous

would have worked but for

tail later,

contento.'"^^

now

a

form

to

a clear picture

This topic

in practice.

warning

flag

recordings by

of

how

this

be dealt with in de-

will

should go up whenever Bach's

mentioned: for the most part, the vocal works performed

is

in the pre-Leipzig years probably involved only soloists.

Such an

arrangement seems obvious in any case for the Arnstadt and

Miihlhausen organ works; but in Weimar and Cothen, too. Bach

may have

operated not with a choir of students but with a small

group of court

Bach

singers.

uses the year in Miihlhausen to enter the married state.

Described in the church register "single fellow ries

on

and Organist

moved and

Martin Feldhaus, register as "the

sisters

his cousin twice re-

who was

were taken in by the mayor of Arnstadt, related to the family.

youngest maiden daughter of the

his genealogy.

Bach

and indeed

lexicographer Ernst

She appears late

in the

honorable Herr

Gehren and famed

for his art." In

will later call his father-in-law

an "able com-

Johann Michael Bach, organist

fiigal

Miihlhausen," he mar-

half a year older than he was. After the death of her

mother, she and her

ent

"most honorable gentleman" and

October 1707 Maria Barbara Bach,

17

poser,"57

as

at St. Blasius in

at the

in

beginning of the nineteenth century the

Ludwig Gerber was acquainted with

"72 differ-

and figured choral preludes" composed by him, of which

twenty-four can be found in the Neumeister collection of organ chorales,

On

which wiU be discussed

29

December

1708,

below.^^

when Johann

Sebastian and Maria Bar-

bara Bach celebrate the baptism of their

first

From Matins Singer

child,

Catharina

to Hofkapellmeister

69

Dorothea, the family release

from

city council

employment

his

Although only

in

Miihlhausen on

Bach

25

June of that

year.

he assumed the position, the

can hardly stand in his way, for according to the pre-

The

summons

resignation

to the court of a ruling prince takes is

accepted, how^ever, only "wdth great

regret,"59 if later oral reports are to

that

Weimar, Bach having requested

a year has passed since

vailing custom, a

precedence.

already in

is

see to

it

be believed, and on the condition

that the reconstruction of the organ

is

completed.

In the end, everything seems to have been resolved amicably, otherwise he would hardly have been commissioned the following year to

compose another cantata

for the swearing in of the

new

council, a

piece of which today no trace exists. Bach's request for dismissal contains the following passage:

Now, God

has brought

should offer

itself to

adequate living

it to

pass that an unexpected change

me, in which

and

I see

the achievement

the possibility of a more

of

my

goal of a well-

regulated church music without further vexation, since

I have

received the gracious admission of His Serene Highness ofSaxe-

Weimar

into his

Court Capelle and Chamber Music. ^°

Since the author of this request has earlier indicated that because of

household expenses he

his increased is

is

able to "live but poorly,"

understandable that a position at court and better remuneration

should prove tempting.

At

first sight,

his assertion that

able to pursue his goal of "a well-regulated church music" cessfiiUy as a court organist

town makes

less sense.

he will be

more

suc-

than as an organist in the service of a

But the passage immediately preceding the

one quoted above provides a further explanation: Although I should always have gladly fulfilled the goal ofper-

forming a well-regulated church in conformity est ability,

with your

will,

music, to the Glory of God

and would,

harmony fashioned

The

according to

and

my mod-

have furthered as much as possible the church music

flourishing in almost every township,

70

it

in this place,

Stations of Bach's Life

and

and

often better than the

therefore

have amassed

from far and wide, not without cost, a goodly I have

church pieces, as

store

of the

choicest

conscientiously delivered the project for

remedying the faults of the organ and should gladly have per-

formed every

I

other obligation of my

sible to accomplish all this

office: yet it

without

obstacles,

present, little appearance that in future this

though

it

Church).

The

may

there

is,

at

change (al-

belonging to this

^"^

many of

the surrounding villages the level of figural

higher than in the free Reich city of Miihlhausen; since no

is

remedy

to the souls

and

tone reminds us of the bold one Bach occasionally struck in

Arnstadt: in

music

would give great pleasure

has not been pos-

is

in sight, the faithfiil

of

St. Blasius

v^ probably have

to

make do wdthout the appropriate "pleasure" for some time, in other w^ords, accept sacrifices in the spiritual

and

aesthetic sense. Yet

Bach

himself has done everything to serve his ultimate goal, even establishing a collection of exemplary pieces of church music. If this acquisition, as has

"old

recendy been speculated,^^ consisted merely of the

Bach family archive,"

gument. For

it

vv^ould

this collection, w^hich

members and added

to himself,

not do

much to strengthen his

ar-

he probably acquired from family

must be pictured

character rather than as a mirror of

as traditional in

modern tendencies

in sacred

music.

Whatever the with the

state

case.

Bach expresses the

greatest dissatisfaction

of vocal church music in Muhlhausen. Should

this

posture be construed as a tactical offensive, intended to preempt objections to his request for dismissal? dissatisfaction? in the

The

council

concrete facts justify his

very pleased with Bach's achievements

is

realm of figural music.

Or do

He

is

asked to compose the cantata for

the council swearing in not only in the year of his departure, 1708,

but also for 1709 and even 1710 from his post in Weimar. thus suppose that Bach scope: in Arnstadt he

is

annoyed

was supposed

cause of inadequate conditions; in

more involved but

is

not allowed

at

to

We

may

not being given sufficient

make music but

refiised be-

Muhlhausen he wants

to

become

to!

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

71

In this context, his reference to the "goal" of a "well-regulated"

church music loses the nimbus

He

it

has acquired in the Bach literature.

not referring in a general sense to his intention of dedicating

is

church music;

his life to

if that

were the

case,

how

could he in good

conscience have gone to Cothen to take up a position with duties re-

and been contented there?

lated only marginally to church music,

Rather he

is

speaking of a specific goal with regard to sacred music.

Figural music must be regulated and composed; there must be an or-

which the various

ganizational structure in clearly delineated

and adequate resources

areas of responsibility are

are provided, to

do justice

to the "current state of music."

This

last

formulation occurs in the "Short but

Most Necessary

Draft for a Well- Appointed Church Music, with Certain Modest Reflections

on the Decline of the Same"

that the cantor of St.

town

will address twenty- two years later to the Leipzig

both

cases,

Bachs

precedence; his

same objection

desire to

work under

make music

refiisal to

— he was prepared

Thomas

council. ^^ In

"regulated" conditions takes

in Arnstadt

stemmed from

this

to play the organ but not to direct

aU the church music under inadequate conditions.

Here,

as before.

logical artist

Bach shows himself to be

who makes

it

clear in every situation that

in 1730, he will

Georg Erdmann

comment

that in

and

good music

and material conditions.

requires excellent organizational later,

a self-confident

Much

in a letter to his old schoolmate

Cothen he had

"a gracious prince,

who both

cherished and understood Music," and he accordingly expected to

These words express pleasure

spend the

rest

finding in

Cothen well-ordered circumstances

of his

life

there. ^"^

—

at least initially.

In Miihlhausen Bach finds no such circumstances.

granted that he will serve not only as the organist at also as the

though the

at

It is

taken for

St. Blasius s

but

de facto director of church music for the entire town, even

his contract

makes no mention of such an expectation. Since

members of the town

carrying out their wishes

council

seem

he encountered in

72

The

be on his

when he attempted

church music on an orderly footing. ties

to

It is

this endeavor.

Stations of Bach's Life

side,

he was likely

to put Miihlhausen's

easy to imagine the difficul-

As mentioned

above, the organist of St. Blasius's has occupied

an influential position for

when Bach composes

many

generations. It speaks for itself that

the "Council Piece" and directs

mance by an obviously distinguished ensemble, he most notable composition of the

whose

he

services

calls are

perfor-

producing the

is

instrumentalists

the council musicians,

who

on

shortly before

sought confirmation of their privileged position, from

his arrival

which we can deduce that there eager to perform

ondary school Divi

The

year.

its

Blasii,

are other musical groups in the

Two

similar services for pay. ^5

also function as cantors:

town

teachers at the sec-

Johann Bernhard

and Johann Heinrich Melchior Scheiner

Stier at the

at the other

of

the two principal churches, Beatae Mariae Virginis. Contemporary

documents indicate that the two cantors lead a "chorus musicus" or a "chorus symphoniacus."^^

Bach may have hoped just

saw

to introduce in Miihlhausen the

in operation in Liibeck. There, although

prescribed, the organist at St. activities related to sacred

it

was not explicidy

Marys, Buxtehude, was

music.

That such

a

model he

in charge

of all

model could be incor-

porated into a contract was something Bach would experience in

when he

1713,

applied for the organist's position at the Frauenkirche in

Halle. Article 2 in the

document drawn up

for

him

there stipulates

that he will ordinarily

— on high Sunday —

holy

every third

and

other feast days, as well as on

present, along

Choir Students, as well as with the instrumentalists, a

music;

and on

feast days Students,

struments;

Town Musicians and other

moving and fine-sounding work of sacred

extraordinary occasions

—perform and

with the Cantor and the

— on

second

and

shortfigural pieces with the Cantor

also at times

and conduct

third

and the

with various violins and other in-

all this in such

a

way

that the members

of the Congregation shall be the more inspired and refreshed in worship

This

is

and

in their love

of hearkening

to the

Word of God.^'^

an astonishingly clear directive for modern church music:

the organist of the principal church in the

town "conducts," that

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

is,

-]-},

bears responsibility

for, all

the vocal music for church services in a dual

function: he both provides the traditional "cantoral music" in collaboration with the cantor

and bears

mosdy

"organ music," in which

full responsibility for

modern

the

shorter solo performances occur,

though they may be accompanied by highly

skilled instrumentalists.

We can detect the influence exerted in Halle by the Pietist theologian and pastor August

document

erences in this

music.

That such music ad

stressed; the

is

Hermann Francke from

meaning and purpose of sacred

to the

intended to glorify

hominem

for the

and refresh the congregation

word of God.

It is

God is

remarkably not

function of church music occupies the

foreground; "moving" music, or music that to inspire

the explicit ref-

stirs

in

is

intended

worship and

its

no accident that

the soul,

its

this formulation

love

comes

about in cooperation with or even on the recommendation of Pietist circles.

On the one hand the approach is modern, in that it shifts re-

sponsibility for figural

music from the

office

of the cantor, whose

pedagogical flinction has been increasingly attenuated over the centuries, to the position tise

of the organist,

and awareness of current musical

who

has greater musical exper-

taste.

On the

other hand, this

arrangement nicely accommodates Pietism, because so long practiced in a spirit of faith and without vanity, the

music, with

its

emphasis on emotional

effects,

as

it is

more modern

can move the hearts

of Christians more effectively than cantorial music based on traditional forms.

In 1713 Bach decides to return the contract to Halle unsigned.

He

prefers to be

promoted

to concertmaster in

have been happy in Miihlhausen

if the position

him. But apparendy such a thing sicians, pastors, or the

dividuals

is

that

work

is

He would

had been created

not to be. Cantors, council itself

—

either as a

group or

for

mu-

as in-

reservations, concerned about salary,

of influence, and so forth. All

Bach does not succeed

him, which will

town council

— may have expressed

privileges, spheres

is

Weimar.

we know for certain

in organizing the circumstances to suit

hardly expected in the short space of a year.

Now he

to achieve his objective in another locale; even if he occu-

pies a lesser position as court organist, a court offers the possibility

74

The

Stations of Bach's Life

of rising to the rank of kapellmeister and in that capacity having a

hand

free

to organize things.

A prolonged and unproductive dispute between Superintendent Johann Adolph Frohne and Pastor Eilmar, thirteen years

may

have played a role in Bach's departure from Miihlhausen.

also

Although

formulated and presented at length by Spitta,

this theory,

enjoys currency in

still

his junior,

Bach

scholarship,^^ there

is

not a shred of ev-

idence to suggest that Bach was driven away by the "pastors' fruitless

wrangling over Pietism and orthodoxy. "^9 At issue in the continuing quarrel

between the two theologians, neither of whom can be con-

sidered a real Pietist,

is

disagreement not over doctrinal matters, as

Spitta posits, but over specific questions, such as

whether sectarians

should be coaxed back to the church through patient persuasion or castigated without mercy. 7°

Although the learned

disputes,

which

were conducted mainly in Latin, may have gone largely unnoticed by the townspeople, the two parties' public struggle for power certainly

made to

itself felt.

make him

Yet even

to give

up

hardly tormented Bach enough

this conflict

his position before a year

had

elapsed.

Could Superintendent Frohne have been one of those who had no

interest in Bach's ideas for organizing Miihlhausen's

music

— perhaps because

Bach, at Bach's

his

nemesis Eilmar was on good terms with

least to the extent that

first

church

he would

become godfather

later

to

child? Perhaps the score of the cantata "Aus der Tiefen

rufe ich, Herr, zu Dir,"

BWV

131,

contains a reference to Eilmar's

"longing" for the simple reason that Bach was waiting in vain for

such "longings" on the part of the more highly placed superintendent,

who was

primarily responsible for St. Blasius's. But in that

case, Eilmar's protection

would have deserved

explicit

mention.

WEIMAR The

court in

organist, to go.

Weimar casts

Johann

its

eye on

Effler, forced

by

Bach

as a successor to the court

illness to retire,

Although the position offered

to

and Bach

him ranks low

hierarchy, there are opportunities for advancement,

From Matins Singer

is

eager

in the court

and the salary

to Hofkapellmeister

is

75

substantially higher than that in Miihlhausen, equal to that of Vice

Kapellmeister Drese, with the exception of the benefits in kind. order to the treasury issued by

Duke Wilhelm

The

Ernst on 20 June 1708

provides "our chamber musician and court organist" "with an annual

and allowances" of "one hundred and

salary

fifty florins, in cash,

eighteen bushels of grain, twelve bushels of barley, four cords of fire-

wood, and

of

thirty buckets

i^

beer."7i

be in-

^^^^ ^^^t salary will

creased by fifty florins, and in 1713 by another fifteen or thirteen florins.

Bach

Appointment

as

from the

St.

March

concertmaster in

a salary of 250 florins. 7^ Smaller

Williams Fund,

in

1714 guarantees

sums of money came

payment

for clavier lessons

him

to

and

in-

strument repairs commissioned by the duke, and so forth.

Did Bach wear cannot be

sure,

member of the

We

court ensemble?

but an obituary for his ducal employer from the year

1730 includes the

by

livery as a

comment, "His hearing was on occasion delighted

16 well- trained musicians clad in

Haiduks' garb. "73

When Bach arrives in Weimar on 14 July 1708, he receives an advance often gulden "for the conveyance hither of his furniture." His

household includes his pregnant wife and her unmarried

Miihlhausen pupil Johann Martin Schubart has after Bach's

move

to Cothen, Schubart will

court organist in Weimar.

also

His

sister.

come

along;

assume the position of

He will not be Bach's only pupil, for Bach's

reputation as a clavier and organ virtuoso has preceded him. Accord-

ing to the obituary. Bach "played for"

Duke Wilhelm

Ernst but did

not have to submit to a formal audition.

The duke

is

in his forty-sixth year

twenty-five. Since his early separation

alone and

As

a

is

considered a harsh

ruler.

and has ruled Weimar from

his wife,

His motto

is

for

he has lived

"All

with God."

boy of seven, he mounted the pulpit of the court chapel on Ash

Wednesday and

delivered a sermon, prepared under the supervision

of the court chaplain, on Apostles

under the

title

church in the entire consistory, has

16.31,

soon to appear

"His Serene Highness the Preacher."74 By state

in print

now

the

of Weimar, and in particular the church

been enjoined to take

its

cue only from him.

The

duke has ordered the reintroduction of confirmation, convoked syn76

The

Stations of Bach's Life

and made personal inspections.

ods,

will establish a

As

Two

years before his death he

seminary for preachers and teachers.

a religious leader,

Wilhelm Ernst

tween orthodoxy and Pietism. Not

follows a middle course be-

at all hostile to the latter,

ularly conducts prayer services in the court chapel

daily Bible readings.

The members of his

to be questioned

most recent sermon. Yet these courtly read,

instituted

entourage are strongly en-

Communion together;

couraged to go to confession and take

them must expect

and has

he reg-

each of

by the duke on the content of the

practices

do not

stifle

and

cultural

In the previously mentioned obituary for the duke,

life.

"He took

earthly pleasure in lovely flowers

and

fruits, in

we

good

music, in a choice collection of Saxon coins, 5c an excell. Library. "75

In the years before Bach's installation, comedies and operas were

sometimes performed title

Fidelity

include as

summer

— among them one with the

revealing

and Innocence Redeemed. For the year 1700, the court lists

many

altos, tenors,

the

at court

and

as three

female and

basses.7^ In 1706

six

male singers

Wilhelm Ernst

—

falsettos,

builds Ettersburg,

residence where later Schiller will finish writing his play

Maria Stuart and Goethe will play the

role

own play

of Orestes in his

Iphigenia.

The

duke's abiding passion

is

music, and thus he favors the court

ensemble, which suffers no significant losses during his reign. In the year

Bach

is

1714,

appointed concertmaster, the ensemble has four-

teen regular members: the kapellmeister and his deputy, the concertmaster, four violinists, a bassoonist, and six vocalists.

trumpeters and drummers on the for church

even

list

The

eight

probably play only occasionally

and chamber music performances. As concertmaster and

later as kapellmeister in

Cothen, Bach probably often

cembalo, but also picked up a stringed instrument

sat at the

when

needed.

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach writes around 1774 to Forkel:

As the most knowledgeable expert andjudge ofharmony, he liked best to play the viola, with fitting loudness and softness. In his youth,

and

until the approach of old age, he played the violin

with a purey piercing

tone,

and

thus kept the orchestra under

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

jj

better control than he could

have done with the harpsichord.

He

understood to perfection the possibilities of all stringed instruments. This

is

evidenced by his

solos for the violin

and for

the

violoncello

without

Wilhelm

Ernst, the elder of two brothers, ascends the ducal

bass.'^'^

throne upon the death of his father in 1683.

Johann Ernst,

The

uncle and

later,

coregent

first his

is

from 1709 on, Johann Ernst s son Ernst August.

nephew do not

one time the older

At

man

get along and are constandy fighting;

has the younger man's advisers summarily

arrested.

Obviously the court musicians cannot remain untouched

by these

quarrels; although they are

equally,

for his

Wilhelm Ernst wants

supposed to serve both dukes

to prohibit

nephew. The nephew threatens

them from doing anything

reprisals if

they comply with

such orders.

Ernst August

is

trumpet and violin and takes an

and

is

adept at the

dance entertainments.

interest in

also has a passion for the chase

The duke

He

a true connoisseur of music.

He

"delights in military games. "7^

plays an active role in expanding the inventory of instru-

ments and

scores.

He

organizes organ concerts in the court chapel

and finances the reconstruction of the organ by Heinrich Nicolaus Trebs in 1713-14.79 In defiance of his uncle s disapproval, he has the court musicians perform in the

regent

—

for instance

Red

Palace, his residence as co-

on the occasion of

a birthday party for his

younger half brother Johann Ernst.^°

From

the private treasury of the younger coregent

smaller salary increases that

Bach

Altogether, Ernst August

one of the three

is

receives in the years 1716

Bach's son Carl Philipp Emanuel, "loved also especially

come

generous to him."

The

rulers

him

and

the 1717.

who, according

particularly

to

and were

other two are Leopold of

Anhalt-Cothen and Christian von Weissenfels.^^

More must

be said here about Prince Johann Ernst.

day celebration just mentioned takes place

at the

The

birth-

end of 1713. At

this

time, the seventeen-year-old prince has completed his studies at

Utrecht, visited 78

The

Amsterdam, and brought home

Stations of Bach's Life

a quantity of musi-

cal scores.

Now he is studying composition with his former keyboard

Johann Gottfried Walther, organist

teacher,

church, and

Weimar town

at the

composing concertos, which have been

is

partially pre-

served in Bach's arrangements for a keyboard instrument,

and

595, 982, 984,

leaves

Weimar;

from

it is

stern

The

seriously.

creates a climate that favors the itself in

Bach's

Weimar

We can be certain that Wilhelm Ernst paid close attention Bach composed; presumably he showed

them

equal interest in what Bach did with

performed alert

am Main.

duke's religiosity ensures that sacred music will be taken

to the texts of the cantatas

an

ill,

Bach followed; yet patterns can be de-

Wilhelm Ernst

concentrated striving that seems to manifest period.

prince, seriously

determine which specific sugges-

difficult to

his "lordships"

The

tected.

young

a year later he dies in Frankfurt

In retrospect tions

987. In July 1714 the

BWV 592,

music for religious services

his

and knowledgeable audience

—

When

musically.

at court,

Bach

he could count on

rather than narrow-minded,

frivolous aristocrats interested only in hunting.

The

half brothers Ernst August and Johann Ernst probably de-

voted their primary efforts to instrumental music and did their part to

make

the increasing cultivation of the

style possible at the court

composed during style

this

of Weimar. That the organ works Bach

show

period

no doubt has something

Of course

modern ItaHan concerto

signs of being influenced

do with

to

seat.

Bach

lives, until 1713

longer, in the house of the falsetto singer

manuel Weldig

at 16

Market

Square, across from the

and two years

February In

1713

March

later his eldest son,

Maria Barbara

1714

and

May 1715

in his

Bach

is

who

the sons Carl Philipp

calls

years," as the

into the world.

godson

Johann Gottfried an

"alas

Adam Im-

Red

at the

Palace.

end of

die soon after birth.

Emanuel and Jo-

The

Georg Philipp Telemann, with whom Bach

younger

also the

Wilhelm Friedemann. In

delivers twins,

hann Gottfried Bernhard come father

born

is

is

and possibly

and pagemaster

There Bach's daughter Catharina Dorothea 1708,

this

this receptive climate.

the court does not exist in isolation; there

tovm of Weimar, the ducal

by

later recalls.

is

former's god"often together

In the year 1783

misbegotten son,"^^ he having

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

79

Sangerhausen without notice;

just left his position as organist in

nothing

known about

is

the circumstances in which Johann Gott-

fried dies a year later.

Weimar

In his

living quarters

Bach

number of pupils, who,

increasing

gives lessons to a gradually

in addition to the already

men-

tioned Schubart, include Johann Bernhard Bach, Johann Lorenz

Bach, Johann Christoph Baumgarten, Cornelius Heinrich Dretzel,

Samuel Gmelin, Philipp David Krauter, Johann Tobias Krebs, Jo-

hann Caspar Vogler will trained

Vogler,

come

to

and Johann Gotthilf

Ziegler.

Among them

be considered the greatest master of the organ

by Bach.^3

Johann Tobias Krebs busied himself with copying works by Manuscripts P801-03 in the Berlin Staatsbibliothek,

Bach.

It is to

which

are principally in his hand, that we

Orgelbuchlein, early versions definitively

767,

several pieces

from the

of the so-called Eighteen Chorales, not

put together into a collection until Bach's time in

Leipzig, and the choral partitas

and "Sei

piled

owe

"O

gegriisset, Jesu giitig,"

by Krebs we

Gott, du frommer Gott," BWV BWV 768. In the volumes com-

also find the script

of Johann Gottfried Walther,

Krebs s second teacher in Weimar.

Walther contributed not only choral

Reinken but machen,"

fantasias

by Buxtehude and

the choral partita "Ach, was soU ich Sunder

also

BWV 770, and individual organ chorales by Bach. Even if

the manuscripts that have

come down

to us

through Krebs cannot

be dated precisely, they unquestionably constitute the most cant sources by organist in

far,

outside of the Orgelbuchlein, for Bach's activity as

Weimar.

We would be

from the Weimar period were Walther manuscripts

we

find there the

all

signifi-

as the

happy

if

Bach's free organ works

as well represented in the

organ chorales. They are not, but

famous Fugue

in

G Minor on

Krebsat least

a "Netherlandish"

BWV 542 (lacking a prelude in this version); the Prelude and A Minor, BWV 569; the Piece d'Orgue in G Major, BWV 572; the Prelude and Fugue in A Minor, BWV 894; the B-minor fiigue on a theme by Tomaso Albinoni, BWV 951; and several works theme,

Fugue

in

also

known from

80

The

older sources.

Stations of Bach's Life

We find some details on the

Krauter's experiences as Bach's pupil in

of the Augsburg Scholarchat academy: Krauter

files

Weimar with

a scholarship,

and

is

an application for an extension

in

begun

that he sends to Augsburg, he explains that he has just

make

new

the acquaintance of

Italian

studies with Bach, dated 30 April 1712,

is

and French music

—

to

that

Johann Ernst s return from Holland. His report on

after Prince

...he

sent to

is,

his

revealing:

is

a most excellent and withal very loyal man^ both in com-

and clavier,

position

me without fail

as well as in other instruments,

and gives

6 hours a day of instruction, which are most

needful to me, especially in composition

and the

clavier,

and also

at times for practicing other instruments; the rest of the time I

spend by myselfpracticing and copying, for the aforementioned

me all musicalpieces I request, and I have likewise the

conveys to

freedom

Did

to look

through all his pieces.

the pupil from

Keiser's St.

Mark

And

1710 or 1712?

Augsburg

Passion,

also

'^'^

look

which Bach and

at the score

a helper copied

hand can be recognized

of the motet "Ich

Anh. self.

whose

159,

Although

to him,

ning,

it is

lasse dich nicht,

first

number of Bach

more

likely that

major portion of the score

BWV

du segnest mich denn,"

scholars attribute the entire

Bach provided Krauter with

beschiitzte Orchestre reports as early as 1711

Weimar / Herr Joh. as

weU

of Bach

As an

as for the

organist.

as the

structure

—"From

Sebastian Bach /

hand

certainly so constituted / that

row

Weimar?

work

a begin-

not obvious but also not surprising that Johann Mattheson

work Das

Casde,

genre, in

to carry forward.

earliest printed discussion

church

in a

its

forty-two measures were written by Bach him-

which the pupil was

It is

in his

a

around

does Bach already enjoy enough prestige by this

time to perform this work, highly modern for Krauter's

of Reinhard

Bach has

casde chapel

and the

is

[i.e.,

1

for

the

—

in the

famed organist

in

have seen things / both for the

keyboard instruments] that are

one must gready esteem the man."^^ his chief place called,

of work in the Heavenly

an allusion to both

ceiling fresco that simulates

From Matins Singer

its tall,

nar-

an opening into

to Hofkapellmeister

81

heaven.

The organ

loft,

located in the highest of the building s four

houses an organ built by Ludwig Compenius and renovated

levels,

just before Bach's arrival. In 1714

it is

renovated again by the organ

builder Nicolaus Trebs, this time certainly to suit Bach's wishes.

configuration can be approximately determined.^^

the two-manual instrument

We

on which Bach played during

years in his career as an organist

was not exactly

a

decisive

major one,

invit-

German

ing the performer to engage in virtuoso feats in the north tradition,

The

can see that

but certainly one that accommodated his preference for

multiple part settings:

Hauptwerk

Unterwerk 16'

Quintadena

Gemshorn Gedacht

8'

Principal

8'

Prinzipal

8'

8'

Quintadena

Grossuntersatz 32'

Viola da

gamba

Gedackt

8'

Oktave

8'

16'

Subbass

16'

Violonbass

Kleingedackt 4'

Pedal

4'

Principal

4'

8'

Cornettbass

Waldflote 2

Posaune

16'

Mixtur 6fach

Sequialtera 4fach

Trumpet

8'

Cymbal 3fach

Trumpet

Oktave

4

8'

4'

Glockenspiel

In spite of the stern atmosphere at the court. Bach has opportunities to travel,

and the more so the longer he

quite often invited to inspect organs

is

furt

in

and Halle

in 1716, in Leipzig in 1717,

The

Taubach

May 1716,

when

how

of the

the collegium

the organ was dedicated on

new Organ:

piece of boeffalamode

marinated pike with anchovie

The

already

certainly in the presence of the evaluator:^7

the installation of the

82

is

also enjoyed the pleasures

For the dining of the esteemed Collegium of the Church

I

He

in 1710, in Er-

by which time he

account books afford us a glimpse of

of the Frauenkirche in Halle dined 3

in

Weimar.

On such occasions Bach, who enjoyed traveling, not only

Cothen.

saw something of the world but table.

—

stays in

Stations of Bach's Life

boiled turnips frosted crullers

.

.

.

upon

I

smoked ham

I

ashiette

1

ashiette with patates

2 ashiettes

roasted

I

pickled

warm

quarter

radishes

roast of veal

Altogether

Bach

fresh butter

groschen

ii talers 12

also travels

from Weimar

performance of the Hunt Cantata,

Duke

asparagus salade

head lettuce salade

with spinache 6c chicory

mouton

lemon peel

Cherry preserves

with peas

to neighboring courts. For the

BWV 208,

a birthday tribute to

may w^ell have gone to Weissenfels in 1712 or 1713. time at the court of the Duke of Gotha, Friedrich

Christian, he

In 1717 he spends II, filling

in for the mortally

On

ill

court kapeUmeister, Christian Friedrich

may have performed

a passion. Since he

receives only twelve talers for his services, hardly

more than what the

Witt.

tenor

is

this occasion

paid for the same performance,

was remunerated both

work performed was

(D

in the

I

he

drew on

as

as

Bach

that

composer, or that the

Weimar

Passion

numbering of the Bach Compendium). Presumably he of

the second version of the

important event

the organist

conductor and

identical with the so-called

several sections

One

we cannot assume

s

St. is

this

work

otherwise vanished major

John

for

Passion.

his application, already alluded to, for

post at the Marienkirche in Halle in the year

spends "14 days to three weeks" in that

city,

He

1713.

lodging at the church's

expense at the Golden Ring Inn, the best in town, where he runs

up some charges there

is

for "beer," "brandy wine,"

strong interest in his candidacy. After a successful audition,

which includes the performance of a cember

and "dabak." Apparently

to succeed the respected

cantata, he

is

elected

on

13

De-

composer and organist Friedrich

Wilhelm Zachow.

He

accepts, immediately following the election,^^ for this posi-

tion seems tailor-made for him:

and

at the

same time

it

will allow

him

to play the

organ

serve as a kind of city musical director, in

charge of polyphonic music; never has he

come

closer to his goal of

being put in charge of a well-regulated church music! So From Matins Singer

why

does

to Hofkapellmeister

83

he postpone giving a

answer and eventually withdraw his can-

final

didacy? Is the base salary, smaller than that in Weimar, really the deciding factor? After

other things, he

to

is

Among

he can expect substantial "accidentia."

all,

be paid separately for composing cantatas for

catechism services and playing the organ for weddings. ^9

In any case, the church collegium in ished"

when Bach

turns

down

HaUe

declares itself "aston-

the position, in February 1714, on

grounds of inadequate compensation.

The

collegium charges that he

has merely used the offer to improve his chances of being

He

concertmaster in Weimar. the

defends himself indignantly: "That

Most Honored Church Board should be

astonished at

cHning the proferred post of organist to which, pired, astonishes

me not at aU, inasmuch as I

the matter so very

This

is

the

named

as

my

they think,

de-

I as-

see that they have given

thought. "9°

little

Bach we know from

letters

and recorded statements:

instead of relaxing once he has in fact been appointed concert-

master and favoring the well-disposed church leaders in Halle with a

few friendly

lines,

he

lets fly a

cursory expression of regret.

number of barbs, softened only by

And once

does him no harm: a good two years

him

to an organ evaluation

tion.

Bach

again, his aggressive response

later,

the same

gendemen

and a hearty meal. In regard

invite

to the posi-

takes care to point out that in the short time at his disposal

was impossible

it

a

for

would have come

him

his

to calculate the value of the incidentals that

way and

therefore the total

income he could

expect.

We may take him at his word but at the same time raise the possibility that

the duke of

Weimar

refiised to accept his resignation,

swearing Bach to silence about the matter, as was his custom, then

rewarding him by promoting him to a position created especially for him.

Whatever the

case,

Bach

thirty-two years later by his son identically

worded

contract.

to his goal: the notice 2

March

which 84

1714,

mentions

Bach has come one

his obligation "to is

Stations of Bach's Life

be assumed

Wilhelm Friedemann

of his appointment

indicates that he

The

rejects a post that will

— with an

step closer in

Weimar

as concertmaster,

perform

new works

dated

monthly,"

to rehearse with the palace musicians

church cantatas of his composition and perform them

at services.

This stipulation does not mean, however, that he will direct

all

polyphonic music in the kapellmeister s place; rather he

add

to

is

9^

the to

the kapellmeister s efforts in this area.

This interpretation

is

supported by the fact that the

tion created here for Bach, that of concertmaster,

new

posi-

was not considered

necessary within the hierarchy of music ensembles at central Ger-

man

The assignment

courts.

to the position of orchestra director; rather tivity in the

1666

Dresden,

when Constantin

was named Concertmeister as part of a

The purpose was

for him.

rector of the "little

special

to recognize that

German Musick"

for less important occasions

is

A similar development occurred in

realm of vocal music.

at the court in

now promoted it pertains to his new ac-

does not say that he

— and

Christian Dedekind

arrangement made just

he functioned

as the di-

— polyphonic music performed

substituted in this capacity for the

kapellmeister and vice kapellmeister. 9^

That

a similar provision

may have been adopted

in

Weimar can

be deduced from the fact that from 1714 on Bach devotes his energy to the strict style in masses at the

Weimar

performed. master siders

is

and motets; apparendy church

The

opportunity to assign them to the

new

concert-

welcome, for not every Protestant court kapellmeister con-

them

part of his duties.

Bach copies out

Giuseppe Peranda, vice kapellmeister Schiitz;

services

court include a segment in which elaborate kyries are

by Johann Marianus Baal,

in

kyries

by Marco

Dresden under Heinrich

a Benedictine

monk

active at the

Franconian cathedral of Schwarzach; and by Johann Christoph Pez, kapellmeister in Stuttgart.93

unnamed mass

A cello part that Bach composed for the

BWV Anh. 29 demonstrates that he must have stud-

ied even the old mensural notation system.

Possibly

vocal chorale

it

was already

in this period that

"Vom Himmel

Bach composed the

hoch," later performed in Leipzig as

part of the Christmas Magnificat,

BWV 243a. But

that the splendid chorale

"O Mensch, bewein

which many scholars claim

for the

it

seems unlikely

dein Siinde gross,"

aforementioned

Weimar or Gotha

Passion, can be ascribed to this period.

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

85

With

Bach's installation as court organist and

chamber musi-

As

the organist he

of

cian, his field

works primarily

activity

clearly delineated.

is

in the church, playing for services but also providing

the continuo for performances of polyphonic music, so long as he

is

not conducting, which his appointment as concertmaster makes his

As

official duty.

by the court

for

chamber music, he

kapelle, playing

needed. Here, too, he

cembalo but

may well have

ducted performances of his

participates in performances

own

also violin or viola as

leading roles.

He probably con-

concertos or secular cantatas.

In our review of this period,

we have no way of determining

whether he suffered continued resistance by his two superiors or enjoyed their favor. Presumably even before his appointment as concertmaster, the organist Bach, approaching his fourth decade

now

highly respected, had already taken over

kapellmeister,

Johann Samuel Drese, and

listed as vice kapellmeister,

beneficial to the

his

work from both

whenever Bach's involvement seemed

development of music

at court.

Perhaps

Weimar

places in a kind of schedule, with

Bach composing new

basis.

In

its

the

son Johann Wilhelm,

relinquish the notion that Bach's

monthly

and by

we must

cantatas can be assigned pieces

on

a

scholarly methodology, the "calendar" of com-

positions

worked out by Alfred

Diirr

tinctions

and corrections of the

sort Diirr

seems

still

helpfiil; yet dis-

contemplated from the

beginning are also meaningfiil and necessary. 94

For one thing,

it

now seems

clear,

though we do not yet have

archival evidence, that even before being

composed

named concertmaster Bach

cantatas for the religious services at the

Possibly he was asked to

compose cantatas

earlier, if

Weimar

court.

only for special

occasions.

Thus even with works

we should

ask whether they represent or draw on earlier works that

Bach wrote.

more

New

precisely

that

fit

scholarly discoveries

how

he arrived

at the

neatly into Diirr 's calendar,

may

allow us to determine

"modern" church cantata.

Furthermore, closer attention should be paid to the question of

whether the cantatas Bach composed outside the church services at the

at that

Weimar

time were also performed

court. If so,

it

would help

explain the rich variations in his repertoire but also the fact that, in86

The

Stations of Bach's Life

—

stead of confining himself to libretti

by the court poet Salomon

Erdmann

Neumeister, Georg Christian

Franck, he also used texts by

Lehms, and

others.

tain indications that

may point to

The

vocal parts of several

Weimar

cantatas con-

performances occurred at different pitches, which

different locations, such as the tow^n church,

where dur-

ing this period Johann Gottfried Walther presided over the music.

The

BWV

cantata "Ich hatte viel Bekiimmernis,"

fruitful subject for the

study of such basic questions and has been

On

analyzed at length in the recent Bach literature. notation on the handwritten score, this cantata

is

the basis of a

assigned to 17 June

1714 in Diirr's calendar; yet the sources indicate that

viewed

as a revision

of an

earlier

information

Bachs

now

visit to

it

must be

composition. For what occasion

could Bach have written the older version? del scholar Friedrich

offers a

21,

As

Han-

early as 1858, the

Chrysander suggested, perhaps on the basis of

lost to us, that the

work might be connected with

Halle during Advent in

1713,

on the occasion of

his

organ audition.95

The church board

in Halle decided in July 1713 to

Johann Michael Heineccius candidates as their

text.

commission

to write a libretto to be given to

Since the candidates could not

all

themselves on the same day, the head pastor of St. Mary's

put together a text appropriate for several Sundays.

also suitable for a

It is therefore

number of occasions, go back

the

may have

out of the question that parts of the libretto of Bach's cantata 21,

all

present

not

BWV

to Heineccius.

9^

Certainly this text shows no clear resemblance to the style of the cantata texts by the librettists

By contrast,

Bach preferred

in

Weimar.

the hypothetical early version that Christoph

Wolff

has reconstructed allows us to recognize that the original text certainly fitting for the "Pietist" climate in Halle

— may have been

conceived as a dialogue between Jesus and the soul.97 In 1714,

Bach undertakes logue character

a revision

is

under changed circumstances, the dia-

eliminated while the

work

splendid and powerful final chorus, perhaps

and quite disproportionate to the sion, the cantata

when

rest

is

"enriched" with a

composed

of the cantata. In

was performed again

in

Weimar

From Matins Singer

years earlier

this

new ver-

or Cothen, also

to Hofkapellmeister

87

during the

summer of 1723

in Leipzig. In 1725,

Mattheson presents

it

to the public in a small printed edition.

This example serves to suggest that in it

does not

the

work

Even

a formulation such as

June 1714"

misleading, for

is

of a discourse.

The

BWV

"Bach wrote the cantata

it

merely a way station in a longer history as

cases

sense to measure Bach's music against a paradigm of

suggests a unique act of cre-

ation, ignoring the likelihood that a date

work

and comparable

derived from Viennese classicism and the concept of abso-

lute music. 21 for 17

make

this

—

of performance represents a history not so

much of a

must not focus only on

analytic process

the works themselves, comparing individual versions; rather we should

seek to reconstruct the situation in which a version might have been required and Bach's day

it

how made

tion piece for the

Weimar court,

would have been received by the audience. In

it

a difference whether one

town of HaUe,

was presenting an audi-

a cantata for a religious service at the

or a piece of sacred music for St. Thomas's in Leipzig.

Today's listeners have two choices for enjoying Bach's music:

they can ignore the context and take in a work "straight" in one of its existing versions.

Or

they

may wish

hatte viel Bekiimmernis,"

BWV

can deepen the experience.

The

to keep in

21,

But

if

Lamm,

shows

how

familiar version

astonishing for the variety that marks

ment, "Das

mind

das erwiirget

its

ist,"

sistencies

cantata "Ich

the latter approach

from the year 1714

sections; yet the final

is

move-

seems completely anomalous.

one considers the probable existence of an

sistent version,

the history and

The example of the

context while listening to the work.

one need no longer close one's

earlier,

more con-

ears to formal incon-

but can instead imagine oneself participating in one phase

of Bach's "march through the institutions." It is

know today how carefiiUy Bach kept the com1714 to provide a new piece every month. The

impossible to

mitment he made

in

calendar that can be drawn up to reflect this

but the missing works

may have

commitment has

disappeared, with the surviving

libretti

by Salomon Franck providing the only evidence of

titles,9^

or they

tatas that

88

The

may

do not

fit

gaps,

never have been composed.

We

their

also have can-

into this calendar, such as the Christmas cantata

Stations of Bach's Life

"Christen atzet diesen Tag,"

BWV

63,

which make us wonder

whether Bach composed works above and beyond

most important

work

like this

feast days, or

his

quota for the

whether a particularly choice-sounding

was intended primarily

for the duke's birthday,

which

coincided with Christmas.

We that

is

can nevertheless detect a trend in Bach's

typical for his entire creative oeuvre: the

Weimar

cantatas

new concertmaster be-

gins with a great burst of energy; gradually the instrumentation of the cantatas he presents

Weimar

becomes

and toward the end of

less lavish;

period his cantata production almost completely dries up.

In terms of text and music, the three

tween March and melskonig,

12;

and

works include

cases the

first

works, performed be-

May 1714, show great consistency; these are "Him-

BWV 182;

willkommen,"

sei

BWV

Zagen,"

cantatas

"Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen,

"Erschallet, ihr Lieder,"

a lengthy "sonata" or "sinfonia,"

In two

172.

and

based on a passage from Scripture, then three

chorus in the form of a chorale. In two cases a repetition of the

all

three

down somewhat,

existing records.

(which

is

final

arias

and

a a

chorus or the

opening chorus follows.

After this opening three -part

earlier

BWV

foUow the pattern of a major opening chorus, followed by

recitative

slowed

his

He

drum

at least so far as

roU,

Bach seems

to have

we can determine from

the

performances of works already composed

directs

presumably the case with

concentrates on solo cantatas, the

first

BWV

21,

199,

and

18)

and

among them being "Wider-

BWV 54, and "O heiliges Geist- und Wasserbad," BWV 165. BWV 54 composed as a solo cantata for alto in pure madrigal style; BWV 165 displays the form that will come to prestehe

doch der

Siinde,"

is

dominate

in his

Weimar work and then

often turns up after his third

year in Leipzig: the solo cantata in madrigal style with a four-part final chorus, tists

the latter portion presumably a concession by the libret-

to the pious congregation, a concession

That during this period he posers

also

we may deduce from

a

Bach

surely supports.

performs solo cantatas by Italian com-

copy

in his

hand, perhaps from the be-

ginning of 1716, of the cantata "Languet anima mea" by the Viennese court theorbo player and composer Francesco Bartolomeo Conti.

From Matins

Singer to Hofkapcllmeister

89

In the meantime Bach composes further cantatas with interest-

BWV "Komm, du siisse Todesstunde," BWV 161; "Wachet! Betet!," BWV 70a; and "Argre dich, o Seek, nicht," BWV i86a. It difficult to deing choral parts: "Der

Himmel

Die Erde jubilieret,"

lacht!

31;

is

why

termine

the

number of compositions

was having problems with the court rus, or

singers available to

perhaps he was accommodating a preference

performances.

ing for the solo cantata;

we must remember that he

making music with

thus accustomed to

him

soloists.

is

as a

cho-

at court for solo

he was indulging his

It is also possible that

Bach

declines; perhaps

own

lik-

an organist and

In this genre he

achieves a quality that cannot be surpassed. In choral composition,

however, he will show in Leipzig that he Bach's

Weimar

compositions.

cantata repertoire

stiU capable

was not limited

We have evidence that he

by Conti mentioned above but

is

of learning. to his

own

not only copied the cantata

one by the court kapellmeister of

also

Dresden, Johann Christoph Schmidt, with the text "Auf Gott hoffe Perhaps copies of church cantatas by his colleague the

ich."

kapellmeister of Dresden, Johann David Heinichen, could also be

found in

his

Weimar

Bach must have his friendship

Johann

son,

especially

collection of scores. 99

received considerable artistic stimulation from

with Walther,

Gottfried,

when

can learn from

it

Jr.,

comes

who

in 1712.

asked Bach to be godfather to his

Both men

are

to the practice of strict counterpoint,

who

this distant relative,

in 1708

pher.

Bach

wrote the Praecepta

der musicalischen Composition, dedicated to Prince later

organ experts; and

Johann Ernst, and

earned wide recognition as a music theoretician and lexicogra-

Bach dedicated

to

Walther the

first

preserved puzzle canon,

BWV 1073, dated 2 August 1713. Walther copies the

fijgue

on

a

theme by Giovanni Legrenzi,

BWV 574b, as well as the fiigue for violin and basso continuo BWV 1026,

and Bach and Walther share the task of copying the previously

mentioned mass by Johann Baal; we may thus imagine the two of

them studying together Girolamo 1635,

famous

Frescobaldi's Fiori Musicali of

particularly for three organ masses, using the

written version that Bach copied onto 104 folio pages in 90

The

Stations of Bach's Life

hand-

1714, ac-

I

cording to his

own

notation.

At

considered exemplary of strict ricercare they include.

cupy

time the Fiori Musicali are

this

style, particularly

As music

with respect to the

keyboard instruments they oc-

for

a position similar to that occupied in vocal

of Palestrina, with which Bach

still

music by the masses

not unfamiliar, at least in later

is

years.

Bach's study of Frescobaldi ters

is

not the

first

attention to older

of the organ for which we have evidence from

Some

his

mas-

Weimar period.

time between 1709 and 1712 he copies out Nicolas de Grigny s

Premier livre d'orgue. Around the same time he must have undertaken his transformation

movements from

of Johann

his

Adam

Reinkens sonatas and sonata

Hortus musicus, parts of them in

the works for the keyboard

BWV 954,

965,

and 966. These works,

too, chiefly preserved in scores in Walther's hand,

determination to master the art of part writing to apply

This

it

—

document Bach's

initially,

to be sure,

to compositions for keyboard instruments.

is

also the period during

which Bach begins work on

major project for the organ, the Orgelbuchlein. The

added

strict style, into

later in

Cothen,

whose help Bach

is

the

first

in a series

elucidates the systematic

of

tide,

a

which he

explicit tides

with

and didactic import of the

organ or keyboard work in question; the Orgelbuchlein will be

fol-

lowed by the two-part Inventions, the three-part Sinfonias, and The Well-Tempered Clavier.

The

tide page reads as follows:

Litde Organ

Book

In which a beginning organist receives given instruction as to per-

forming a chorale in a multitude of ways while achieving mastery in the study

of the pedal, since in the chorales contained herein the pedal

is

treated entirely obligato.

In honor of our Lord alone

That

my fellow man

his skill

may

hone.

Autore Joanne Sebast. Bach P[leno] t[itulo] CapeUae Magistro S[erenissimi] P[rinceps] R[egnantis]

Anhaltini Cotheniensis

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

91

At the

top of the blank pages in the volume Bach writes the

of the text of 164 chorales in the sequence of the

the hymnal. Yet over the years he completes only a ter

of the project; the

last entries are

made

by compositional

taking: the collection

is

and

over a quar-

little

in Leipzig. Bach's pattern

may

of tackling large projects but then running out of steam case be explained

first lines

liturgical year

difficulties

in this

inherent in the under-

pitched at such a high level and laid out with

such variety that after forty-six parts are completed, everything has

been said that can be

from

a practical

book

said.

The

project has inadvertendy developed

for organists, perhaps even intended for publi-

cation, into a collection of

exemplary compositions for experts.

Parallel to the Orgelbilchlein, tita "Sei gegriisset,

Jesu

giitig,"

Bach probably composed the par-

BWV 768.

Many

of the individual

organ chorales, composed on a larger scale and preserved in single copies, also belong to the

Weimar

Bach

in his Leipzig years

revised

some of them

period.

As mentioned

into the manuscript of the Eighteen Chorales,

Since

Weimar

for the organ,

before.

and compiled them

BWV 651-68.

represented the high point in Bach's composing

it is

regrettable that in this biographical chapter

we

cannot even begin to suggest a chronology for the individual organ

works from noted the

on the

made

this period; specific dating

difficulties that arise

basis

of their

clearly

draw on

a wealth

evident from a brilliant

Major,

lacking,

when one

stylistic features.

here: in the free organ

is

tries to

and

I

have already

date works solely

One general observation can be

works of the Weimar period Bach can

of experience and inspiration. This becomes

work such

as the

Toccata and Fugue in

F

BWV 540.

In the period before Weimar, Bach received lasting impressions

from the imaginative element in the north German organ he absorbs the principle of concertizing, structural significance

intuitively grasping

composing

for the organ.

Thus

its

fea-

the Toccata

C Major, BWV 564, is clearly shaped by the basic layout of a con-

certo: the

opening movement follows the

following adagio corresponds to the slow 92

Now

and dynamic potential and applying these

tures productively to his in

style.

The

Stations of Bach's Life

tutti-solo principle, the

movement

in

an instru-

mental concerto, and the

Doric Fugue),

541, signal Bach's

composed Is this

there

presents itself as a fugue

D Minor, BWV 538 (the soand the Prelude and Fugue in G Major, BWV

The Toccata and Fugue

cornertante.

called

movement

final

in

Weimar

preoccupation in

— with the concerto

—

if

indeed they were

style.

preoccupation a result of the "Vivaldi fever" that reaches

epidemic proportions in the

two decades of the eighteenth

first

century in Europe? Bach must certainly have sensed early on

how

important the Vivaldi-style concerto would become for the develop-

ment of a "grand" European

style: for

music, instrumental music

being organized on a large

is

the same time in gradations

form. But Bach

is

—

the

first

time in the history of scale, yet at

an autonomous yet transparent

as

neither an Italian composer nor a composer

lessly imitating the Italians. Succinctness

mind-

and sensuality of form

are

not everything; the search for a prima causa of music cannot be sus-

pended any more than the theological-philosophical goal of deriving multiplicity

from unity and unity from

multiplicity.

he evidendy has much room in Weimar to explore is

the period during

how

For

this reason

strict style.

This

which he dwells intensely on the question of

the free and the strict style can be brought together coherendy

in the bipolar far less

forms of the prelude and

fijgue

—

problem that seems

a

urgent to his contemporaries.

Perhaps Bach never did experience the infamous "Vivaldi shock" referred to time

and again

in the

Bach

literature,

tendy observed and studied the Italian concerto

new

questions to bear. Perhaps too

much

tributed to the fact that between 1713 sixteen

but instead consisstyle,

bringing ever

significance has

and 1714 he did

five

been

at-

organ and

cembalo arrangements of instrumental concerti by composers

as varied as

Antonio Vivaldi, Giuseppe

the Elder and Younger,

Ernst of

Weimar

been written

Georg Philipp Telemann, and Prince Johann

(BWV

at the

nited Bach's

592a-96, 972-87). These works

behest of the prince,

music and wanted to hear nized concerts;

it

in his

we need not see

own

Benedetto Marcello

Torelli,

this

own

who

may have

obviously valued this

lessons or in specially orga-

undertaking

as the

spark that ig-

interest in the instrumental concerto as a genre.

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

93

We all

have only fragmentary indications of

in the copies

Weimar

—

first

of

of work by other masters that Bach made during his

some of which have been

years,

this interest

copies, for instance that of a concerto in

identified only recently as

G major for two violins by

Telemann. Bach apparently prepared the copy

as a gift for the later

concertmaster of the Dresden court kapelle, Johann Georg Pisendel,

when

this colleague spent

when

the manuscript, which displays the

Bach, was discovered it

was thought

Around

some time

among the

to have

found

in

Weimar

in 1709: at

hand of a

any

stiU fairly

rate,

young

holdings of the old Dresden kapeUe, its

way

there through PisendeL^°°

the same time or several years later

been studying Tomaso Albinoni's Concerti a

Bach

cinque,

known

is

opus

2,

to have

published

in 1700.

We own.

do not know when Bach began seems

It

likely that

to

even in his early

compose

Weimar

concerti of his

years he

was not

only copying concerti but increasingly composing them. Bach scholarship today leans toward the view that even

some of the Branden-

burg Concertos already existed in early versions during the period.

As of now these

fijrther in

are merely hypotheses; they

Weimar

wiU be discussed

the chapter on Bach's orchestral works. Here two details

should be mentioned that belong in a biographical context: the early version of the

some

BWV

respects

208,

recitative,

first

Brandenburg Concerto,

make an

ideal first

whose handwritten

movement

1713,

would

Hunt

in

Cantata,

score begins immediately with a

may

thus have been

or on the occasion of the presumed repeat per-

formance of the work in

1716.

According to the more recent view,

not universally accepted, the

is

1046a,

for the

omitting an overture; the concerto

played as early as

which

BWV

fifth

composed in conjunction with Bach's

Brandenburg Concerto was

trip to

Dresden

—

for the

planned competition with Louis Marchand.^°^ If this event actually occurred in the traveling to

when he

Dresden

feels

94

The

of

at a precarious transitional

1717,

Bach would be

moment

in his

life,

has accepted a position in Cothen but has not yet been re-

leased from his duties in

he

fall

Weimar. There

are several indications that

driven to leave Weimar: in 1716 his production of cantatas Stations of Bach's Life

began to

slow,

to a standstill.

now know that by

and we

Then

there

his previously

is

the court of Gotha in April 1717. kapellmeister Drese died, and son, as vice kapellmeister,

of Bach's installation

as

is

1717

On

i

has practically

it

mentioned engagement

December

Bach knows with

1716 the old

it

at

Weimar

certainty that Drese

his designated successor.

concertmaster

come

s

On the occasion

was expressly

stipulated that

he would remain subordinate to the vice kapellmeister.

One

year

did in fact

later,

when Bach was

become

already in Cothen, Drese junior

the kapellmeister.

The appointment was made

primarily on the basis of the seniority principle, which a ruler intent

on keeping

had

his servants loyal

to observe. It cannot be confirmed

whether the duke nonetheless negotiated with Georg Philipp Tele-

mann,

Telemann

as

later

more hinted than

asserted in an autobio-

graphical account.^°^

Bach may have been annoyed dictable fashion, or stay in

he

may

Weimar with Drese

at

being passed over in this pre-

have simply decided that he would not

does not wait for the decision to be

made but

on Gotha and even more on Cothen. The tively easy, since the

ried to Eleonore

At any

junior as kapellmeister.

Weimar

rate,

he

rather fixes his sights

latter

choice seems rela-

coregent Ernst August has been mar-

Wilhelmine, the

sister

of young Prince Leopold von

Anhalt-Cothen, since the beginning of 1716. Perhaps Ernst August relishes the prospect

spised uncle list

Bach

of snatching the great

Wilhelm

Ernst,

for his private

who

away from

of Bach's formal installation

has forbidden Ernst August to en-

we do know for certain

as kapellmeister in

Prince Leopold prizes his

new

Cothen:

50 talers and soon thereafter his salary, although the

he will take up his appointment had not yet been contrary: a notation from

December

5

the date

August

kapellmeister so greatly that

"upon the Capitulation [accepting the contract]" Bach

retary,

his de-

music making.

If these are merely speculations,

1717.

artist

1717

is

to receive

moment when

fixed.^°^

On

the

by the Weimar court sec-

Theodor Benedikt Bormann, makes

it

clear that in the pre-

ceding months Bach has applied persistently yet

fiitilely

for his

dismissal:

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

95

On 6 November [ijij], ganist Bach

was

the

arrested

quondam

and

concertmaster and court or-

held at the County Magistrate's

house ofdetention for obstinate behavior

andforcing the question

of his dismissal, andfinally on 2 December was informed by the

Court

from

Seer,

ofhis unfavorable discharge and simultaneouslyfreed

arrest}^^

In view of the harsh conditions prevailing in Weimar, Bach probably did not serve the barely four-week sentence merely pro forma; each time the waldhorn player

Adam

Andreas Reichardt

re-

quested his discharge, as happened more than once during the reign

of Ernst August, he was sentenced to a hundred blows and impris-

onment.

hanged

When

he

who can consider himself a protege of the prince of Cothen,

fares relatively well

a

he was declared an outlaw and was

"in effigie."^°5

Bach,

him

finally fled,

new

by comparison; that the prince prompdy grants

position runs contrary to the custom of the time and

points to a special relationship between the two. in

Weimar, Bach apparently has

access to paper

While imprisoned and

quill, for "ac-

cording to a certain tradition," which Ernst Ludwig Gerber passes

on

in his Historisch-biographisches Lexikon der Tonkiinstler,

Bach

writes The Well-Tempered Clavier in "a place where dismay, boredom,

and the lack of any

sort

of musical instrument made

this

way of pass-

ing time essential."^°^ Since the encyclopedist had in his father a

noted Bach pupil fact: early

in

as his informant, this report

may well be

rooted in

versions of The Well-Tempered Clavier wcrt indeed written

Weimar.

COTHEN "With an unfavorable old

by

Bach must take

leave of his

his wife, his sister-in-law,

who

96

discharge"

—

that

is

how

Thuringian homeland, accompanied

and four children: Catharina Dorothea,

has just turned nine; seven-year-old

The

Stations of Bach's Life

the thirty- two-year-

Wilhelm Friedemann;

three-year-old Carl Philipp Emanuel; and two-year-old Johann

Gottfried Bernhard.

Nonetheless, Bach has no itude.

accuse his native land of ingrat-

call to

On the contrary. To the

extent possible in his day, he has been

recognized as an exceptional figure: the people of Arnstadt,

summoned him willfiil

as

an organ expert

very young age, tolerated his

at a

behavior with remarkable patience; the people of Miihlhausen

continue to commission ing

town

left their

for

him

to write council pieces, despite his hav-

Weimar

the reigning duke

fails

to value

he shows him no indulgence

By now Bach

Bach

him

Even the

bicker-

an

artist,

an the same time as

also enjoys a reputation outside Thuringia. Stu-

him

out. In Halle the

to evaluate their organ, overlooking

church over-

what they

see

of the organist's position recendy offered him.

as his scornful rejection

a

as

year.

Weimar does not imply that

as a subject.

dents travel great distances to seek seers appoint

one

after only

ing over his resignation from his post in

And

who

mere two weeks

after his release

from prison, he turns up

in

Leipzig, where he evaluates the organ at the Paulinerkirche, but pre-

sumably

also looks

around elsewhere; might he have a chance to suc-

ceed the chronically ailing cantor at

Bach may not dance unworldly.

a jig like

And that remains

St.

Thomas's, Johann Kunau?

Telemann, but he

true

when he

is

neither timid nor

gets to Cothen. In 1719 he

spends time in Berlin, picking out a harpsichord to buy; in 1720 he invited to

Hamburg

as

an organ virtuoso; in

in Schleiz as a guest performer. In the visited the court ter

is

vacant.

Ten

a Composition

But

talers are

paid to "Kapellmeister Back of Cothen for

in status over

Bach

paid no

less

is

in

Weimar, and

As

Cothen a first

—

a considerable

summit reached on

imhis

kapellmeister, he occupies a position of

authority in the court hierarchy. is

summer of 1722 he may have

upon our Most gracious Duke's day of birth."^°7

ambitious climb upward.

he

he goes to the court

of Anhalt-Zerbst, where the position of kapellmeis-

for the time being

provement

1721

is

At

four hundred talers per

than the second-highest

official,

annum

Majordomo Gott-

lob von Nostitz.

From Matins

Singer to Hofkapellmeister

97

—

not possible to identify with certainty a Bach house in

It is

may have

Cothen; he

lived at

his

die in

September of the following

year. It

snatched away Maria Barbara; her burial

According to the obituary, Bach was

when

his prince to

Holzmarkt/°^

Stiftstrasse or 12

ii

son Leopold Augustus was born in November

There

document

she died.

that

It is

was

1718,

only to

there, too, that death

recorded for 7 July 1720.

is

at the baths in

Carlsbad with

an appealing thought but impossible

Bach composed the Chromatic Fantasy,

BWV 903,

memory of his first wife; an early version possibly goes back to the Weimar period.^°9 Xhe significance of the work is by no means limin

ited to

its

presumed commemorative purpose: preserved

in thirty-

three handwritten copies from the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the composition established the genre of the free piano

fantasia in

its

modern form.

Neither the cause of Maria Barbara's death nor Bachs reaction

known

The

to us.

is

surviving documents indicate only that social ob-

ligations did not cease for the widower, never

one to shirk the de-

mands of the world around him. After accepting the

role

of godfather

to the daughter of his kapelle colleague Christian Ferdinand

January 1720, he does the same in January

1721 for the

Cothen goldsmith Christian Heinrich Bahr, and

Abel

in

son of the

in

September of

that year for the son of the ducal ceUarer, Christian

Hahn. In the

second

case, the baptismal registry records the

name of a godmother,

of particular interest here: "Demoiselle Magdalena Wilckens, ducal singer in this town."

Considering Bach's good connections with the court in Weissenfels, first

it is

conceivable that the young singer

who

appears for the

time in the Cothen records as a supper guest in June

hired by Bach himself "° six-year-old

At any rate, on 3 December 1721,

widower Bach

1721

the thirty-

leads the twenty-year-old daughter of

the Weissenfels court trumpeter, Johann Caspar Wilcke, to the

Whether as

wedding

festivities in

the

ishing

is

neither here nor there.

sum of twenty-seven

The

Stations of Bach's Life

altar.

Bach house were subdued

was not uncommon with second marriages

flowed

98

the

was

— or whether

the wine

Wine

bills

amounting

from

this

period can give those in-

talers

to the aston-

terested in biographical details his eye

on

With

when

his future wife this marriage,

ond mother

to speculate if Bach already

Dorothea

into his house not only a sec-

Wilhelm Friedemann

(13),

and Johann Gottfried Bernhard

(7),

also a professional musician.

had

she was hired.

Bach brought

for Catharina

Carl Philipp Emanuel

room

More will be

(11),

(6)

but

said of her in conjunction

with Bach's Leipzig period. Since the wedding

is

celebrated in the palace church,

Bach owes

the Lutheran church a dispensation fee, which, however, he refuses to

pay

— probably on the grounds During

orders from the prince.""^

that the his

time in Cothen, however, he

remains loyal to the Lutheran church of a

pew and takes Communion one to

been

pleased wdth the pastor, a

less

One

somewhat shady

when Bach

Cothen, he knows that

the secular rather than the sacred realm. It that he has a tendency to

other positions.

An

Agnes: he pays rent for

St.

three times a year.

thing should not be forgotten:

to the reformed court in

wedding took place "on

grow

is

He may have

figure.

receives his call

his duties will lie in

another matter entirely

resdess in any post

and

to apply for

appointment to a Lutheran church might have

been very welcome. November 1720 finds him in Lutheran Hamburg: the records of St. Jacob's reveal that he applied for the vacant position

of church organist. But he cannot stay for an audition; he must "travel to join his prince.""^

the

That

good old Hanseatic

clears the

tradition of

way

for an applicant

buying

— — pays

who

official positions

in

four thousand marks into the church coffers as an installation fee. Several years later

Johann Mattheson

recalls in his

work Der

mmikalische Patriot the unsuccessful application "of a certain great virtuoso," at the

and quotes smugly from the Christmas sermon delivered

time by Hamburg's head pastor, the cantata

librettist

Erdmann

Neumeister:

[The pastor] believed with

certainty that if one of the angels of

Bethlehem should comefrom Heaven and play divinely, wishing to

become the organist at

St. /.,

but having no money, he would

simply have tofiy back whence he had come}^'^

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

99

"

It is

doubtful that Bach seriously considered the vacant position.

He would hardly have left his native central Germany to move to the Hanseatic city

as the successor to the organist

and church

secretary,

Heinrich Friese. Perhaps he received encouragement on the spur of the

moment

to apply, but actually

had

his eye

on the position of city

cantor and "director musices," the prestige of which was approxi-

mately equal to that of the cantor

at St.

Thomas's

in Leipzig.

The

current city cantor, Joachim Gerstenbiittel, successor to the famous Schiitz pupil Christoph Bernhard,

was considered an "almost con-

stant valetudinariuSy' or chronically ailing,

seventy- first year.""^ Indeed he died a few

was back a

more

in

and was already

months

later.

in his

By then Bach

Cothen, and the position was offered not to him but to

affable genius,

Bach seems organ virtuoso.

who

Telemann,

accepted

it.

to have enjoyed great acclaim in

An

Hamburg

as

an

episode recounted in his obituary can easily be

brought into connection with his stay in that

city,

despite a slight dis-

crepancy in the date:

During

this time,

about the year ij22y he made a journey

Hamburg and playedfor more

to

than two hours on thefine organ

of St. Catherine's before the Magistrate and many other distinguished persons of the

city, to

organist of this church, Johann Adam Reinken,

was

nearly one hundred years old, listened to

When

lar pleasure.

The aged

their general admiration.

who

at that time

him with particu-

Bach, at the request of those present, per-

formed extempore the chorale By the Waters of Babylon at great length (for almost halfan hour) best organists

and in

different ways, just as the

of Hamburg in the past had been wont

to

do at

Saturday vespers, Reinken paid Bach thefollowing compliment: "/

thought this art was dead, but I see that in you

But back more,

to

Cothen. There Bach

"a gracious Prince,

of Bach's

100

The

lives on.

directs a large kapelle; fiirther-

he wiU write retrospectively in the Erdmann

as

early as

it

arrival,

who 1718

he has

both loved and knew music.""^ At the time

the prince

November

letter,

is

twenty- three and

still

unmarried.

he and two of his siblings serve

Stations of Bach's Life

as

As

god-

parents to Bachs

not

live long.

)-ears

that

son Leopold August, his namesake, ^vho will

little

There

to suggest that during the five and a half

is little

Bach spent in Cothen anything arose

lationship; after his departure,

He

"house kapellmeister.''

to cloud the

he will continue to be

good re-

titled the

returns several times to the court

Leipzig and performs his works

—

from

the last being the TrauerkantatCy

B\W 244a, upon the death of the prince. In Leopold, Bach finds a ruler

Muses.

into a court of the

formed

at a

Academy

young

He

who wants

Cothen

to transform

has an extraordinar)^ appreciation,

age, for the arts: after

two years

at the Knights'

on the grand

in Berlin, the prince sets out

tour,

almost

completely documented in ledgers and travel journals. During four winter months in

The Hague

in 1710-n, he attends the opera twelve

times; later he acquires, for the steep price of fifty-five talers, "rare

works by

M.

Lully, the printed music"

—

neither the

purchase of scores on

himself organizes, he engages up to twelve musicians. casions he plan's the harpsichord

In in

few years

few highlights of the

are a

tour, in \'^ienna

Cantatas,"

last

On these

oc-

\iolin.

and

was Johann David

it

who at the time was still in Rome on a scholarship. Only later the Saxon prince elector \\dll meet him on his own

grand tour and make him kapellmeister

Here

nor

also goes to the opera,

he hires a violin master. Perhaps

Heinichen, a

and the

London and Venice Leopold

Rome

first

his journey. °^ For evening musicales that he

sits

Dresden.

at the court in

final stages

of Leopold s grand

he acquires Francesco Mancini's **Book

for the

famous

portrait painter

^^ith

Twelve

Johann Kupezk\; and

bm-s a \iolin from the dealer Faschinger. Continuing on to Dresden,

he goes to the court opera to hear the famous virtuoso Francesco Borosini sing. 1713,

On the way back to Cothen, where he arrives in April

he stops in Leipzig to take in the musical

oflFerings at

Zimmer-

manns Coffeehouse.

The

prince spends

more than 55,000

resulting costs will prove even higher. litde

more time

to build

talers

While

and expand an

on the

tour,

and the

the prince can take a

art gallery;

whose eventual

dimensions and rich holdings will be impressive, and to construct a From Matins Singer

to Hofkapcllmcistcr

loi

good-sized orangerie, Leopold turns his mind immediately upon his return to reconstituting a kapelle that of the typical central

whose

German

quality

intended to exceed

small court, and he will actually

ambition."7

fulfill this

Leopold

which the

sets

about hiring members of the Berlin court kapelle,

upon

his

accession; with

kapellmeister to the ensemble as

He

Bach

is

appointed.

largely complete.

seventeen musicians

is

appointed interim

taking shape, and in gratitude

it is

dedicates six Italian cantatas to the prince in

is

1715.

Strieker has to step

By the time Bach assumes

The

I,

them comes the former

kapellmeister, Reinhard Augustin Strieker.

aside once

Wilhelm

puritanical Prussian Soldier King, Friedrich

has dissolved

ensemble

is

his post, the

surviving sources allow us to

who belong to the kapelle

name

during Bach's years in

Cothen, most of them permanently:"^

Joseph Spiess

Premier

Cammer

Musicus (concertmaster) Christian Bernhard Linigke

Cammer Musicus,

Johann Ludwig Rose Christian Ferdinand Abel

Karl Friedrich Vetter

Cammer Musicus

Martin Friedrich Marcus

Cammer Musicus,

violinist

130 talers

Johann Christoph Torle

Cammer Musicus,

bassoonist

130 talers

Johann Valentin Fischer

Cammer Musicus

125 talers

Johann Heinrich Freitag

Violinist, flautist

120 talers

Johann Christian Krahle

Court trumpeter

108 talers

Johann Ludwig Schreiber

Court trumpeter

108 talers

Johann Gottlob Wurdig

Town

cellist

183 talers

Cammer Musicus,

oboist

150 talers

Cammer Musicus,

gambist

150 talers

piper,

Musicus,

137 talers

Cammer

flautist

74 talers

Anton Unger

Court timpanist

72 talers

Wilhelm Andreas Harbordt

Court Musicus,

Adam Ludwig Weber

Town

Johann Freitag

Ripienist

Emanuel Heinrich

Cammer Musicus,

Gotd. Freitag 102

The

Stations of Bach's Life

ripienist

52 talers

40

piper

talers

32 talers violinist

20

talers

The number of ripienists may have been the score copyist and a page or two

increased by the addition of

who had musical training. As no-

tations in ledgers or other records suggest, cantors, organists, city pipers

from Cothen

ex officio or

on an ad hoc

The documents

basis.

from elsewhere were engaged and

sicians

performances

also participated in

the size of their honoraria, remained in

also

show

and

at court,

that

mu-

occasionally, to judge

Cothen

Although most of the outsiders performed

for

as soloists

some

—

by

time. "9

the records

note guest appearances by violinists, lutenists, and players of the

waldhorn and pantaleon particular

need

— they

arose. All in

all.

Bach has

superior in both quality and size. it

suffers three deaths

also joined the

ensemble when a

at his disposal

Although during

and two departures,

it

his

an ensemble

time in office

does not have to con-

tend wdth budgetary reductions.

Those who

some of whom office

and

who

set the

tone are the well-paid chamber musicians,

receive substantial increases during Bach's time in

without doubt are one and

makes sense that Leopold

hires Christian

all

excellent soloists. It

Ferdinand Abel, an out-

standing virtuoso on the cello and viola da gamba, for the prince plays the

gamba

himself.

flautist Freitag also

But the concertmaster Spiess and the

stand out in the ensemble

nificant flute sonata

by the

latter

as

has recently

Leopold must have viewed the kapelle he not only took some of the

—

soloists

composers; a sig-

come

to light."°

as the jewel in his

crown; ^^^

along on his regular trips to

Carlsbad but perhaps also showed them off at the court in Dresden, for instance

when he

attended wedding

festivities there in

Septem-

ber 1719.

We have somewhat more detailed information about the journey to Carlsbad in the year 1718: in addition to Bach, the prince has

him

six

balo

is

members of the

with

kapelle; furthermore, "the princely clavicem-

shipped to CarlsBad" after them, presumably because they do

not find any good instrument there. This step offers a clear indication that the prince cares a great deal about having fine able."^

Another instance of Leopold's

keyboard instruments

at his court

is

desire

to

music

have excellent

Bach's trip to Berlin in

From Matins

avail-

March

Singer to Hofkapellmeister

103

1719;

he goes for the purpose of examining and bringing home a new

two-manual harpsichord

The chamber

by Michael Mietke.

built

ledgers note reimbursements for rehearsals

collegium musicum held at Bach's house these are weekly events/^^ It

is

— another source

by the

tells

us

not

likely that these rehearsals involve

always the entire kapelle but sometimes the smaller ensemble of

chamber musicians. These musicians would have the hearse on their

own and v^thout

tion of Bach,

whose appointment

right to re-

further supervision than the direcspecifically designates

him

as

"Kapellmeister and Director of our chamber music."^^^ It is intriguing to

imagine the members of

this

ensemble per-

forming some of Bach's sonatas, which are by no means easy to

and

also

performing the solo parts in concerts, for which

play,

at least

two

or even three vocalists are available in Cothen/^5 There could be, in

appropriate circumstances, performances of the second and fourth

Brandenburg Concertos, a solo-tutti contrast almost rivaling the richness of Italian orchestration.

Whereas

it is

difficult in

every instance to form a precise picture

of the quality achieved in Bach's Leipzig performances, quite certain that in

Cothen the ensemble

pieces were always metic-

ulously rehearsed and brilliantly performed.

on

particular emphasis parts.

we may be

Bach no doubt placed

a differentiated articulation of the vocal solo

That conclusion can be drawn

directly

from the surviving

sources (of which, to be sure, there are few) and indirectly from Bach's later practice in Leipzig: there he

made

notations

on the

scores with detailed reminders for future performances, perhaps so as to avoid lengthy rehearsals. In

Cothen such

rehearsals unquestion-

ably took place.

In discussing the instrumentalists, calists.

As

Bach's

first

we

should not neglect the vo-

the chamber ledgers reveal, most of the vocalists during years in

Cothen were guest performers; from

1720 on, the

daughters of Monjou, the supervisor of pages, and from December 1721 on, Bach's

Liturgical

new

The

Anna Magdalena,

and secular

prince's birthday

104

wife,

on

10

festival

music

December and

Stations of Bach's Life

is

held regular positions. to be provided for the

to present congratulations

and

best wishes to the reigning family of Anhalt-Cothen

Day.

As

far as

we

are informed, the libretti are

Friedrich Hunold,

known

and passion

his opera

for the court in

as

texts,

Cothen

Menantes,

who was

Leipzig period

active in Halle but also

when he

is

worked

Menantes Bach has

and an adherent of the

upon him during

will call

composing the cantata "Ich bin

in

his

mir

BWV 204.

vergniigt,"

Of the

congratulatory pieces written in the

know only a tatas:

penned by Christian

until his death in 1721. In

Bach

New Year's

a poet noted particularly for

a distinguished poet, secular in orientation "gallant" school of literature.

on

few, those later transformed

"Der Himmel dacht auf Anhalts

66a; "Die Zeit, die

Cothen period we

by Bach into

Ruhm und

religious can-

Gliick,"

BWV

BWV 134a; and "DurchBWV 173a. Traces of other compositions can be

Tag und Jahre macht,"

lauchtster Leopold,"

found elsewhere; the Bach Compendium follows these

traces

under

numbers B30 and G4-11. Because so there

is

a

little

from

this

group of works has been preserved,

tendency to undervalue Bach's

efforts in this area.

Yet in

likelihood he planned for these special events with great care.

weU-documented example

is

the prince's birthday in

all

One

171 8: at least

four guest artists are invited to help perform the cantatas "Lobet den

Herrn,

alle

BWV Anh. and the previously BWV 66a — the discantist Prese and the

seine Herrscharen,"

mentioned secular cantata

I 5,

bass Johann Gottfried Riemenschneider, as well as the violinists Lin-

igke from

Merseburg and Johann Gottfried Vogler from Leipzig.

We know

Uttle

Cothen, but we are orchestral

enough about the cantatas Bach composed really

groping in the dark

it

comes

to his

and chamber works. Cothen's Court of the Muses

tainly has a kapelle

whose

hard to match anywhere. sical expertise

equals his

The

court

is

headed by

enthusiasm. There is

full respect.

ascribed to this period in Bach's

is

a highly

no doubt selected with great care

assured of his prince's

cer-

and ensemble players would be

soloists

collection of scores. Finally, there ter,

when

in

a prince

whose mu-

apparently a splendid

motivated kapellmeis-

for the position

and therefore

But what works can be

definitely

life?

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

105

and foremost we must mention the Brandenburg

First

Bach 24

certainly

March

composed the

1721 to

entire score in

Concertos.

Cothen, dedicating

it

on

Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg. The

handwritten dedication in French reads: Six Concerts

Avec plusieurs Instruments. Dediees

A Son Altesse Royalle CRETIENLOUIS par Son tres-humble

&

tres obeissant

Serviteur

Jean Sebastien Bach

Maitre de Chapelle de

S.

A. S:

le

Prince regnant dAnhalt-Coethen

The

dedicatory essay, written in less than perfect French, begins:

Monseigneur, whereas I had afew years ago the pleasure ofplaying before Your Royal Highness, at Your Highnesses commandy

and whereas I noted on

that occasion that the modest talent for

music that Heaven has bestowed upon

and whereas

eyes,

honor

me with

in departing

1 have,

of mine,

nesses

most gracious charge, taken the to

in accordance liberty

We do

know when

not

trips to the

it

when Bach

skills

my

most

concertos,

.^^^ .

Bach's encounter with the margrave oc-

took place during one of Prince Leopold's many

Bach

scholars are

chose the

unanimous

six concertos,

in the

assumption

he took into account the

of the Brandenburg kapelle, but that he also delved into a sup-

ply of works already

Perhaps he 106

offulfilling

baths or during Bach's journey in 1719 to Berlin to buy

the harpsichord. that

to

with Your High-

Your Royal Highness with the present

which I have scoredfor several instruments.

curred; perhaps

Your

Your Highness some composi-

tions

humble duty

in

Your Royal Highness deigned

the charge to send

therefore

me foundfavor

The

felt

on hand from

drawn away from

Stations of Bach's Life

his

his

time in

Weimar

or Cothen.

current place of employment,

as

was so often the case with him; the dedication would then have conSuch considerations,

stituted a subtle application for a position.

however, are of less importance than the recognition that in the form

of the Brandenburg Concertos Bach was presenting a unique form,

at

once concentrated and rich in variation, of the ensemble concerto. Until a few years ago

it

was taken

for granted that

most of

Bach's orchestral compositions originated in the

Cothen

period,

when

among

his offi-

the presentation of such works was included

cial duties.

chestra

two

is

The number of surviving

small: besides the

violin concertos

BWV

two vioHns

original compositions for or-

Brandenburg Concertos we have only the

BWV 1041

and 1042, the double concerto

and the four orchestra overtures

1043,

for

BWV

1066-69. Then, on the basis of new examination and analysis of the existing source material, Christoph

Wolff put

sive thesis that all Bach's orchestral

works for which no handwritten

versions

from Weimar or Cothen

in Leipzig.^^7

He

exist

forth the

comprehen-

must have been composed

argued that the collegium musicum in Leipzig,

under Bach's direction from 1729 on, provided ample occasions for such compositions.

This

thesis has

tions.

The

major

BWV 1042

in the light

of fiirther considera-

existing handwritten copies of the violin concerto in

after Bach's sitions.

been modified

The

and the overture

E

BWV 1069 were prepared only

death and thus provide no basis for dating these compooverture in

C

fi-om an original that can

major

BWV 1066

may have been

copied

be dated more plausibly from the Cothen

period than from Leipzig.

The

other works under discussion exist

only in the form of scores for the separate parts, prepared for a specific

performance and therefore offering no clue

composition. In particular,

new

research has

versions of the violin concerto in

minor

BWV 1067 and D

major

A

of

as to the date

shown

that the existing

minor and the overtures

in

B

BWV 1068 belong to a period that

can hardly represent their earliest incarnations. ^^^ Thus although these works cannot be unambiguously reassigned to Cothen, neither

can they be clearly claimed for the Leipzig period. Cothen's status as the "town of provenance"

From Matins Singer

is

threatened not

to Hofkapellmeister

107

only from the direction of Leipzig but also from that of Weimar. six

Brandenburg Concertos were doubtless

compiled

first

The

as a collec-

tion in Cothen, although not without a rather long period of gestation.

For most of the concertos, older versions existed, in some cases

Weimar

perhaps going back to the particular

works

comes

to his kapellmeister

large

and highly

—

that

is,

unde-

it is

faces uncharted territory

music in Cothen

to locate the kind of concertos

While the dating of

be a topic of discussion,

will continue to

Bach scholarship

niably true that

period.^^9

when

when

it

it tries

and overtures that the director of a

skilled court kapelle

would have been

contractually

required to provide.

We are of course not dealing with dozens, let alone hundreds, of works, such as Bach's contemporaries Telemann, Graupner, Stolzel, or Fasch

composed in

similar positions.

Bach was not

poser; rather, he tended to concentrate

on

just a

a prolific

com-

few projects and

models over a period of time. Yet we wish we could form a picture of

him

as

works

an orchestral composer for

not raises questions.

It

seems certain that not

Cothen have

positions from

survived, but

the history of Bach's works if the sitions

was very

of the composer of

as distinct as that

keyboard and organ or of cantatas.

it

The all

we

fact that

the orchestral

can-

com-

would be an anomaly

number of lost

orchestral

compo-

large.

For the time being

at least,

Cothen Bach composed

relatively

unknown. Contrary

to

some

we must

thus conjecture that in

few orchestral works

speculation,

we

—

for reasons

have no evidence that

during Bach's tenure the prince turned his back on the kapelle.

seems

far

more

likely that

he

really

was

knew" music and therefore remained meister, even

in

though the

chestra, increasingly

latter, in his

man "who

both loved and

"gracious" toward his kapell-

capacity as leader of the or-

performed the works of other composers to give

himself time to pursue his

somewhat more

a

It

own

explorations of

new

sparsely fiarnished repertories of

territory

—

the

chamber and key-

board music. In this realm at least we can form a more distinct picture of Bach in io8

Cothen, for The

we

have some clearly established dates.

Stations of Bach's Life

The

fair

copy

of Set Solo senza Basso accompagnato, the three sonatas and three partitas for

BWV 1001-06, dates from the year 1720. It

solo violin

22 January that

Bach begins the

Wilhelm Friedemann. In Notenbuchlein for

We

Klavierbuchlein for his eldest son,

he writes the

first

the

first

time in Cothen,

part of The

and Sinfonias.

should place the solo works for cello

sonatas for a

pages of the

his

those for the violin, since they have

exist

title

end of

1723, at the

tide page of the Inventions

BWV 1007^12 next to

come down

to us in a

Anna Magdalena's hand from around

script written in

on

Anna Magdalena Bach and

Well-Tempered Clavier. In

comes the

1721

is

melody instrument with harpsichord

manu-

1720. Several

obligato,

which

only in later handwritten copies, can be assigned to the Cothen

chamber music

repertory, but only hypotheticaUy: the six violin

BWV ioi4-i9a, the sonatas for viola da gamba BWV 1027-29, as well as the flute sonatas BWV 1030a, 1034, and 1035. sonatas

Of the

first

Notenbuchlein for

Anna Magdalena

only a torso has

survived. It does, however, contain early versions of five of the six

French

Suites,

BWV 812-17,

thereby making

it

clear that this series

belongs chiefly to the Cothen period, to which the works that Forkel rather arbitrarily calls the English Suites, also

be assigned

— contrary

to the widespread scholarly

The

they were composed in Weimar/3°

making, of which

we

BWV 806, should perhaps view that

practice of family music

catch a glimpse in the fragments of the

first

Notenbuchlein for Bach's wife, emerges clearly from the second collection of keyboard chiefly

works dedicated

of movements from

must jump ahead

when Bach was

dance pieces, religious

suites, smallish

and secular songs, and elaborated

We

to her: the repertory consists

recitatives

and

arias.

to the Notenbuchlein, not

begun

until 1725,

already in Leipzig, in order to highlight the differ-

ence between this work and the Klavierbuchlein that he put together

exacdy two months

after the ninth birthday

spite the interruptions in his

damental character

is

work on

of his eldest son. De-

this latter collection, its fun-

clearly didactic,

with emphasis not only on

mastering the keyboard but also on achieving excellence in compositional technique.

To be

sure, parts

of the

From Matins

first

section are intended

Singer to Hofkapellmeister

109

music and keyboard playing: the

for basic instruction in offers

examples of notation, fingering, and flourishes,

two no doubt

versions of lieben

Gott

carefully selected chorales,

book

little

as well as easy

"Wer nur den

walten" and "J^su, meine Freude." It also contains

lasst

the nine litde preludes

BWV 924-32 and a few dance movements, to

whose composition Wilhelm Friedemann may have contributed himself Telemann and Gottfried Heinrich Stolzel are represented

with one

suite each.

But the volume's

real substance consists

by Wilhelm Friedemann, of preludes

versions, copied only partially

from the Well-Tempered Clavier i, in the sequence of keys

C

minor,

D

D

minor,

E

major,

F

major,

major,

major, C-sharp

minor; also from the two-

Praeambulum,

as the

F

C

in the

key sequence of

B-flat major,

E minor, F major, G major, A minor, B minor, A major, G minor, F minor, E major, E-flat major, D

C

minor; and finally with the three-part sinfonias in the

C

major,

D

known

E

minor,

major, C-sharp minor, E-flat minor, part inventions

of early

major, and

minor,

key sequence of minor,

B

telling

major,

D

minor,

minor, B-flat major,

E-flat major,

This

C

minor,

F

major,

G

major,

A

A major, G minor, F minor, E major,

D major.

and

listing

E

of the keys

may seem

tedious, but

it

provides a

glimpse into the genesis of the keyboard cycles that were to

play such a significant part in music history. Their final form was by

no means established

at the outset; for instance.

Bach may have

ex-

pected to write only one two- and one three-part invention for each step

on the diatonic

rectly reveals that

scale.

The

repertory of the Klavierbuchlein indi-

he reached two decisions crucial for the

of The Well-Tempered Clavier only ludes and fugues and to include

of the rising chromatic

all

at a

final

form

very late stage: to link pre-

major and minor keys in the order

scale.

How important he considered the last-named collections can be seen from their detailed

titles;

they could have been intended

basis for a printed version, or at least to

Cothen how

significant these

make

as the

clear to the prince

works should be considered,

of

falling as

they did outside the ordinary purview of Bach's kapellmeister's duties.

no The

Stations of Bach's Life

The Well-Tempered

Clavier

or Preludes, and

Fugues through

Both

all

the Tones and Semitones,

Ut Re Mi

in regard to the tertia major or

And

minor or Re

in regard to the tertia

Mi Use and

Fa. For the

of musical youth

profit

Desirous of learning, as well as for

The

pastime of those already skilled

In these studies, composed and

completed by Johann Sebastian Bach p.t.

Kapellmeister to His Serene Highness, the Prince of Anhalt-Cothen, and Director of his

Chamber Music.

Anno 1722

The

Inventions and Sinfonias bear the

title:

Proper Instruction

Wherein

And

to lovers

especially those desirous

A clear way Parts,

And

but

(i)

of learning,

shown

is

to learn to play cleanly not merely in

also, after further progress, (2) to

two

proceed properly

well with three obligato parts and furthermore, at the

Same

To

of the Clavier,

time, not merely to have

good

execute the same well, but above

Style in playing

inventions but all,

to achieve cantabile

and furthermore acquire

a strong

Foretaste of composition.

Produced

By Joh. Seb.

Bach

Kapellmeister to his Serene Highness

The

Anno

Prince of Anhalt-Cothen

Christi 1723

From Matins Singer

to Hofkapellmeister

iii

In both cases, Bach signs himself as the kapellmeister of Cothen, despite the fact that

both works were not actually produced

his duties in this position but constitute a first

as part

major attempt

at

of

de-

veloping the core of a universal theory of music, using the example

of keyboard music

as a starting point.

The

idea

is

to demonstrate this

theory not with a random assortment of models but with a coherent series

The combination of elementary and

of significant works.

phisticated works, of strict

and free

of systematic planning and

style,

of order and expressiveness,

lively multiplicity,

of spirituality and sen-

sual sound, represents the first potent expression

that

we will discuss in greater detail later. The concept of "multiplicity in unity"

these works offers a

so-

of a complex idea

that finds realization in

framework into which one can

also effortlessly

the Brandenburg Concertos and the violin solos; the former

embody

the relevant possibiUties within the genre of the concerto, in

compo-

fit

sitions

with a

colorfiil

ensemble of instruments; the

latter restrict

themselves, this time in the realm of the sonata and the suite, to a single voice.

Although our limited sources prevent us from

ascertain-

ing whether Bach composed only the works mentioned or others as

document

well to

his universaUst thinking,

of his oeuvre speaks for of

how

itself:

Cothen

also

losophy of musical order. Against

make an educated guess

ter,

he

offers

pursued step by step his phi-

this intellectual horizon,

at the significance

as conscientiously as

Bach

of the

we can

later years in

flilfiUed his duties as

kapellmeis-

also gave his creative impulses free rein.

Can

this

behavior also be interpreted as a sort of "inner emigra-

tion" in response to adverse conditions in

cent

an important example

he not only responded to the circumstances in which he

found himself at a given time but

Cothen:

what has been preserved

Bach

Leopold

is

Anhalt-Cothen? More

re-

scholarship has pointed out that during his reign Prince trying to repel attacks

finds himself in conflict with his conflict that forces

Leopold

to

on two

fronts:

on the one hand, he

younger brother, August Ludwig, a renounce his secundogeniture rule

over Anhalt-Cothen-Warmsdorf and the revenue from that province.

After 112

fierce struggles, a

The

settlement

Stations of Bach's Life

is

reached in August

1722.^^^

On

the other hand, Leopold

is

by the

assailed

efforts

of his mother,

Gisela Agnes, to strengthen the position of the Lutheran creed in the principality. Officially the principality

formed gio,"

faith, in

is

committed

to the re-

conformity with the principle "cuius regio, eius

enshrined in the Peace of Augsburg of

1555,

reli-

for in 1596 Prince

Johann Georg

forcibly established Calvinism in the

and almost

the villages around. Lutheranism nonetheless retains

its

all

loyal adherents for over a century,

that Gisela

Agnes

is

town of Cothen

who now benefit from

the fact

and energetically pursues

herself a Lutheran

the construction of a Lutheran church and the establishment of a

Lutheran school in Cothen.

weaken Leopold s power not

Whether Bach was

inconsiderably.

affected

by these

he grew weary of his position seems his reasons for leaving

conflicts to the point that

In any discussion of

doubtfiil.

Cothen, one should give the most credence to

those he cites in his letter to

Erdmann.

He

explains that after the

prince married at the end of 1721, his interest in music

"somewhat lukewarm" seemed

"to

and

Political confrontations erupt^^^

— perhaps because

became

who

of his young wife,

be an amusa?'^^^ Bach adds that Leipzig offers better ed-

ucational opportunities for his sons.

We have little evidence that would allow us to comment reliably on the

first

reason Bach mentions so cautiously.

Of course

it is

con-

ceivable that the nineteen-year-old princess, Friederica Henrietta of

Anhalt-Bernburg, had

husband

less

appreciation for Bach's music than her

did. In general, though, she

but hostile to music and the other

seems to have been anything

The

arts.

inventory of her papers

includes "A notebook wherein are several small Pieces of music

bound

in

Turkish paper,"

ing, in a case," "a

are written," as

"An

aria,

"a ditto in

book bound

in

French binding, with

brown

leather,

gilt letter-

wherein several Arias

"two written books of notes, in Turkish paper,"

with blue gilt-edged paper.

scores allows us to infer that she

the collection

is

engaged

rather extensive for this

the time of her marriage

"^^"^

in

The

as well

presence of musical

some music making, and

young noblewoman, who

would have only another

sixteen

at

months

to live.

From Matins

Singer to Hofkapellmeister

113

Bach's

reference

to

the better educational opportunities

in

Leipzig seems plausible; for the younger boys, the Latin School in

Cothen may have been Bachs

last

chance to move to a university town!

At any years in

rate,

Bach's critical remarks in retrospect about the last

Cothen may

reflect accurately his

mood

that

change. But hasn't this been true at least since 1720,

on

his trip to

Concertos to

Hamburg,

when he

or 1721,

time for a

when he

Margrave Ludwig Christian? In the course of his

of his current circumstances comes left

it is

Cothen

if

out

set

dedicated the Brandenburg

often feels impatient to leave a place, and at such

have

was perhaps

perfectly adequate, but this

easily.

moments

life,

he

criticism

Yet he would surely not

Leipzig had not exerted the greatest imaginable

professional attraction.

On his path from matins singer to court kapellmeister Bach never fails

to find recognition

— on

the contrary, he enjoys a steady, almost

steep rise in prestige, such as only a

granted.

We

few of

his contemporaries are

should take note of his unobtrusive yet remarkably

quent changes in employment element in his

—

artistic existence

a sign

up

fre-

of the searching, seething

to this point.

Even Cothen does

not signal that he has arrived. In the effort he invests in The Well-

Tempered Clavier and the Inventions and Sinfonias in

particular,

he

proves to be a composer committed not to art dictated by courtly taste

but to a kind of music that explore and express in his

music, the years in also represent a sical life is

Cothen

sets its

own

own

standard, a music he wants to

way. In terms of his philosophy of

are a period

of seeking and finding. They

high point for Bach with respect to the way his

organized. From the beginning of his

career,

mu-

he has hated

having to work v^th mediocre or inadequate resources. In Cothen he has everything he needs. In Leipzig he will again have to fight for a "well-regulated church music"

performers

114

The

— and

— meaning music with enough

will eventually

Stations of Bach's Life

be forced to capitulate.

skilled

CANTOR AT

ST.

THOMAS AND CITY MUSIC

DIRECTOR IN LEIPZIG

THE POSITION AND Once appointed

ITS

NEW INCUMBENT

to the position of cantor at St. Thomas's,

changes, almost overnight, a feature of his notational

of the

C

Does

clef

this detail

portend the

many

One

small, that await the thirty-eight-year-old? will

be working under public scrutiny

post.

The Hamburg

far

style:

the same time

it

the form

changes, large and

thing

more than

in

is

certain:

he

any previous

press alone will devote fourteen reports to the

appointment of the new cantor. Perhaps the emphasis

Hamburgers' pique

Bach

at "their"

reflects the

Telemann's being passed over, but at

suggests the visibility of this particular office even

outside the immediate region.

Indeed, for centuries following the Reformation important sicians at St.

and composers have been appointed Thomas's,

among them Wolfgang

Sethus Calvisius, Johann

hann

Schelle,

Hermann

to the cantor's position

Figulus, Valentin Otto,

Schein, Sebastian Kniipfer, Jo-

and Johann Kuhnau. The incumbent

teacher with academic training.

He

mu-

is

always a

occupies a position in the hier-

archy of the collegium just below the principal (known as the rector)

and vice

and

five

principal,

Latin classes per week.^

the student choir ticular

with a teaching load of seven music lessons

when

it

He

is

also responsible for directing

performs for church services; but

this par-

duty reveals the awkwardness inherent in the position, an

Cantor

at St.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

115

awkwardness that his

more recent So long

will affect Bach's

work in Leipzig

of

as it did that

predecessors.

as the artistically prepossessing vocal

music accompany-

ing the services consisted primarily of variations on the motet form,

such as an Introitus motet, a kyrie, a Gloria, and a motet based on a passage from Scripture, the cantor was the ideal director; he could

works with the students during

practice the appropriate structional time,

and then they would perform the works without

further ado in church. positions.

But

The

this type

when

a

pieces did not need to be his

of performance, well suited to the

a student choir, reached century,

their in-

its

of

abilities

limit in the course of the seventeenth

new concept of sacred music began

now progressively minded

own com-

to

make

inroads:

musicians were no longer content to con-

tribute small choral flourishes to the individual elements of the liturgy;

it

became

ing on their

own

their ambition to offer pieces capable

—

first spiritual

of stand-

concertos, later cantatas in several

movements.

Thus Christoph Bernhard, claims the

''stylus

continue" the rians

compositionis of performing a concerto over a basso

new style of the

seventeenth century.

shift

Bernhard describes has three

manner of composing changes: the motet

sizes "not so

much

certizing style,

the text as the harmony,"

which

and good is

is

style,

aspects. First,

which empha-

replaced by the con-

more types of dissonance

arias that suit well the texts ..."

A

special variant

of

.

.

this

the "theatrical."^

Second, along with the

mance

a stylus luxu-

consists of "fairly rapid notes in part, peculiar

leaps, calculated to stir the emotions,

style

As

in the papal kapelle.

The paradigm

tal

of Heinrich Schiitz, pro-

supplants the old stylus gravis, the use of which persists un-

it

changed only

the

a student

style

of composition, the type of perfor-

also changes: the choir tends to be replaced by an instrumen-

ensemble with vocal

soloists that takes its

cue from the basso

continuo.

And

itself felt:

beauty and harmony no longer serve merely to objectify

and enhance ii6

The

third, a

new understanding of

a given liturgical text; they are

Stations of Bach's Life

sacred music

now

makes

a vehicle for self-

representation

God

on the part of the

— addressing Him

faithful,

nizes the difficulties that the

Of

Evangelist

The

s

his

new

new

style

mu-

Weihnachts-Historie he prudently allows only the

part with the continuo

to be feared "that aside

ventiones

of composing, recog-

stylus luxurians presents for

accompaniment

of the parts are available exclusively

rest

raise their voices to

passionately and direcdy.

Heinrich Schiitz, a master of the

sicians.

who

In Bach's day, the

as copies;

because

it is

from well-staffed princely Kapelles, such in-

would hardly be

where,"^ they must not

to be printed.

able to achieve their intended effect else-

fall

into the

new music

is

wrong hands. referred to as Figuralmusik. This

term, according to a definition perhaps derived from Christoph Bernhard, in

means

Johann Gottfried Walther s Musikalisches Lexikon of

a kind

of music "whose notes are of varying type and

whose tempo

cance; and

varies

between

fast

is

flexible

and

— an explana-

makes

clear that this

it

richly nuanced, reflecting the varied

of the human emotions. In 1725, uncommon term musica formalis

when Bach for this

paniment to the

chooses the apparendy

When tata, it is

figural

music

is

its

own

inherent musical character.

presented in the form of a lengthy can-

service but the "principal music"

on the

— Bach

among others

addresses

it

—

as

that

is,

included in the

main musical event of

the

such in a note he wrote to himself

structure of church services in Leipzig, using the

the cantata

"Nun komm

der Heiden Heiland,"

posite of "principal music,"

music has

not conceived as a mere accom-

not merely one piece of music

the service

this

is

it is

of the name;

text but has

movements

same phenomenon,'^ he

emphasizing a different yet equally crucial component: a "form" deserving

signifi-

and slow"

tion that sounds simplistic but nonetheless

music

1732,

BWV

61.

margin of

As

the op-

Bach mentions "ordinary music," which

"can certainly be directed by vicarios 2.n^ praefectos!"^

One

can equate the

"recital"

of the cantata, so often mentioned in

the sources, to the sermon, which

is

always

while the performance of the motet music

is

new

for the occasion,

equivalent to the read-

ing from Scripture or the singing of hymns: the former

is

an individ-

ual creative accomplishment, the latter the presentation of something

Cantor

at St.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

117

already in existence

— of

central importance as an expression of faith

but marginal as an expression of artistic In the absence of fresh

used

as sources

books are

ability.

new compositions,

the old compendia are

of traditional motet-style pieces. Occasionally these

"fairly tattered" or

even "chewed through and through by

mice," as Bach's predecessor in office, Kuhnau, discovers

One

undertakes an inventory in 1702.^

when he

particular compilation of the

traditional repertory published in 1603 turns out to be so useful that

reprinted time and again: the Florilegium Portense of Erhard

it is

denschatz, a collection of four- to eight-part motets, most of in Latin, of

which Bach orders new copies

Bo-

them

several times starting

in 1729.

But the Florilegium Portense

no modern concerted music

offers

or cantatas. Since such music must adapt to rapidly changing tastes

and

be calibrated to the local resources available for perfor-

also

mances,

it is

not always practicable to get

tor of modern church

he

will

music in a

it

printed; only the direc-

specific location

knows what

talent

have at his disposal and what degree of modernity his supe-

riors will tolerate;

he must be

flexible,

the best case and always aware that

composing

it

his

may become

own music

in

the subject of

controversy.

Who called, ter,

in

is

the director of local

modern music,

without further specification? At courts

some towns the

organist

—

as

it is

it is

generally

the kapellmeis-

for instance, in Liibeck or Halle.

In the course of the seventeenth century, a division of labor develops: the cantor tor

is

academically trained, with strong school

ties,

the direc-

of the student choir and guardian of musical tradition; while the

organist

s

activity includes

composing, performing, directing an en-

semble that he himself must recruit from among the available musicians

and introducing new ideas

in music.

In other towns that have both a Latin school and a cantor s position, there is

leeway

is

an attempt to bridge

given to both

another, the cantor

from 118

is

For one thing,

modern organ music and

much

cantorial music; for

put in charge of modern music but not excused

his traditional duties.

The

this gap.

Stations of Bach's Life

Leipzig

is

one

compromise. The town has a

city that adopts this

When Adam

splendid tradition of vocal organ music.

himself as "devoted to the liberal arts" considers he, like his distinguished predecessor,

performing sacred vocal music

it

Krieger

who

elected organist of St. Nicholas's in 1655, this musician

self-evident that

Johann RosenmiiUer,

be

will

by the student

as well, assisted

is

describes

"col-

legium musicum." Within a year the treasury of St. Nicholas's grants

him one hundred gulden

two

for training

discantists

and paying

a

bass singer, "because the music performed heretofore by the aforesaid Kriiger [Krieger] has

been pleasing to many and has brought

fame and distinction

particular

to the entire

town and notably

to the

church."7

This remarkably enthusiastic articulation of the reasons for an appropriation of flinds

Bach

reference to

cination this

— not

a single statement like this appears in

in the Leipzig official

new music must have

documents

—

reveals the fas-

engendered, with

its

emotional,

songlike character, but also the motivation for promoting such

music:

it

strengthens Leipzig's reputation as a city of the

course these

comments can

also

arts.

Of

be read as an allusion to the inade-

quacies of the aged and feeble cantor of St. Thomas's, Tobias

Michael. Indeed, a later cantor at

with indirect criticism of his musical just

Thomas's

St.

will

taste: in 1702,

have to put up

when Kuhnau

has

been appointed, a dynamic young mayor, Franz Conrad Ro-

manus,

will

commission

a twenty-two-year-old student to

compose

The

sacred music for St. Thomas's in alternation with the cantor.

student

is

Telemann, recendy

installed as musical director

of the

opera and of a student collegium musicum.

The

Elector of Saxony has installed

Romanus

purpose of transforming Leipzig into a modern city face of opposition

manus

from conservative

circles.

for the express

—

possibly in the

A few weeks

after

takes office, a decree reaches the Leipzig city council

Ro-

from

Dresden, in the handwriting of the bold burgomaster, that without

mincing words urges the councilmen to adopt a

among

series

of innovations;

those listed are gutters to allow street cleaning and outdoor

lanterns

on

all

the houses, practice drills in bird hunting and musket Cantor

at St.

Thomas and

City Music Director in Leipzig

119

and police checks on coffeehouses. Furthermore,

firing,

during the

fair,

when foreigners come to

Leipzig from

"particularly

afar,

the music

in the churches should be raised to a high standard."^

This directive shows that excellent church music

is

as vital to

Leipzig's reputation as the splendid baroque residential

and com-

mercial palaces built at the beginning of the eighteenth century, not

of all on the

least

initiative

of the young burgomaster. Romanus pro-

motes organ music vigorously, having Telemann appointed organist

and music director of the

New

Church, whose building has

fallen

into disrepair over the centuries but since 1699 has been used again for services, at the

Romanus

also

wish of Leipzig's business community. wants to see Telemann appointed to succeed the

Kuhnau, which would place

ailing

a worldly personality in charge

of

Leipzig's church music. Yet events take a different course: in January 1705, this

age

burgomaster

who

has achieved distinction at such a young

arrested for actual or alleged malfeasance in office

is

where he spends the remaining four-

off to the Konigstein Fortress,

teen years of his that

same year

life.

Telemann, deprived of his great patron, departs

for the court at Sorau.

Under Telemann's

Melchior Hoffmann, Johann

successors

Gottfried Vbgler, and Balthasar Schott the

hub of the new music, inspired by style.

In

1717,

and dragged

the

first

New

Church remains

Italian orchestral

passion oratorio

is

performed

and operatic

in Leipzig: Tele-

mann's score to a text by the poet Barthold Heinrich Brockes. find

it

certain place

was supposed

on Good Friday before and to

be performed.

rived at church so early preacher."^ Presumably ring; at

any

rate,

and

it is

The

after the

in such

numbers

for the sake of the

The

refer-

same

Thomas's, Kuhnau, complains that he

all

at his church, for

fallen prey to "the wild opera craze,"

New Church:

Stations of Bach's Life

is

vividly. It is in this

cannot find suitable musicians for performances

also prevails at the

sermon a passion

people would surely not have ar-

he describes the situation

the student musicians have

"I recall that in a

Telemann's passion to which he

context that the cantor of St.

120

Some

comical, others a feast for the ears. In 1721, the Leipzig theol-

ogy student Gottfried Ephraim Scheibel remarks,

which

a

the young gentlemen prefer

the "merry music in the Opera, and the coffeehouses, to our chorus,"

and have no sense of proper church

which

"for

a specialized

Thus well

into the

style

and devout

and long course of study

Bach

is

liturgical music, essential."^°

period, Leipzig encourages a vocal organ

music that epitomizes the most

modem practice,

academically trained young people. Yet the city

calculated to attract

is

not ready to accept

a division of schoolmastering and composing into two offices.

was

idea

rejected as early as 1657,

^^en

The

Kriegcr's application to succeed

Tobias Michael was turned down, in spite of the great esteem in which his

accomplishments were held.

He

had

stipulated that he should not

have to "both labor in the school and act director," for the following reason: "not

as cantor, like the previous

out of any ambition to cast as-

on the school position, but because

persions

Studio Compositionis,

this effort,

along with the

would be too burdensome, considering

that one

who works himself to the bone in the school subsequendy has litde desire to

put together a musical concert, and

posing,

it

tends to turn out poorly."

if

He

he lacks desire for com-

added that the previous

incumbents of the position had "because of the school duties become stiff with

The

indignation and council

bastian Kniipfer

ill

humor and

suffered poor health.""

was not willing to compromise. To be it

willing to "inform"

that

is,

to teach

also

— and thus became the

first

cantor of St. Thomas's to subscribe unhesitatingly to the certizing style.

The

rich instrumentalization in Kniipfer s

veals plainly that the official Leipzig

with Se-

composer who was

selected a distinguished

—

sure,

new conworks

re-

church music required not only

well-trained vocal soloists but also a competent instrumental en-

semble.

The

among

the eight council musicians

ists,

cantor had to recruit the

somewhat

inferior to the

members of his ensemble from

— four town

pipers, three violin-

former in reputation and

salary,

and

a

journeyman musician. In some cases the council musicians may have had apprentices and additional journeymen associated with them.

The

cantor could also count on funds for student assistants; but these

flinds

flowed sparsely and not with the desired regularity.

Bach's activity in Leipzig can be understood only against the

background of the Cantor

special circumstances prevailing there.

at St.

Thomas and City Music

As

Director in Leipzig

the 121

cantor of St. Thomas's and director of music, Bach faces a structural

problem and one not merely organizational but ideological.

This problem,

Over the

too,

centuries, there

also theological

must be described

in

some

and

detail.

was probably no Leipzig council

mem-

ber who did not want his city to be important and at least reasonably

cosmopolitan. In particular, the enthusiasm for music displayed by the leading officials was far greater than that of most comparable

where would one find today a

politicians in our day;

majority of whose

members would argue

city council the

that for every

Sunday and

holiday service a concertizing piece as long and difficult as a Bach cantata should be performed?

That the Leipzig

city council as a

body supports the

cultivation

of this kind of music shows the desire of an ambitious middle to gain access to music

on which the

aristocracy has

music should no longer be heard only in a

oly:

tocratic context,

aesthetic

middle

it

monop-

a source of sensual pleasure. True, the

does not yet have at

its

disposal the institutional

nancial resources of a court, nor does pleasure of the sort in It is therefore a

a

liturgical or aris-

should also be experienced as an autonomous

phenomenon and

class

had

which the

and

fi-

ethos countenance pure

its

aristocracy indulges.

matter of both necessity and virtue that the re-

orientation of middle-class music occurs in a church setting. this point

class

opinions diverge

—

as they

would

today.

The

But on

question

is

how much "modern"

church music a normal church service can ac-

commodate without

losing sight of

tion.

its

purpose

— namely,

edifica-

Skepticism toward innovation, extending well back into the

seventeenth century, takes three different aspects. First, the

music represents

more

artistic excellence

to the churchgoers' ears

sire for

and

or even virtuosity, thus appealing lust for novelty

devotion. Second, for the faithful

musical sensibility or interest, this music

and therefore not Third,

it is

who

is

than to their de-

lack any particular

difficult to

understand

particularly conducive to religious edification.

the sermon, using the spoken and thus unambiguous the hearts of the faithful;

what

pronounced from the pulpit should not be overshadowed by

litur-

word, that is

new

122

The

is

chiefly intended to

Stations of Bach's Life

move

gical

music that goes on too long and assumes too

much importance

of its own.

Duke

It is in this spirit that

Ernst the Pious follows up a general

with the directive that in his province of Saxony-

visitation in 1645

Gotha-Altenburg everyone should "bring

his breviary to

church and

read therein during the figural singing and organ playing. "^^ In the

subsequent period, important Lutheran reformist theologians inveigh quite frequently against church music that takes the place of "the old, silent devotions," music in pipers,

and musicians,

mances

in city churches

hearts' content":

tones, but

know

battle or depart

and

ing,

artfiiUy

which the

organists, cantors,

"oft unspiritual persons, lead the perfor-

and

and diddle

play, sing, fiddle,

to their

"You hear much roaring and booming, and soaring not what

from that

it is,

whether you should gird yourself for

place;

several strive against

one chases the other in concertiz-

one another to see

and echo the nightingale most subdy

who

." .

.

can do

Thus

most

it

the Rostock

theologian Theophil Grossgebauer laments and mocks the goings-

on

in churches in his 1661

"Watchman's Voice from the Devastated

Zion." In 1687, his attentive reader Philipp Jacob Spener, father of

more moderate form of Pietism,

the

sounding but no

less

expresses a

more amiable-

disapproving view in a theological assessment:

he suggests that extensive figural music be restricted either to the end

of the service or to specially arranged performances.^^

The same

spirit

informs the comments in the

Leipzig

official

Church Bulletin: Item, Clear Instructions for the Conduct of Church Services in

Leipzig from the year 1710: there one finds suggestions as to

how "one

can spend the time during which the organist

ing a prelude or playing at length (even though

is

improvis-

some [members of

the congregation] have but slight regard for figural or often operatic

music) more profitably than in idle chatter."

mend

"prayer

sung" (page

The

when

the organ

is

The

playing or a Latin motet

is

is

being

5).

Pietists are

not the only ones

who worry that

music may take on a significance independent of the cern

authors recom-

shared by

many

Cantor

artistic

church

service; the

con-

representatives of Lutheran orthodoxy,

who

at St.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

123

need not be

hostile to art

tions of cantor

and

city

and music

music

oppose separating the posi-

to

They believe

director.

ically trained and, if possible, theologically

be best equipped to serve

as a

that an

academ-

knowledgeable cantor will

municipal music director

who

prevents

the gulf between tradition and modernity from becoming unbridgeable.

While

a music director without ties to the church

sumably ignore the

would include

it

modern

Thomas's

chorus musicus, a St.

would pre-

Thomas's cantor

in his arrangements as a valuable artistic "instru-

ment" and thereby

The

St.

signal the intention to preserve traditional values.

Leipzig city council does not have political parties in the sense but rather conducts

its

The

business by consensus.

advocates of opposing positions must therefore eventually reach

agreement. This

modus operandi has

its

advantages but also

its

dis-

advantages: problems are seldom resolved definitively. This indefiniteness will beset the search for a successor to

the end.

Johann Kuhnau.^'^ In

Bach will be hired under the terms of a compromise

will "strive to

honor" on the highest

artistic level

that he

but never fully ac-

cept professionally.

Abraham Christoph

Plaz, a sixty-eight-year-old appeals judge;

Adrian Steger, about sixty-one; and Gottfried Lange, those are the three Leipzig burgomasters

who

fifty:

set the

in 1722

tone in the

Leipzig city council. All are well educated, highly respected, and by

no means narrow-minded men, and Plaz and Lange have traveled extensively. Plaz

theology, and

was halfway through

his studies

had even studied Hebrew, before he decided

law his profession. In Leipzig he performs various also chairs the

toward a degree in to

make

legal fimctions;

governing body of St. Nicholas's and has close

he

ties to

the Spener branch of Pietism.

Lange, also a lawyer, already has behind him a career in

at the court

Dresden. There he rose to the position of manager of the Privy

Cabinet, the highest post open to a non-noble. Wanting to see as "his

man

on the

in Leipzig," the Elector

council.

from Dresden

When

in 1717,

the council

The

for a position

resists, a secret directive arrives

mandating that Lange be elected

burgomaster's position to 124

recommends him

become

Stations of Bach's Life

him

available,

which

is

done

to the next in 1719.

As

the

of the famous

site

ony

is

the most important city in Sax-

Dresden, which explains the Electors desire to make his

after

influence

Leipzig

fair,

there at

felt

Feller, a professor

all

times /^ Lange's wife

of poetics

who

is

a daughter of Joachim

serves several terms as rector of the

university in Leipzig, sympathizes with Pietism, but also loves

music; on the side, he heads the governing body of St. Thomas's and

belongs to the consistory.

from an

Steger,

lawyer, with the

learned

man

was elected of St.

St.

title

in his

old,

established Leipzig family,

own

right, served as

another

is

of Hofrat, or privy councilor. His

father, a

burgomaster before Steger

to the council in 1689. Steger heads the governing

which

Peter's,

board

from among the singers trained

receives

at

Thomas's, in Bach's words, only "the leavings," namely "those

who do

not understand Music, but can only just manage to sing a

Chorale."^^

Among

the

members of the

the traditionalists.

They cannot

and Steger represent

council, Plaz

disagree in public with the axiom

and commercial

that because of its reputation as a cosmopolitan

city

Leipzig needs a music director with an outstanding reputation. But in their hearts they are far

more

interested in finding a cantor for St.

Thomas's. Therefore every mishap in a performance by a candidate

from the ranks of music directors gives them a pretext for uttering their formula: ''Ceterum censeo,

Cantorem

The governing burgomaster

in the year

profile

recommended

for the Leipzig position

Lange would separated.

of the election

by the court

prefer to see the offices of cantor

He

is

Lange,

somewhat reminiscent of Romanus,

whose general

is

esse eligendum.''*

at

also

Dresden.

and music director

places his entire emphasis on hiring a music director

and thereby bringing a vibrant modern musical

life

to Leipzig.

Hav-

ing been appointed head of the St. Thomas's governing board in

*"Once again, ferring to

I

Cato

submit, a cantor must be elected." This

is

something of a joke,

re-

the Elder's habit of introducing the phrase "Carthago delenda est"

("Carthage must be destroyed") into every speech he made, no matter what the topic was.

Cantor

at St.

Thomas and

City Music Director in Leipzig

125

—

1720,

he probably used his position to ensure that there, and not

New

only at the

Kuhnau formed

Church,

at St.

Thomas's

be performed,

figural passions could

in fact did for the first time in 1721.

That

a passion

as

was per-

in 1723, while the cantor's position

was va-

cant, can probably be attributed to Lange's personal influence.

After Kuhnau's death, the council seems to have gone straight to

Telemann, serving

at the

four principal churches in tion in Leipzig all

time

as cantor

and music director of the

Hamburg. Telemann

and an even better one

enjoys a fine reputa-

in the rest

of Germany and

among them

of Europe. There are other applicants,

the

Magde-

burg cantor, Friedrich Rolle; the kapellmeister Johann Friedrich

New

Fasch, serving at the court of Bohemia; and the organist of the

Church

in Leipzig,

1722 only

Telemann

Georg Balthasar receives

Schott.

But

in the

summer of

an invitation to audition.

Given the candidates uncontested fame, the conservatives con-

demanding

tent themselves with

his plans for teaching at the St.

would

gressives

like to relieve

ment, the favorite

that

Telemann

Thomas

him of entirely. Despite on

elected unanimously

is

specifically describe

School, a task that the pro-

11

this disagree-

August

1722.

Well

aware of the situation in Leipzig, Telemann soon takes steps to make sure that he will also be in charge of music at the university church

that St.

is,

the church of the Paulines

—

already overseen

by the cantor of

Thomas's under Schelle and Kuhnau. The council and the univer-

sity

seem prepared

time

later the

to grant the request in this case, whereas a short

nonacademic Bach cannot even voice such a request,

because the position has already been

Then Telemann withdraws

filled

his candidacy;

without consultation.

Hamburg

has offered

him

a substantially raised salary of 400 talers. It is revealing to

look at the reasons the "famous virtuoso," as the

press celebrates him,^7 duties in

names when asking

Hamburg: he mentions not only

expect in Leipzig but also difficulties he "elders,"

who demanded

that the

is

to be discharged

from

his

the higher income he can

having with the caucus of

Hamburg

senate forbid the cantor

"under pain of severe punishment" to "perform his music for money in a tavern

126

The

."^^ .

.

One

can easily imagine that the progressive wing of

Stations of Bach's Life

may

the Leipzig council that in Leipzig he

without any

When

would be welcome

to undertake such initiatives

restrictions.

the search for a cantor has to be reopened, seven candi-

emerge

dates

have made representations to Telemann

at

The

first.

favorite

is

now Fasch, who

He

accepted an appointment at the court at Zerbst.

Leipzig position

—

citing,

At

"cannot instruct."

among

has meanwhile declines the

other reasons, the fact that he

the cantor's auditions held

on the

first

Sunday

of Advent, the candidates participating are Georg Balthasar Schott, the Merseburg court organist and music director

Georg Friedrich

Kauffmann, and the Braunschweig cantor Christoph Duve. Is

Bach already

a figure

on the horizon?

A

conversation about

questions of remuneration with the rector of the University of

which Bach speaks of

Leipzig, Ulrich Junius,

taken place during the

summer term of 1722.^^ There on the order of the

viously mentioned notes

Bach jotted down on the

that

may go back to ers

put out by the Leipzig council; in the

that he "delayed his eye

right 21

on Leipzig

moment

December

selves,

my

such

BWV

for

some

time, and

Whatever the

Thomas's 61.

These

serve as evidence of feel-

Erdmann letter Bach writes

decision for a quarter of a year."

to apply?

is

Has Bach had

he merely waiting for the

case, the council

1722 record that "several others

as

are also the pre-

service at St.

score of the cantata

Advent season and

the 1722

must have

in 1725,

minutes for

had presented them-

Kapellmeister Graupner in Darmstadt and Bach in

Cothen."^°

Of these sion

is

the St.

two, the one

who

initially

makes the stronger impres-

the court kapellmeister Christoph Graupner, an alumnus of

Thomas School

Leipzig university.

He

is

and, like Telemann, a graduate of the

apparently eager to

move

to Leipzig in

view

of the catastrophic financial situation of the kapelle in Darmstadt. Yet doubtful that his prince will grant him a discharge, the council arranges for two further auditions: for Schott,

chance, replacing a candidate

and

for Bach.

ary,

Bach

a

Graupner auditions on

week

who

thus has a second

who has withdrawn on short 17 January, Schott

on

2

notice,

Febru-

later.

Cantor

at St.

Thomas and

City Music Director in Leipzig

127

"On the Sunday just past, ter to his

had

in the

morning, the Hon. Kapellmeis-

Serene Highness the Prince of Cothen, Monsieur Bach,

his audition here at the

Relationscourier reports

on

Church of St. Thomas," the Hamburger

15

February

1723.

Once

it

has

become ap-

parent that Graupner will not be released by his prince but instead will

be tied more closely to the court through the promise of a salary

increase, the three semifinaHsts, according to

on 9 April

1723, are

would be unable

Burgomaster Lange

Bach, Kauffmann, and Schott, "but

to give instruction at the

same time, and

three

all

in Tele-

mann's case the question of a division [of the duties] had already

been considered."^^ Plaz finds the most recent talk of separating the duties "trouble-

some

for significant reasons"and continues, "since the best could not

be obtained, mediocre ones would have to be accepted; many good things had previously been said about a

This vote

is

man

occasionally interpreted in the

cating a lack of enthusiasm for Bach, but direction: instead

of separating the two

the trouble of teaching, ter.

The "man in

Pirna"

it

is

would be

it

in Pirna."

Bach

literature as indi-

actually points in another

offices, so as to spare "the best"

better to take a solid schoolmas-

probably Christian Heckel,

who has indeed

gained prominence as a historian and expert in ancient languages. Plazs opinion

is

not shared by the majority of the councilors,

who

vote to appoint Bach, with certain stipulations. Unfortunately the council minutes pertaining to this very important juncture in Bach's are incomplete:

life

Syndicus Job,"

it

"The

says just

rest

of the minutes were kept by the Hon.

where things might become

exciting.

^^

Although the minutes break off here, the search process continues.

On 19 April Bach signs a pledge that commits him, among other

things, to provide a certificate of dismissal in the event of his election; to

fiilfill

conscientiously his

work as

a teacher at the St.

Thomas

School; to provide individual singing instruction without remuneration, as cil

needed; and to

demand no

additional fiinds from the coun-

for a possible substitute Latin teacher. ^^

Prince Leopold grants Bach his dismissal on

128

The

Stations of Bach's Life

13

April 1723 with a

Not

laudatory statement. ceeds to a vote

on

yet notified of this step, the council pro-

22 April.

The comments of

the three mayors,

recorded in two parallel sets of council minutes, mirror faithfully the discussion that preceded them. Lange's remarks are follows:

tor [he]

as

"Bach was Kapellmeister in Cothen and excelled on the

Besides music he had teaching responsibilities, and

clavier.

[a

summarized

was required

textbook of piety,

was willing

to do.

[as]

Can-

to provide instruction in the Colloquia Corderi

and behavior] and

letters,

He had agreed to give

in

grammar, which he

not only public but also pri-

vate instruction. If Bach were chosen, one could forget Telemann, in

view of

mann

his conduite' (likely a reference to the

down

displayed in turning

poor manners Tele-

the appointment). ^"^

Plaz thereupon shows himself favorably disposed: "Bach must be in

good renomme, and

his person

was winning, most

especially be-

cause he had declared himself willing to instruct the boys not only in

Music but

how

also regularly in the school;

he would accomplish

it

would remain

to be seen

this last."^^

Steger articulates the concerns of the conservative camp:

"had declared himself ready to prove but also as colleague in the

make such compositions

who

evidendy has the

sense he previously

as

St.

his loyalty not only as

Thomas

were not

theatrical."^^ Steger

the slighdy irritated

tion with Graupner's candidacy that

Cantor

School," and "he should

least interest in artistic

made

Bach

is

the one

church music; in

comment

this

in connec-

"He was no Musicus" and

re-

frained from voting yea or nay.^^

After

all

those eligible have voted for Bach, Lange summarizes

the proceedings in his capacity as governing burgomaster; the minutes characterize his

comments

thus: "It

was necessary to

of renown, so that the [university] students might be

Bach

is

select a

man

inspired."^^

entided to view his election as a real honor; he does not

have university training, a fact that could have given the conservatives

ample grounds

for objecting; unlike

Telemann, Fasch, and

Graupner, however, he does not compose operas, a genre that might have appealed to the progressive faction of the council. Yet he

Cantor

at St.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

is

a

129

virtuoso of the keyboard, in no

show the Leipzig

way

inferior to

who

considerations for Burgomaster Lange,

godfather to Bach's son Heinrich,

Thus

bears

We

should not take this election a pleasing composer.

mentioned

the audition was

listening

lightly, for

"much

praised

on

knowledge-

Bach

is

by no

on

later

The

Bach performed

that occasion

by

all

who

—

at the

They essentially dictate

as cantor

of

St.

Thomas

the

school system and as an to

to

time of his election

as well.^^

conservatives exact a high price for their willingness to

promise.

at

can ap-

nuanced formulation seems

encapsulate Bach's situation in Leipzig

into the minutes the stipulation that

new man

artist

com-

must

will

be firmly attached to the

practice moderation

when

it

modern church music. These conditions have profound

implications for the next twenty-seven years, during which

work and compose

in Leipzig.

As an

on consideration or support from

Bach will

instructor,

he can hardly count

his rector; as a

composer, he will in

cases have to be satisfied with the admiration of a small

ber of connoisseurs. But above

overworked, a

man whose

all

he

is

productivity

num-

destined to be chronically

we

register only

with disbe-

and amazement.

Bach pieces

displays great skill in the composition of his audition

and

his

performance of them

at St.

Thomas's.

sources lend credence to the supposition that

Sunday he was allowed dates.

Although

imposed

The

it is

to present

two

it is

The

available

on Quinquagesima

cantatas, like other candi-

not possible to determine whether the council

specific guidelines for the choice

tional style,

130

mu-

difficult artist for Leipzig.

that the music

earlier,

preciate such things," this simple yet

lief

become

1724, will

the correspondent for the Hamburger Relationscourier notes,

in the report

many

will

important

There may have been some pre-

monition that he would prove to be a

comes

all

the progressive faction prevails, after seeking the best

means merely

When

—

Lange 's name.

and attending the various auditions and

sician

ably

who

is

apparently assumes the

of Bach's protector and, on 27 February

role

and

Telemann, and

what modern music

students

clear that

Stations of Bach's Life

of text and the composi-

Bach handles the

situation cleverly: be-

sermon he

fore the

offers "Jesus

nahm zu

BWV 22, a kind of

sich,"

conventional Sunday cantata that begins with a quotation from Scripture, ends with a choral

mentation of the sort that

movement with instrumental orna-

traditional in central

is

Germany, and

al-

together does not confront the Leipzig congregation with anything

too

new

or disturbing;

we can

picture the conservative councilors

nodding approvingly. After the sermon he offers the cantata

"Du wahrer Mensch und

Davids Sohn," an exquisite piece of liturgical chamber music

full

of

bold effects in the structure of the movements and the harmonies

showcasing himself as the highly accomplished Cothen kapellmeister.

The

"chorale" element

is

more

implicit than explicit in the purely

instrumental recitative that occupies the middle portion of the originally

three-movement work. But since

without a concluding chorale tion.

is

perhaps

Bach may have been advised

to

at St.

still

Thomas's

a cantata

considered an abomina-

add one to

he was given called for one. From the sources

it

his cantata; the text

seems

likely that

he

delved into his supply of finished works and added the artful poly-

phonic choral version of "Christe, du

ment, which, to be

Lamm Gottes" as a final move-

sure, appreciably distorts the original proportions

of the piece.

On 5 May Bach had taken

is

his place

invited into the council chambeVy

behind the

chairs,

and after he

Dominus Consul Regens

D. Lange stated that although a number of candidates had presented themselvesfor service as Cantor of the

St.

Thomas

School,

but since he had been deemed the most capablefor the post, he been elected unanimously,

perintendent ceased Herr

here,

and he should be presented by

and should receive the same [salary] as

i.e..

Bach] expressed

his

St.

Su-

the de-

most humble gratitude for

being thought of andpromised his complete loyalty

of the

had

Kuhnau.

I lie [he,

Bach

the

signs a

compact that primarily

Thomas School and

further

details his duties as cantor

commits him not

town without the burgomasters permission; Cantor

at St.

Thomas and

and industry. ^^

to leave

to "so far as possible

City Music Director in Leipzig

131

walk with and among the boys

in funeral processions"; and, a tricl^^

on any post

provision, not to take

at the university

without authori-

zation. Point 7 contains the instruction that "in order to preserve

good order it

not

last

in the churches,"

Bach should

"so arrange the

music that

too long, and be of such a nature as not to appear operatic,

but rather to inspire the listeners to devotion. "^^

The

next hurdle

is

for

Bach

to present himself before the consis-

Schmid

tory and the professor of theology Johann

mandatory examination, perhaps not pro forma

to

undergo the

for a candidate

has neither theological nor any other university training.

The

who

previ-

ous year, Bach's colleague Conrad Kiiffner failed such an examination

when he was

a candidate for the cantorship at St. Katherine

Schmid had asked

in Zwickau.

in the Bible,

where the statement "That

can be found, and what characteristics the primary

The

member of the

God

is life

eternal"

the Father possesses as

Trinity.^^

record confirms that Bach answered the questions put to

him (we do not know what they were) him

iner considers

eligible for

remains for Bach

is

Lutheran creed in

its strictest

visitation

and

how many chapters the how often Christ's geneal-

Kiiffner

Gospels and the Epistles of St. Paul have,

ogy appears

s

in such a

appointment

to take an oath

way

that the

exam-

as cantor. All that

and swear

now

his fealty to the

form, which includes the articles of

of 1593, with their condemnation "of the Calvinist denials

antidoctrine."^^

For 29

May

the

Hamburg

Stats-

und

Gelehrte Zeitung reports:

This past Saturday at nooriyfour wagons loaded with household items arrived here

from Cothen;

Princely Kapellmeister there, tor Figuralis.

2 carriages St.

At 2

o'clock

now summoned to Leipzig as Can-

he himself arrived with his family in

and moved into

Thomas

they belonged to the former

the freshly renovated quarters in the

School.

The Hamburg Relationscourier reports stalled cantor

132

The

performed

his inaugural

Stations of Bach's Life

further that the newly in-

music

at St. Nicholas's

on the

Sunday

first

after Trinity

—

"to generous applause," as the annual

chronicle of the Leipzig University notes.^'^

At place

on i June

the church,

way of Weise,

Thomas

Bach's installation at the St. 1723 in the presence

Bach

School, which takes

of representatives of the

publicly introduced and given his instructions

is

by the head town

a text read

clerk,

pastor of St. Thomas's, likewise issues instructions in his

Sr.,

on behalf of the con-

and the superintendent. This intervention, however, arouses

the displeasure of the school's director,

who

by

whereupon Christian

capacity as spiritual overseer of the school and sistory

and

city

Johann Christian Lehmann,

speaks for the council to the effect that the church has no right

to issue instructions.

An

outright confrontation in the presence of

and student body

the entire faculty

to express his gratitude, after

is

averted in time for the cantor

which the student choir performs,

bringing the ceremony to a close.^5

In the

official

other things, the

assignment

—

minutes of the

new

five

Weise

installation,

notes,

among

of turning over his teaching

cantor's intention

hours per week of Latin with grammar, Luther's

catechism, as well as Maturinus Corderius's Colloquia scholastica

—

the "Tertius" in the collegium for an annual salary of 50 talers.

The

possibility it

of hiring a substitute was expressly conceded to Bach, but

had the potential

to arise about the

example, in 1730

Buying

his

free the cantor

for causing serious problems. If complaints

performance of the substitute

— Bach would be held

way out of teaching

at this school

as

with

fifty- five

the school's

accountable.^^

outlined, the institution

is

a

best interests of the poor."

''

classes, giving

many other pedagogical

boarding students.

new

is

It is

no accident that

located right next to that of

charter, drafted

Schola pauperum,

That means

obligations

and adopted

endowed

in 1723,

to serve the

that the teachers

must

in loco parentis to the scholarship students living at the school

show each of them

Cantor

were

happened, for

the academic subjects does not

the apartment provided by the school

As

—

of his responsibility for teaching music

individual lessons, or meeting his

the rector.

to

act

"and

paternal affection, love, and solicitude, and be

at St.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

133

forebearing toward their mistakes and weaknesses while nonetheless

expecting self-discipline, order, and obedience."37

The emphasis serfs,

in the charter

on

treating the boys as pupils, not as

must not have come out of the

doubt suffered

blue,

and the younger ones no

hands of the older ones. In the year 1701 a com-

at the

plaint against the older students asserts that they

them on the teacher s

candle and deposited

and undressed

at the

wrong

chair; that they dressed

times, spilled water

smashed windows, and swore

tables,

burned mice over a

on the

at teachers. ^^

In

floor

and the

the teach-

1717,

ing assistant Carl Friedrich complains about encountering rats and

mice on the

stairs in

broad daylight. In

1733,

Christoph Nichelmann,

about sixteen years old, runs away from the boarding school; will

become

a highly respected

Marpurg

would be boys

vise the

interesting to

—

in an obituary,

we must

conclude

too rough for him.^^

know how

often

Bach had

.

.

alternately

to super-

from Holy Scripture or a His-

preferably a Latin text, such as Erasmus's Apophthegmata,

was the wish of Rector Johann Matthias Gesner,

for this

Wilhelm

mealtimes, making sure that "something useful was

at

read clearly and slowly. toricd'

him

Thomas School was

that the St. It

ascribes to

he

composer and harpsichordist. Given

the "gentle and peace-loving nature" that his colleague Friedrich

later

since 1730."^°

We

would hope

tute fairly often,

mances by the

St.

and

altar

also for the

Thomas

appearances,

principal chorales,

and

that for this duty

for

Bach found

in office

a substi-

many major and minor

perfor-

choir that took place in addition to

its

instance the presentation of motets,

music during services on Sundays and holidays,

as

well as during the numerous supplementary services.

Even official

if

Bach took advantage of the many

opportunities to hire a substitute,

we

mate the daily drudgery with which he had

official as

weU

as

un-

should not underestito contend.

Thus Carl

Gotthilf Kerner reports that he was appointed in 1741 to provide a

kind of officiator's services,

among them

singing the litany in alter-

nation with the choir or the congregation.^^ Even though

sume

that

Thomas 134

The

Bach examined the vocal

himself and then Stations of Bach's Life

made

abilities

we may as-

of every pupil

at St.

the appropriate assignments, this

archival detail, discovered

more or

less

by chance, provides insight

into the extent of such duties.

Since the

Thomas

St.

commits

School's mission

it

to accept only-

students from impecunious families, most of its income comes from

musical services provided by the boarders. ing that

all

fees

and the key

to their distribution

pupils are minutely recorded in the

other

members

new key

tions, since the

new

Bach

of the collegium.

not surpris-

It is therefore

among

teachers

and

Along with

charter of 1723.

protests against these stipula-

reduces his income.

Was

he

later able to

recoup what was owed him in the form of larger and smaller incidentals

from

his share in the proceeds for funerals, collections

Year's, St.

money

Gregory's and

St. Martin's,

collected for music

on

New

from the Currende and the

between Michaelmas and Easter?

For singing a motet outside a house where someone has died "with a large half of the school, which includes the chorus musicuSy^

Bach

receives the tidy

him

bids

to perform

sum of one

separately." If a funeral procession

school" without the

chorits musicus,

the rector receives at least

That the must likewise officials

not

rely

when

mean

it is

all

it

is

on such

a matter

is

accompanied only by

for

a "quarter

he receives only 6 pfennigs, whereas

usually also a professor at the university,

paltry

sums

indicates the frugality that the

feel obligated to observe.

at

many

courts,

Erdmann he

is

These con-

where money flows

of satisfying the prince's

that Bach's financial situation

tastes.

This does

worse than in Cothen: in

estimates his annual income, together

incidental sources, at about 700 talers, whereas he started in

Cothen with 400 state

yet the school's charter for-

grosch and 6 pfennigs.

from those found

his 1730 letter to

with

who

i

of the city of Leipzig

ditions differ freely

rector,

taler;

two or three motets and "have each one paid

talers.

But with

this

in the letter for tactical reasons

income

—

if

he did not over-

— the number of onerous

daily

chores and petty calculations also increased.^^

What makes

this situation particularly

burdensome

for

Bach

is

the dual set of obligations. Unlike his colleagues at the school, he

cannot enjoy his leisure then his other

life

when

his teaching duties are fulfilled, for

begins, that of a municipal music director

Cantor

at St.

Thomas and

City Music Director in Leipzig

who 135

must

see to

maintains

that the public music

it

its

To accomplish singers

Steger, not acquainted

good shape and

that Leipzig

a first-rate ensemble of

A city administrator like

with such matters in

sumed when Bach was hired

violinists,

in

Bach needs

this mission,

and instrumentalists.

place: there

is

reputation as a city of fine music.

detail,

that such an ensemble

town

the school choir, there are four

is

Burgomaster

may

have as-

was already

and three

pipers

along with a journeyman and perhaps an apprentice or

two, and there are always musically inclined students on hand.

managed

previous cantor of St. Thomas's resources;

why

Yet Bach's art that has

should

it

arrival in

The

perfectly well with these

be any different for the

new one?

Leipzig marks a shift in the view of musical

been coming for some time but

understanding of the

his

in

art,

is

brought to a head by

according to which the composer no

longer builds on prearranged understandings but operates within the

complicated dialectical relation between socially agreed-upon standards and

artistic

autonomy.

A pragmatist in the post of St. Thomas cantor would reason as follows: I have the school's pupils, the council musicians,

students at

my

disposal; I will adapt

Bach's reasoning goes this way: cil

I

Passion in

my

a

few

music to those resources.

have the school's pupils, the coun-

musicians, and a few students at

but

my

and

my disposal,

and the

St.

Matthew

I

need better conditions. The "Short

for a

Well- Appointed Church Music," in

head; therefore

Most Necessary Draft

which he accuses the Leipzig

city council in the year 1730

of provid-

ing inadequate staffing, contains a passage that captures the spirit of this shift.

Bach comments

that his predecessors could expect with a

good degree of confidence that the council would reward

a

number

of students with scholarships for their participation in church performances.

The

statement continues:

Since, howeveVy the status

from what creased,

it

was

musices

The

quite differently constituted

previously, for our artistry has greatly in-

and the gusto

has changed wondrously,

former style of music no longer

136

is

Stations of Bach's Life

and therefore the

resonates to our ears, considerable

assistance

be chosen taste,

is

thus needed all the morey so that such musicians

and

may

hired as will accommodate the present musical

new

master the

of music, and thereby be ready

types

and

justice to the composer

his work.

Now

do

to

the few beneficia,

which should have been increased rather than reduced, have even been withdrawn from the chorus musicus. //

any

in

is,

curious that

case,

German musicians

and ex tempore

pected to be capable ofperforming at once kinds of music, whether

it

written

and who have

most know

it

by heart

erous salaries,

all

comefrom Italy or France, England or

Poland, just like those virtuosi, for instance, for is

are ex-

studied

and who,

and whose

it

the music

long beforehand, indeed al-

besides,

and

efforts

whom

nota bene, receive genindustry are thus richly

rewarded; whereas thesefactors are not taken into consideration,

but they [German musicians] are left to their own

many a

one, out

of concern for the bread on

thought to improving, trate this statement

den and

see

how

let

cares,

such that

cannot give

his table,

alone distinguishing, himself To illus-

with one example, one need only go

the musicians are remunerated by

to

Dres-

His Royal

Majesty. It cannotfail, for the musicians are relieved of all con-

and each person

cern for their nourishment, freed of c^Z-gim,

pected to master but a single instrument;

it

splendid and most excellent to hear. The conclusion easy to

draw: that with the

of the power

Bach

takes

to put

it

ern church music. that have

cessation

traditional sacred

become accustomed

changes in

taste. If Leipzigers

lam

robbed

state.

of Leipzig want

to hear brilliant

and considerable music equivalent

to Italian, French, English, or Polish styles, the musicians

capable of performing

ment

it,

must be

mod-

music no longer pleases ears

to a higher standard

want

accordingly

^'^

for granted that the people

The

is

ofthe beneficia

music into a better

ex-

must be something

specialists

must be

who can play one instru-

superbly.

Senior

Mayor

Steger must have shaken his head as he read Bachs

memorandum, wondering whether Cantor

at St.

the real issue

Thomas and

was

a well-appointed

City Music Director in Leipzig

137

church music or one

and an

a church musician

music and

is

ambition.

artist's

artist

actually

wants both: he

is

through and through; he loves the old

We would

eager for the new.

ment if we did not have

Bach

not understand his argu-

his works; they create in the realm

of the ideal

the synthesis that he does not achieve in his everyday circumstances. If

we examine

Bach's art

he

is

all

the more.

ceaselessly caught

in fine

we must admire

these everyday circumstances,

At up

least

during the early period in Leipzig,

in keeping the St.

Thomas

chorus musicus

form and drawing the best he can out of the council musicians

in his capacity as their official supervisor.

measuring

his efforts against the

much

But

at the

same time he

is

higher musical standards of

the court at Dresden, inviting virtuosi to his house and clearly doing

everything to maintain the level of professionalism invoked in his

memorandum.

At

may

times he

find himself longing for the calmer days in

Cothen; there he had a bevy of virtuoso musicians

ample time

for rehearsals.

Among

at his disposal

and

the musicians of the Leipzig

council ensemble, only the senior member, Gottfried Reiche, stands

out as a recognized performer on the horn and trumpet. a

premium

for Bach:

he must compose a

new

—

prepare an already existing

The work must

work

for a

ergy

commands

one year

calls for sixty

mention only the

less fre-

— twice

for high

must supply three

and two passions

—

to

larger pieces of church music.

—

that

is

the tide of a 1710 guide to the

church services, which celebrates the inhabitants' good fortune

in having

twenty-two services with sermons to choose among every

week, and even more prayer

services. It

is

indeed a city of churches

and schools into which Bach has moved, and its

dark side

as well: the air

around

St.

this

The

Stations of Bach's Life

new environment

Thomas and

gloomy; the students wear black, and not only for 138

—

performance.

cantatas altogether. His en-

a magnificat for orchestra

Leipzig, City of Churches

has

at

respect, particularly during the early Leipzig years,

when he produces

city's

new

then be rehearsed and presented

holidays. For each of the highest feast days, he cantatas, so that

is

cantata for almost

every Sunday and write out the different parts himself, or

quendy

Time

the school

fiinerals.

is

We can-

not

fiilly

understand Bach's time in Leipzig, which despite some

and important honors may sometimes have appeared

great successes to

him

like the

Cross, if we do not keep in

way of the

constellation: a passionate

and

lishment of secular

man and

religious

artist

mind

the basic

confronting a dual estab-

power that has perfected methods

over the centuries for asserting and reproducing itself

Arnstadt, Miihlhausen, and solitary

hothead had a fighting chance

cious release if

from

one wriggles

from a

summarized

—

if

of one arm, one

surviving documents.

conflict

prompdy

where a

like

an octopus:

seized

by another.

is

Bach hardly ever emerged

with officialdom.

may

briefly

is

stations

only to extract an ungra-

his duties. Bureaucratic Leipzig

free

To judge by the torious

Weimar were way

The

facts that will

vic-

now

be

be few in number, but they represent the

kind of tribulations he confronted frequendy.

As

Bach has

early as 1724

to endure a severe

reprimand from the

superintendent because without permission he has scheduled the

John Passion for

St.

Thomas's rather than

St. Nicholas's,

St.

presumably

because of technical factors bearing on the performance. In the fol-

lowing years he

is

on the

losing side in a conflict over the

"new wor-

ship service" at the university. In 1728 he locks horns with the vice

deacon

at St. Nicholas's,

hymns

for the services;

Gottlieb Gaudlitz, over the right to choose

he seems not to have prevailed.

Two years later Bach is chastised by the council for dereliction of duty. He responds at length in the above-mentioned "Short but Most Necessary

Draft," trying to persuade the city council of the

need for structural changes to the arrangements for pubUc music,

though the to him.

fiitility

al-

of his attempt must have been painfully obvious

documents on the

"prefect

asserts his right to select

and ap-

Profound bitterness pervades

controversy" of 1736-38, in

which he

his

point prefects, even against the will of the rector.

In 1739 he

is

forbidden to perform a passion because he has not

cleared his plans with the authorities. In the year before his death,

when

the council begins to look around for a successor, the charge

bruited about that the St.

Thomas School

cantist."^ Accordingly, the

Cantor

at St.

is

does not have a single dis-

minutes of a council meeting held a few

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

139

days after his death note that "Bach had no doubt been a great sician,

but no schoolmaster

But

mu-

.""^5 .

.

Bach has landed not only

to return to the year 1723:

in a city

am

of churches: Leipzig, along with Hamburg, Liibeck, Frankfurt

Main, and Nuremberg,

membership

for their

mercial

fairs.

one of the great Protestant

is

in the Hanseatic

With about

League and

its

importance

as a center

of trade. Between 1693 and 1720 Leipzig

year while irritating devout Christians as

mentioned, Telemann became

would not be

it

fair three

little as

is

was

possible; as

possible to pay a

permanent ensemble

at the university carry

the performances; in other respects, too, they leave their

Bach

times a

musical director for a brief period

its

of professional musicians, students

town's musical

com-

Nuremberg and Frankfurt

has an opera intended to entertain visitors to the

in 1702. Since

for their

15,700 inhabitants around the turn of the

eighteenth century, the city has surpassed in

known

cities

most of

mark on

the

life.

coming

also

to

Athens on the

Pleisse, or

Litde Paris,

nicknames for the new, cosmopolitan Leipzig. Despite the ordinances adopted in 1716 and other years against "the frivolous carrying on in coffee houses" and against the "suspect views and

of speaking and writing" prevalent

at the university,^^

new ways

and despite the

draconian censorship of books and theatrical performances, Leipzig is

a city

The

of enlightened culture. writer

Johann Christoph Gottsched, who

is

appointed to a

position in Leipzig a year after Bach, publishes the moral weekly

Biedermann in 1727 and his work on poetics, Versuch einer

critischen

Dichtkunst vor die Deutschen (Essay on a Critical Poetics for the Ger-

mans), in 1730. In 1732 he founds the

first

major German

literary pe-

riodical, his Beytrdge zur critischen Historie der deutschen Sprache,

Poesie

und Beredsamkeit (Contributions

German Language,

Poetry,

to a Critical History

and Rhetoric)

—

all

in

of the

an attempt to

break the power of the "prevailing Scythian and Gothic taste" and "Lohensteinian

.

.

style in literature.

140

The

.

bombast" and

"^7

to establish a natural

and

rational

In 1748 Gotthold Ephraim Lessing has his

Stations of Bach's Life

first

play,

Derjunge

Gelehrte,

performed in Leipzig. By the time Goethe

Leipzig in 1765 to take up his university studies, the city

arrives in

is

considered the intellectual metropolis of Germany.

As we

He

Bach had

shall see,

several encounters w^ith Gottsched.

w^orked more closely with Christian Friedrich Henrici, born in

who never made a lasting name for himself in German but who has the reputation of having had a revitalizing in-

1700, a poet literature

on the

fluence

literary scene in

Leipzig has

Leipzig of the time.

less to offer in

when he needs an

the fine

official portrait

In Bach's

arts.

of himself, he has so few choices

Haussmann, whose

that he automatically thinks of Elias Gottlob local reputation exceeds his talent.

away and soon comes

last years,

To be

Dresden

sure,

to represent for the cantor of St.

is

not far

Thomas

the

essence of a finer world.

THE EARLY YEARS IN LEIPZIG

How fascinating it would be to ing his

first

weeks

pupils at the St. to

him?

What

the town? tions

in Leipzig!

accompany Bach on

What

his

rounds dur-

tone does he adopt toward the

Thomas School and the

council musicians entrusted

does he discuss wdth his superiors in the church and

How does he wend his way through the tangle of regula-

and obligations that must make the court

at

Cothen seem pos-

itively idyllic?

He

probably expends most of his energy on staking out his

sphere of activity as quickly as possible, that regulated church music."

organized

—

for

Thomas's and focus in the

is

Above

all,

is,

the "principal music" must be

weekly performances that alternate between

St. Nicholas's

own

establishing a "well-

on Sundays and

holidays.

The

St.

liturgical

the "early service," the so-called office, which begins at 7:00

morning and occasionally continues

holidays the music at 1:15 P.M. in a

morning

is

until 11:00.

On

numerous

repeated for the "Vesper sermon," which begins

church that has not had a musical performance

at the

service.

Cantor

at St.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

141

From

how its mas

the original printing of the Christmas Oratorio

we can

see

distribution of performances looks during the 1734-35 Christ-

season:

Part

was performed on Christmas

I

noon

Nicholas's and at

Part 2

Thomas's and

at St.

Part 3

at

noon

after

at St.

Christmas, in the morning

at St. Nicholas's.

performed on the third

is

morning

Thomas's.

at St.

performed on the day

is

day, in the

morning

day, in the

at St.

Nicholas's.

Part 4

is

performed on

Thomas's and Part 5

ing at

noon

Day, in the morning at

St.

at St. Nicholas's.

performed on the Sunday after New Year's, in the morn-

St. Nicholas's.

Part 6

and

is

at

New Year's

at

is

noon

peformed on Epiphany,

in the

morning

Thomas's

at St.

at St. Nicholas's.

On Christmas day. Bach also has to provide figural music for the service at the university church.

On

high holidays

Christmas day, within the framework of

like

the "principal music," he must also supply compositions based on sections of the Latin liturgy, especially Sanctus

movements;

way

Yet his primary ob-

Leipzig's fondness for tradition

ligation

is

and remains the presentation, on Sundays and holidays, of

a cantata based

make

on the Gospels or the Episdes.

sure that for his first year in office,

Sunday

after Trinity to Trinity

a complete supply sible.

is satisfied.

Also due in

after 24

He must

Sunday of the following

of cantatas and one that this year is the

therefore

which extends from the

is

year,

first

he has

as consistent as pos-

annual council piece, which must

be ready for the celebration of St. Bartholomew's

day

in this

August. Each year he receives an

Day on

the

Mon-

official directive

from

the council to present the piece.

At the beginning of his time all

what he can expect of

rists, ists,

his St.

in office,

Thomas

Bach must

pupils as soloists or cho-

and of the town pipers and council musicians

as instrumentalin.

He

are available

and

and how many students can be recruited and paid

must determine whether the necessary instruments 142

ascertain above

The

Stations of Bach's Life

to

fill

in

good

He

repair.

he will employ

years,

We

part-time.

hard-working copyists

also needs at least five

dozen copyists

— over

the

either full-time or

have no concrete evidence that upon

first

surveying

the territory he gains the impression that his organizational efforts will give the "satisfaction" for

We

know

later explicidy wishes.

His predecessor, Johann Kuhnau, had established the prac-

cantatas. tice

which he

equally litde about the sources of the texts for Bach's

of printing the

for performances

texts

of the church music in advance, particularly

on high

holidays, "so that each can procure a copy

to read for himself after the service.""^^ Several printed texts that

turned up in 1971 in a Leningrad library show that Bach continued this practice.

They offer documentation of the

1724 during the

months between the

first

cantatas performed in

Sunday after Epiphany and

Misericordias Domini, and in 1725 during the weeks between the third

and

The lisher

sixth

Sunday

text booklets

after Trinity.

were produced carefiiUy by the Leipzig pub-

and printer Immanuel Tietze, who commissioned copper en-

gravings for the

title

pages.

Even those attending the

services

who

did not feel inspired by the music could take away something from the texts, which were also intended for private devotions at home.

number of pious

Christians collected

Undoubtedly Bach had intendent

them and had them bound.

to have the texts approved

— but probably not "each time

at the

week," as Friedrich Rochlitz, a later pupil at until 1769, reports.'^^ In that case, lect a half dozen

reject

St.

comment

now and If

may lie

his

superintendent could

sermon. Behind such

the hard fact that the superintendent

then refused to approve a

text.

Bach had already composed the music

would need tight spot.

to

compose

a

new

cantata,

That may explain why

particularly in the first year,

Cantor

at St.

we should not

Bach always submitted

that

one that would best complement

anecdotal formulations

beginning of the

Thomas, not born

in advance. Yet

"several," "customarily three," texts so that the

select the

by the super-

he would not have been able to col-

and get them printed

completely Rochlitzs

A

for

for such a text,

which would put him

some Sundays and

two cantatas

are

documented.

Thomas and City Music

he

in a

holidays, It

seems

Director in Leipzig

143

more

likely that,

with a few exceptions, two cantatas were actually

performed on these days. Perhaps he occasionally had to supply two Leipzig churches with different cantatas, for reasons cover today. tatas

now and

probable that

It is

we cannot

dis-

then he performed two can-

during one and the same service.

One would sermon,

or, to

have come before the sermon, the other after the

be more precise, during Communion. According to

Bach jotted down

the Leipzig "Order of the Divine Service," which

on the score of the Advent cantatas

BWV 6i and 62, there was room

for a well-developed piece of music,

which on occasion meant

a

cantata.5°

wdth the

It is difficult to reconcile this thesis

fact that the surviv-

ing brochures with texts from the cantata performances never include

more than one

for each

Sunday and

holiday.^^

The

absence of

a second cantata text might be explained by the reduced importance

given to a cantata performed during

Communion. At least

in north-

ern Germany, vocal music during this part of the service was primarthe responsibility of the organist,

ily

selections

who would perform

special

chosen to honor prominent guests or representatives of the

church. Sometimes a wealthy family might even commission music to

accompany

its

taking of Communion.5^

That Bach's colleague Gottfried Heinrich vice in

Gotha

in 1720-21

Stolzel

began

his ser-

with a double annual cycle has emboldened

Christoph Wolff to venture the hypothesis that Bach, too, might have provided the Leipzigers with a double annual cycle during his year in office, that

day and

is,

a two-part cantata or

holiday.53 If this theory

is

correct,

first

two cantatas every Sun-

Wolff has

at the

same time

found an elegant solution to the puzzle of why the obituary speaks of five

annual cantata cycles, while in Bach's

construct

Yet

it

it

at present, there

was

would be surprising

actually if

Bach

life,

to the extent

room

we can re-

for only four.

— who,

in

view of the four

double annual cycles and eight single cycles produced by Stolzel, can hardly be described as prolific

— had gone

ing a double annual cycle during his very calendar of 144

The

to the trouble first

year in Leipzig.

known performances shows another

Stations of Bach's Life

of compos-

The

picture altogether:

in the first annual cycle, two-part cantatas predominate; later

the year, one-part cantatas predominate, but

most have

on

in

a chorale in

the middle, revealing a tendency toward separation into two parts. It

seems pointless to speculate whether these works were also broken up, with one part performed before

can

we

and one

few cantata

establish that the very

after the

pairs identified today be-

longed originally to a complete double cycle; such an annual for each later

cycle,

Sunday and

Nor

sermon.

if

Bach had planned

he would probably have provided two cantatas feast

day precisely in the beginning; not until

would he have had recourse

to "mere" two-part cantatas, to save

himself work. In reality the two-part cantatas date from the begin-

may

ning of the year, which suggests that a cycle of two-part cantatas have been planned, but no annual cycle with double cantatas.

It

can

hardly be contested, however, that for some reason he occasionally

performed two cantatas

at

one

service. 5^

In the beginning, Bach must have entrusted the writing of his bretti to persons familiar

likely the texts for the 1724-25

a

member of

cycles of song

sure he

the Leipzig clergy or an academic, especially since

sermons were a

ing for suitable

tive.55

annual cantata cycles were the work of

local tradition. In spite

was under. Bach apparendy spent

familiarity

libretti.

The

texts

of the

a

of all the pres-

good deal of time search-

first

two annual

cycles reveal

with the Bible and a well- developed theological perspec-

Their character

reflects his

own

intentions, as well as the cir-

cumstance that in the City of Churches cantata but a

li-

with cultural expectations in Leipzig. Most

trivial

matter

— on the

contrary: to a

texts

were anything

good number of the the-

ologians and pious Christians the texts were probably of greater

mo-

ment than the music. Ultimately, our knowledge of the external circumstances under

which Bach begins

his

work

what he accomplishes: within a

is

limited.

AU

the

Lutheran church music. Here a forty-year-old fliU

is

a period of about four years he creates

mighty corpus of compositions that express

ergy and

more impressive

his sets

understanding of out with great en-

concentration to accomplish his "ultimate goal" of cre-

ating "a well-regulated church music to the glory of God." This goal Cantor

at St.

Thomas and

City Music Director in Leipzig

145

was formulated for dismissal

from

become

once he

clear

his post in Miihlhausen, is

in Leipzig: in the

Lutheran Germany has to

and passion' to

his skill

when he made his request

in simple, pragmatic terms

offer a

fulfilling

but

its full

implications

most prominent position

church musician, Bach commits

what he

he owes to

feels

all

this special

position.

In his 1962 lecture "OutUne of a

Blume

He

vigorously disputes such an interpretation.

Bach was tion,

New Picture of Bach," Friedrich

a reluctant cantor

of

St.

asserts that

Thomas. Upon taking the

posi-

he "delivered a couple of impressive religious works" in the form

of the St John Passion and the Magnificat, then composed three annual cantata cycles "as if in a state of creative intoxication," but after that viewed the composition of church music,

the

St.

Matthew

contributions":

Word, the

an

Passion, as

''onus'^

that

committed Lutheran,

This distinguished musicologist

maintains that in different phases of his tions

Bach emphasized

Thomas he

different things,

increasingly turned

of the

creative servant

a myth."^^

is

right,

is

and including

to

as "voluntary-reluctant

is

"The archcantor Bach, the

steadfastly

up

life

of course,

and

when he

in different situa-

and even

as cantor

of

St.

away from composing church music.

Yet Blume seriously underestimates Bach's commitment to Lutheran

church music; there can be no doubt that

component of Leipzig

is

work

as a

its

music forms a crucial

composer, and the early period in

the midpoint of his creative

cantor," despite for

his

this

life.

Even the

somewhat pejorative connotations,

epithet "archis

which composer, with the exception of Heinrich

appropriate: Schiitz, suc-

ceeded better in expressing the idea implied by "Lutheran church music"? That four years are sufficient for laying the foundation of this idea

does not contradict the notion of an archcantor;

rather, for

Bachs

universality. In other periods

of his

life

it

speaks,

he devoted

himself with similar intensity to other tasks. Starting with the

assignment sion with

is

to write

first

Sunday

after Trinity in the year 1723, the

Lutheran church music.

which Bach

sets

We can sense the pas-

about creating a rich supply of church

pieces that he can present to the people of Leipzig as his specific 146

The

Stations of Bach's Life

—

contribution.

The

aesthetic properties of these

topic of a later chapter; here

events. If he does not have a suitable cantata

performance in Leipzig, he composes a

and

day in the

feast

works

on hand

new one

a setting of a biblical passage

form the

The new works

to revise for

for every

Sunday

they are mostly

liturgical year; at the outset,

splendid two-part compositions.

will

a matter of describing the external

it is

usually begin with

and always close with a simple four-

part chorale. In between are recitatives and arias, with original texts

by contemporary poets.

BWV 238,

For Christmas in 1723 Bach composes the Sanctus,

BWV

and the Magnificat,

243a. Interestingly,

he

inserts into this

early version of the Magnificat four so-called lauds referring to

Christmas, thereby taking up a local tradition related to the custom

of "child cradling." this

It

would be

nice to

know whom he

consulted on

matter and what he found so attractive in these popular musical

interludes,

which form

a clear contrast to the refined tone of his set-

ting of the Magnificat. Perhaps he

"Vom Himmel

komm

hoch, da

had these short movements

ich her," "Freut euch

"Gloria in excelsis deo," and "Virga Jesse floruit"

und jubiliert,"

— accompanied

only by the basso continuo, sung from a special choir loft such as the so-called Swallow's Nest.

Bach's choice

aU the more remarkable because the city council

is

in 1702 explicidy rejected the singing

antiphones, psalms, hymns, collects a clear criticism

of certain Latin responses

— but

of the Saxon Elector's

version to Catholicism.

From now

also the

Christmas lauds

politically

motivated con-

on, everything that

smacked of

old "Catholic" ceremonies was to have no place in Leipzig church services.57

But apparendy no

actual ordinances to that effect

were

adopted.

At for, in

the Christmas holidays, three cantatas were of course called

addition to the concerted Latin church music. For Christmas

Day, Bach used the cantata "Christen atzet diesen Tag,"

composed

in

Weimar, and

he composed two Gottes,"

new

BWV 40, Cantor

for the

cantatas,

BWV 63,

second and third day of Christmas

"Darzu

ist

erschienen der

Sohn

and "Sehet, welch eine Liebe hat uns der Vater at St.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

147

erzeiget,"

BWV 64. A six-week tempus clausum, which meant six pas-

sion Sundays in February and

gave him the opportunity to first

1724 without figural music,

move along and complete work on

the

of his passions that have survived, the St John Passion.

Hearing a modern passion for the people of Leipzig.

sion v^th a text

and

March

As

is

not an unprecedented experience

previously mentioned,

by Brockes was performed in

in 1721 at St. Thomas's,

Telemann s pas-

1717 at the

and presumably

New Church by

in 1723 a passion

Bach's predecessor, Kuhnau, as well. But Bach's accomplishment

is

of another magnitude.

The

takes place during the

Good

and the performance

preceded and followed by controversy. In de-

is

first

performance of the

St.

John Passion

Friday vesper service, on 7 April 1724,

fiance of the standing

agreement that passions in Leipzig should be

performed alternately

at St.

passed over

St. Nicholas's in

his plans given

ing room.

St. Nicholas's,

favor of St. Thomas's,

two thousand-odd

its

He has

Thomas's and

seats

and

a

more

Bach has

favorable to

good deal of stand-

already sent around text brochures announcing the

site.

Four days before the performance he council,

would

where he responds to the

is

called before the city

council's chiding

be glad to shift the location, but only if

by saying that he

more room could be

created at St. Nicholas's and the harpsichord repaired.

The

council

responds sympathetically and agrees to pay for a flyer announcing the change of venue. This

without

flyer,

which Bach sends

to the printer

fijrther consultation, reads:

Since, after completed printing

of the Passion

texts, it

has pleased

a Noble and Wise Council that their performance on Friday next should,

God

willing, take place at St. Nicholas's

should, as usual, also alternate

Sundays, notice of this

is

Church and

with the musicsforfeast days and

herewith given to the hon. Messrs.

Auditoribus.5^ It

would be hard

to miss the decidedly snippish tone of this flyer.

Apparendy the superintendent has the same impression when flyer accidentally

148

The

comes

the

to his attention, long after the passion has

Stations of Bach's Life

He summons Bach on

been performed.

23

May

and

him

forces

to

confess that he did not submit the text of the notice to the council.

According

to the

had

that he

minutes of the meeting, Bach admits

erred, hoped,

however, that he would be pardoned

as a stranger, unacquainted

with

local practices.

In future he

would take heed and communicate on such matters with me, Superintendent, which

had

also been impressed

his

upon him most

earnestly^^

Considering that lation, flict,

this incident occurs in the year after his instal-

a harsh rebuke.

it is

however, were

sources do not

it

supposed to be performed

Bach

over this particular con-

fundamental positions.

The

realized that the passion

was

reveals

it

us whether

tell

more appropriate

One might pass

not that

at St. Nicholas's. St.

Thomas's seemed

to him, for practical, performance-related reasons

but perhaps also because his protector, Lange, headed the board

and Christian Weise was the his confessor

sympathy

is

somewhat

for Pietism

pastor.

(That Bach chose the

surprising; in 1693

by becoming the

Weise had displayed

forty-sixth

member of

Philobiblicum, founded seven years earlier by August Francke.^°)

toph Plaz

and

At

as

St. Nicholas's

latter as

the

Hermann

Bach must deal with Abraham Chris-

head of the board and Salomon Deyling

as the pastor

also superintendent.

In his

own mind. Bach may have

the place where his

performance

seen

it

as his right to

choose

work would be performed. Perhaps he viewed

itself as

the

the result of personal initiative, following the

Hamburg example. That he was apparendy not reimbursed for printing the text booklets, which presumably contained only the passages, not the text of the biblical passion,

rhymed

might confirm

this

interpretation.

Presumably Bach assumed the cost himself, hoping that such service

would be rewarded with

special honoraria

a

from wealthy

He must

have also paid for the printing of

the text booklets for the regular

Sunday and feast-day cantata per-

Leipzig music lovers.

formances and marketed them himself. In Hamburg, Cantor

at St.

Thomas and City Music

this

kind of

Director in Leipzig

149

income was taken director. ^^

The

for granted as "pars salarii" of the cantor

first

performance of the

character of a concert, even though

it

St.

and music

John Passion took

on the

occurred within the framework

of a church service with a sermon, and

it

was

in this spirit that

Bach

— the

audi-

addressed the change-of-venue notice to the Auditoribus ence, not the congregation of Christians.

In this connection,

it is

important to understand that the main

churches of Leipzig were not simple gathering places and that the buildings' design

meant

that visitors did not

form

a united congre-

The

interiors actually

gation brought together for a religious service.

resembled theaters with boxes. ^^ Better-heeled citizens were required to rent a pew, and there was a spatial hierarchy, with gradations extending

the boxes,

from standing room to benches and simple pews

known as

chapels and located in the balconies, which were

On one balcony,

opposite the pul-

luxurious fittings of the boxes and their

good view of the

often accessible from the outside. pit,

was the

The

to

royal box.

music, which was also performed on balconies, their occupants to experience the

made

natural for

performance of the passion

musical entertainment and a social event as well. in Zedler s Universal-Lexikony

it

where the entry

We

as a

find this idea

for "Oratorio" reads:

...a spiritual opera or musicalpresentation ofa religious story in the chapels or chambers ofgreat men, consisting of conversations.

Solo,

Duo, and

Trio, Ritornelles, mighty choruses, &c.

The

musical composition must be rich in all that this art can furnish

of what

is

meaningful and choice. In Rome, most

ing Lent, there

is

nothing more

especially

dur-

common than such Oratori. They

are especially suited to Bridal Masses, Passions,

and

other such

spiritual or churchly musics.^^

Is this is

what many music-loving Leipzigers want and what Bach

prepared to supply, without

his conception

150

The

as will

be shown

of Lutheran church music?

thing the conservatives feared

Kuhnau

—

when

they

And

— departing from is it

also the very

made Bach promise,

like

before him, not to construct his sacred music along theatriStations of Bach's Life

Unfortunately no reactions to the passion have

cal or operatic lines?

come down

to us, but the splendor, refinement,

the

work must have

the

good sense and the bad.

and profundity of

struck Leipzig like a bolt of lightning

For Bach the daily routine continues. nual cantata cycle and on the

He

completes the

Sunday

first

—

both

in

first

an-

after Trinity in 1724

plunges without a break into the next annual cycle, one of choral cantatas, probably the tire

most ambitious

oeuvre. Perhaps this

is

cyclic

also the year in

on hymns.

plete a passion based primarily

that because he does not have

undertaking in his en-

which he intends

ready in time for

it

to

com-

We may speculate further Good Friday in the

year 1725, he repeats the St John Passion, replacing several sections

do not

that

perfectly

fit

the traditional conception of a passion: the

introductory chorus "Herr, unser Herrscher," the aria "Ach, mein Sinn," the arioso "Betrachte meine Seel," and the aria "Erwage."

The

work now opens with

dein

the splendid chorale

"O Mensch, bewein

Siinde gross," which, however, will not remain in that position; after

Bach

most part

returns for the

mance of the passion

wein dein Siinde gross" finds St Matthew In

1725,

to the first version for a third perfor-

more

in 1728 or, its

likely, in 1732,

"O Mensch,

be-

place in the definitive version of the

Passion.

Bach

interrupts his

work on

the annual cantata cycle

around Easter, although he needs only a few more pieces to complete it.

Later he will

14, 112, 129,

and

cantatas

BWV 9,

For cantatas to be performed on Easter

Monday

some of the gaps with the new

fill

140.

as well as

on the Quasimodogeniti and Misericordias Domini Sun-

days

and second Sundays,

(first

respectively, after Easter),

the short-term services of a librettist tists

he used for the

resident bilate

first

Trinity. It

tron, Gottsched,

would be

is

takes over for the period interesting to

recommends her

unwilling to write religious twice widowed,

he secures

be one of the

libret-

Leipzig annual cycle; after that the Leipzig

Marinne von Ziegler

and

who may

to

libretti for

between Ju-

know whether

Bach because he

is

her pa-

himself

Bach. This still-young woman,

the daughter of the burgomaster

Romanus, now

languishing in the fortress of Konigstein. She stands at the very Cantor

at St.

Thomas and

City Music Director in Leipzig

151

beginning of her to Gottsched's

career.

German

In 1730 she will be the

and three years

Society,

faculty of the University of

Wittenberg

She

Romanus

perial poet.

lives in

the

first

will

woman

later the

admitted

humanities

crown her

im-

as the

house, a splendid structure

erected at the beginning of the century for her father, and turns into a gathering place for lovers of literature ciety.

it

and music in Leipzig so-

Christian Gabriel Fischer, a contemporary, gives the following

account of her in this period: She

is

as yet a young

widow, who, however, on account ofa mul-

titude of circumstances, will hardly things, her

Conduite

spirit far too lively

expectations.

marry again.

Among

almost excessively womanly,

is

and alertfor

her to submit to

Her outward aspect

is

other

and

her

common male

not ugly, but she has rather

large bones, a squatfigure, a fattish face, a smooth brow, lovely eyes,

and she

Her

collaboration with

intense. Frau

is

healthy

and rather brown Bach proves

in coloration. ^"^

rather short in duration, yet

von Ziegler complies with the composer's

specific

wishes and works into her libretto for the Whitsun cantata "Also hat

Gott die Welt

BWV

geliebt,"

BWV 68, two arias from the Hunt Cantata,

new words. Altogether

208, with

nine cantatas. If

we compare

she provides the texts for

the wording that

Bach

uses with the

versions the poet publishes in her 1728 Attempts in Fixed Forms, find a

number of variations

altered her texts to suit his

to their original

form

in style

and content.

own purposes, while

He

we

seems to have

she restored the texts

for the printed volume.

Although the collaboration between Bach and Marinne von Ziegler does not last long, episode, for

on

librettists

it

could offer a

who

should not be dismissed as a mere

it

first

example of Bach's turning

belong to Leipzig's

clergy,

professional poets of both sexes. In 1725 he

Ziegler but also, as will be discussed latest

marks the beginning of

in that year provides sion

and the

152

The

Stations of Bach's Life

is

in touch not only

Gottsched.

his collaboration

him with

Satisfied jEoIus,

later,

back

with

And 1727 at the

with Picander,

the libretti for the

BWV 205.

his

and instead seeking out

St.

who

Matthew Pas-

This Picander, described

as "small

means the kind of person who even though he has worked his

and

frail

of body,"^5

is

by no

considered important in Leipzig,

is

way up, under his

real

name. Christian

Friedrich Henrici, from commissioner of postal operations to collector

of district land taxes and city beverage

mined

to gain a foothold in poetry,

taxes.

As

a student he

and achieves

is

deter-

his first successes in

Leipzig with wedding poems that do not shun erotic allusions; in

he

is

all

supposed to have written 436 such "carmina," "often in the dark

of night

.

,

. .

when

not the slightest poetic star shone upon me":

Go

wee bed

forth and play in thy

A sweet duet that whirls the head. Sustain the chord with

And when

thou'st

all

thy might,

done so through the night,

Just wait a brief three-quarter s year,

Thou'lt find thou hast a

trio here!^^

But Picander soon develops into an author of comedies, portraying portions of Leipzig society so unmistakably in works like

The Academic Dolce Far Niente, The Arch-Drunkard, and The Good Wives Trial thzt one day the city council issues a ban.

apphes to certain works by Gottsched

— one of those

The ban also who despised

Picander. Earlier

Bach

scholars in general gave Picander s frivolities a

berth, never considering this ne'er-do-well.

settling in, to

why Bach was on

But Bach must find

it

such familiar terms with

important, after a period of

emancipate himself from the confining religious

and open the door

to literary Leipzig. It

wide

is

no doubt

circles

for this reason

that he specifically commissions Picander to write the libretto for the 5/.

Matthew Passion

—

a

work whose conceptional and

aesthetic hori-

zon transcends that of utihtarian church music once and for

Bach

displays Picander's

name prominently on

the

the authoritative handwritten version of the passion; he sort in

of resource he has in him, and

no way

inferior to the

Cantor

at St.

may

title

all.

page of

knows what

think that "his" Picander

is

famous Barthold Heinrich Brockes, whose Thomas and

City Music Director in Leipzig

153

"The Martyred

passion libretto

Dying

Jesus

World" was thoroughly cannibalized

for the

St.

for the Sins

of the

John Passion, perhaps

with Picander's help. Certainly Picander functions more effectively than Gottsched as Bach's intermediary to Leipzig literary

godmother

1737 Picander's wife serves as

at the

circles.

In

baptism of Bach's

daughter Johanna Carolina, an indication that the families, too, are

on

friendly terms.

To

return to the second annual cantata cycle: although the cantatas

composed between Easter and Trinity of 1725 do not belong cycle of choral cantatas, that does not

them

uses

as the core

mean

of another annual

by such authors

as

replacement for the

librettist

on

annual cycles. Neumeister and

Neumeister received

and was the

university.

In

1715

whom

Lehms

The

gen.

Lehms

also

regular

ing

where he spent falls

on hand, and eighteen

literature at the

his youth.

back on some of his own

cantatas

composed by

his

court kapellmeister in Meinin-

were probably written by Duke Ernst Ludwig of

to have got off track

composing of choral

them

two

with a dissertation on po-

performed cantatas by Telemann

Bach seems

permanent

relied for the first

on German

Meiningen. The recendy found Leningrad

Bach

Christian Lehms,

published the anthology The Gallante Lady

Ludwig Bach, who was

texts

he

texts

at least are "old" Leipzigers.

scholar to lecture

In the course of the third year. Bach

cousin Johann

draws on older

at first to find a

his doctorate in 1695

first

Poets of Germany in Leipzig,

pieces, already

which, however, he

Erdmann Neumeister, Georg

and Salomon Franck, apparently unable

etics,

cycle,

He now

gives himself several years to develop.

to the

they lack a home. Bach

cantatas.

text booklets suggest that after Easter in 1725.^7

somewhat when

What made him

it

came

stop

to the

compos-

The librettist may have left him in the lurch, pastor who combined music with his sermons.

so abruptly?

perhaps also the

Maybe Bach was

so

worn out from

ceaselessly inventing

and rehears-

ing complicated chorales that he wanted time to focus on cantatas

based on biblical quotations and set for solo voices.

154

The

Stations of Bach's Life

Or

perhaps the

change should be seen in the context of a recently experienced

which would not be unusual

The

the right to perform

Pauline church.

note that Bach

On 3

is

for Bach.

when Bach

year 1725 was

clashed with the university over

modern music

in the university church, the

March, the minutes of the university council

demanding

vice in the Pauline church."^^

new worship serdirector of this new service,

"a Salarium" for "the

The music

which has taken place every Sunday and open

to

all, is

The

ganist at St. Nicholas's.

university hired

move from

him

shortly before

Bach must have been

the outset, for during the term in

of his predecessors Schelle and Kuhnau, music

office

was

sity

this

in the

is

also functions as the or-

Bach's appointment to the cantor's position.

by

day since 1710 and

feast

Johann Gottlieb Corner, who

greatly angered

insult,

hands of the cantor of

St.

at the univer-

Thomas's, and the same

arrangement had been offered to Telemann.

As

for the "old

for singing motets

worship

service,"

Bach

with the choir from the

has the responsibility

still

St.

Thomas School

at the

Quarterly Orations, and four times a year he also must present ural music: at Christmas, Easter,

Corner

day.

worship sity

is

Whitsun, and Reformation Sun-

"new

responsible for the concerted music of the

service."

fig-

While Bach has up

to

now worked

for the univer-

without extra remuneration. Corner receives the entire amount

appropriated for the university music program.

In a complaint addressed to the Elector and dated 14 September 1725,

Bach emphasizes

that in the last analysis he

with the Directorium of the

new

—

that

is,

vice but with the "withdrawal of the salary. "^^ sity decides a

few days

later to divide the

Corner, the cantor of St. Thomas's failure

fare

on the part of the

when monies

is

is

additional

concerned not

— worship

ser-

Although the univer-

budget between Bach and

not mollified.

university to provide for

its

He views

it

as a

employees' wel-

"appropriated and assigned for the proper remu-

neration of a servant of the Church" are siphoned off 7°

He

is

not

willing under any circumstances to relinquish the significant supple-

mentary income promised when he was

Cantor

at St.

recruited.

Thomas and City Music

Director in Leipzig

155

Apparently Bach

enlists legal assistance in

tion to the court at Dresden,

ment than from six

Leipzig.

formulating his peti-

from which he expects more just

The

third

treat-

and longest petition amounts

dense pages in the Bach Documents; appended to

it

to

are affidavits

from the widows of Bach's two predecessors, supporting Bach's claim.

But

all

these efforts prove in vain; after a lively exchange of

letters

among

the various governmental agencies, early in the year

1726 the decision

handed down that Bach has no

is

"new worship

ipate in the

the "old service" are regularly paid

withdrawn from

Although

service."

for,

right to partic-

his contributions to

he seems to have increasingly

responsibiUty after receiving the decision

this

against him. It is

hard to

ciple or out

to only

tell

whether Bach fought so hard

matter of prin-

of actual financial need. His basic annual salary amounts

one hundred

and every reduction

talers,

earnings makes itself felt. Besides, his family four

as a

is

in supplemental

growing: in 1726, the

young children Anna Magdalena has borne him

are at

home,

while Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Philipp Emanuel are pupils the St.

Thomas

at

School.

In 1726, Bach slows his pace somewhat.

On Good Friday he per-

forms the previously mentioned cantatas by his cousin in Meiningen, along with Reinhard Keiser's St or merely tired, this

is

the

lull

Mark Passion. Whether he

before a great event: on

of the following year he wiU present his

St.

Matthew

angry

is

Good

Friday

Passion, a

work

whose importance wiU extend

far

Bach must sense when he

produces an elegant handwritten ver-

sion of the score.

work on

11

As we

later

beyond the

its

creation, as

can recognize today, with the premiere of the

April 1727, the great period in which Bach concentrated

on composing Lutheran church music comes Since the rediscovery of the

delssohn in 1829, first

era of

it

St.

Matthew

to an end.

Passion

by

Felix

has been generally assumed that the

heard exactly one hundred years

earlier, in 1729.

Men-

work was

Carl Friedrich

Zelter found this date in "an old church text" but left open the question of whether this really

was the

first

performance.^^ Perhaps Zel-

ter

based his dating on the Serio-Comical and Satyrical Poems of

156

The

Stations of Bach's Life

who includes his libretto

Picander,

St.

Matthew Passion

in that

published in 1729, without mentioning a date of performance.

text,

As

of the

evidence for a 1729 performance, some cite Bach's letter to his stu-

dent Christoph Wecker of 20

March

1729, in

which he writes that he

cannot provide him with "the requested Passion Musique'' since he needs the score himself.7^

It is doubtful,

however, that Wecker has

the resources in Schwednitz to perform such a difficult work, requir-

ing a double chorus. Perhaps a different passion

Bach the

is

meant? Or perhaps

needs the score not for a performance but for the composing of

BWV 244a, some of which

Co then flineral music,

the passion, as will be discussed

The

date of 1727 for

St.

is

drawn from

later.

Matthew

Passion rests primarily

on the

observation that the viola part of the Sanctus, written around this

time and later integrated into the phrases from

"Mache

the passion.73 But 1726 or 1727

dich,

B -Minor Mass,

mein Herze

rein"

— an

how do we know that this viola

contains

some

aria that occurs in

part

was copied

in

— and by Bach's nephew Johann Heinrich? The question

of chronology brings us to an interesting subfield in Bach scholarship, its

one to which insiders devote

entire conferences

at least a brief digression for the benefit

touched on previously, Bach's vocal works, exist

and which mer-

of nonspecialists. As was

like the rest

of his oeuvre,

almost without exception in undated manuscripts. In the course

of almost one hundred years of research, which began with the publication

found

of the second volume of Spitta's Bach biography in 1880 and

its

high point in Alfred

Diirr's

epoch-making

Chronologic der Leipziger Vokalwerke the Leipzig Vocal

Works of J.

results to light, scholars

S.

J. S.

1957

^ork "Zur

Bachs" (Chronology of

Bach), yet continues to bring

new

have managed to organize the surviving

manuscripts so successfiiUy that the dates on which most of the cantatas

were

first

performed can

now be

pinpointed and entered into a

calendar.

Spitta

was the

first

to order systematically the scattered cantata

manuscripts into annual cycles and to date them. idea that manuscripts

began with the

on paper bearing the same watermark must

have originated in the same period. If Cantor

He

at St.

Thomas and

fiarther indications

made

City Music Director in Leipzig

it

157

possible to date one of these manuscripts, that suggested a date for

the entire cycle. This trained

and among

classicist's

approach broke

was the dating of the vocal works from the

his successes

Weimar and

early Leipzig periods, but Spitta's

fundamental

errors,

many of which were

1744,

whereas today

longed to the 1724-25 annual

To look Spitta's

cantata

work

also resulted in

not corrected until

For

cycle.

one example, the year 1744 gained prominence

at just

in

dating scheme in a rather curious way: he thought the choral

"Du

Friedefiirst,

Herr Jesu Christ,"

BWV

could not

116,

have been written before 1744, because the text of recitative to the Prussian soldiers'

5 alludes

march through Saxony during the Second

War: "Oh, may by the blows that

Silesian

had generally structured

our head

strike

much precious blood be shed ..." According to brettist

1957.

many cantatas to the period between 1735 we have irrefutable evidence that they be-

instance, Spitta assigned

and

new ground

/

not too

Spitta, because the

li-

his text as a stanza-by- stanza para-

phrase of the original church hymn, this recitative clearly represented a free invention inspired

hymn

to

by the

which the "blows"

overlooked

it

political situation.

recitative

Yet a stanza in the

can be traced did

exist;

he had

because the hymnal he consulted happened to have the

verses arranged in a different order!74

In individual cases,

false datings

based on

this

kind of guess-

work, of which Arnold Schering perpetrated quite a few more in the twentieth century, were no disaster. Cumulatively, however, they created the impression that

Bach composed many of

cantatas for specific occasions, and as isolated works.

his

church

That impres-

sion hindered the recognition that he thought in terms of annual cycles, particularly

during the

first

Leipzig period, so decisive for his

production of cantatas. These cycles, once identified, lend themselves well to study

among

of his compositional strategies and the relations

the individual works. Another problem with Spitta's assign-

ing the bulk of the cantatas to the period starting in 1735

is

that

launched the myth of the "late" choral cantatas, composed by a

it

ret-

rospectively oriented cantor of St. Thomas's. It took generations for this

myth

158

The

to be recognized as such

Stations of Bach's Life

—

in the face

of

fierce resistance

from many, including Friedrich Smend, a respected scholar deeply involved in the examination of original sources.

While attempts

to date Bach's

works by reference to contempo-

and

rary events were undertaken less

less frequently,

increasing at-

tention was devoted to examination of the documents themselves,

and the copyists in particular came in

for closer scrutiny.

On the

one

hand, changes in Bach's handwriting could be established, providing the basis for a relative chronology.

Bach employed had

Anna Magdalena,

the other hand, the copyists

and identified

as far as possible:

Bach's sons as they grew up, his son-in-law, and

especially the students at the St.

"chief copyists"

On

to be recognized

— Christian

Thomas

School,

among them

the

Gottlob Meissner, Johann Andreas

Kuhnau, Johann Heinrich Bach, Johann Gottlob Haupt, Johann

Ludwig

Dietel,

instance, if

Rudolph Straube, and Samuel Gottlieb Heder. For

one could estabUsh when Meissner and Kuhnau, whose

writing can be recognized in Bach's audition piece, "Jesus

nahm zu

sich die Zwolfe," BWV 22, left the school, one would have a termi-

nus ad quern for the composition of the pieces they copied.

myself was introduced by

I

my

mentor, Friedrich Blume, into

the haphazard "old" chronology of the cantatas, and toward the end

of

my

university studies

process by

which

a

new

and

later

basis

followed with great suspense the

was established

calendar of Bach's Leipzig cantatas.

community of scholars

we owe

the

first

is

To

for the

this day,

performance

an international

working on achieving greater

precision. If

great breakthrough to Alfred Diirr, the project of es-

tablishing a comprehensive chronology of Bach's oeuvre has occu-

pied

many

States

scholars, located primarily in

Germany and

the United

— but with Yoshitake Kobayashi, one of the world's preemi-

nent experts on Bach's handwriting, even Japan has entered the picture.

Let us return to the year of the

S>t.

Matthew

Passioriy in

which

Bach composes another major vocal work, the ode of mourning on the death of the reigning elector's mother, Christiane Eberhardine of

Saxony, which begins with the words "Lass, Fiirstin, lass noch einen Strahl aus Salems Sterngewolben schiessen" Cantor

at St.

(O

Thomas and City Music

Princess, let just

Director in Leipzig

one 159

—

last ray

stream from Salem s starry firmament),

sion of its performance versity church

on

17

is

a

memorial

October

BWV 198. The occa-

service scheduled for the uni-

Gottsched provides the

1727.

and

text

Bach the music.

The

service has a political dimension, because the elector's

mother has been greatly respected

in Saxony; unlike her late

and currendy governing son, she had not yet converted cism and had to spend lost interest in her.

many years

husband

to Catholi-

who

separated from her husband,

In another sense, too, the service has political im-

port for Bach, because the initiator of and chief orator at the service, a university student

of only twenty- three, Hans Carl von Kirchbach,

commissions Bach rather than the university music to

director.

Corner,

compose and perform the ode of mourning. Corner promptly protests, but allows himself to be placated with

a payoff of twelve talers

from Kirchbach and reaffirmation by the

university of his general rights.

The

university auditor, however,

fails

twice in his attempt to obtain Bach's signature on a corresponding

statement of understanding.75 until

15

October

leaving only hearsals.

The

— according

two days

The

score of the ode

with a pealing of the

St. Nicholas's to

tendance at the Leipzig

fair,

with a great number of noble

The

to the service, along

ladies, as well as the entire

city council

in a body. "7^

under the tide "Leipzig Weeps," the performance their places,

and

honorable In an ac-

Sicul, published is

described thus:

the organist

had

played a prelude, the Ode ofMourning written by Magisterjo-

member of the Collegium marianum, was distributed amongst those present by the Beadles, and

160

hann Christoph

Gottsched,

shortly thereafter

was heard the Music of Mourning, which

The

Stations of Bach's Life

a

who had been in at-

count by the Leipzig historian Christoph Ernst

had taken

re-

and

"Princely personages, re-

found their way

and the distinguished

and

bells

the university church.

spected ministers, cavaliers, and other foreigners

then, all

own hand

for copying of the individual parts

Hamburg Stats undgelehrte Zeitung reports,

When,

not completed

to a notation in Bach's

service itself begins

solemn procession from

university

is

this

time Herr KapellmeisterJohann Sebastian Bach had composed in

with Clave di Cembalo [harpsichord] which

the Italian styky

^

Herr Bach himselfplayed, recorders, fleutes douces

organ, violas di gamba, lutes, violins,

andfleute traverses,

&c., halfbeing heard

preceding and halffollowing the oration ofpraise Sicul's

comment,

that

Bach composed

and mourning

his "excellent music," as

the university chronicler, Johann Jacob Vogel, calls

makes

ian style,"

ing to

it

Bach

clear that

stanzaic structure but like a cantata libretto: as a series of

its

by seeing

his

Bach such freedom a

grand

scale

poems

is

may be

the prerequisite for composing a

and with such

less

than

structure flouted in this fashion, but for

a varied texture.

elegiac tone in masterful fashion. its

"in the Ital-

Gottsched s ode not accord-

set

choruses, recitatives, ariosos, and arias. Gottsched edified

it,77

The

He

work on such

captures the courtly

refined musical language finds

counterpart in the unusually rich instrumentalization: in addition

to the traditional string ensemble, the score requires

two oboes d'amore, two

flutes,

If the

work did not have

modern performances

that

uncontested, even

are rare,

among Bach

To be

molded its

would

is

certainly be

the circumstances,

Bach ascribed

sure, quite a bit

lutes.

to a specific occasion

stature

Under

lovers.

provides evidence of the importance occasional music.

gamba, and two

violas di

a text so

two transverse

to the genre

at stake; for

it

of

one thing, by

collaborating with Gottsched, already highly regarded as a representative

of rational

literature.

Bach can make

it

clear that

he belongs

not only to the Leipzig church community but also to the "living and flourishing Leipzig of today" earlier.

For another thing,

present his music before favor

becomes

torship

all

the

—

this

to quote the city guide

event gives

members of

mentioned

him an opportunity

the court at Dresden,

to

whose

more important the more the burdens of can-

weigh on him.

Any

account of Bach's early Leipzig years that failed to do jus-

tice to his

ambitions in the realm of secular music, in

would be woefully one-sided. The ode of mourning piece of secular music

Cantor

Bach composes and performs

at St.

Thomas and

is

all its facets,

not the only

in Leipzig, not

City Music Director in Leipzig

i6i

even the

first

sion: the

written in collaboration with Gottsched; two years

two men worked together

earlier the

for a significant social occa-

marriage of the Leipzig burgher Peter

Hohmann, Noble

Standardbearer of Hohenthal, to Christine Sibylle Mencke, daughter

of Johann Burchard Mencke, a noted scholar and interim rector

of the university. in the

Hohmann

historian

"Auf,

as the finest

1725 art

example of Leipzig baroque

Gottsched composes a "Serenata" that begins

entzuckende Gewalt" (Arise, o sweet enchanting power)

and Bach composes a cantata us

on 27 November

7^

this occasion

siiss

takes place

house on the market square, described by the

Georg Dehio

architecture.

For

The wedding

(BWV Anh.

1 196).

An

in thirteen parts, unfortunately lost to

can be reconstructed from vari-

aria that

ous parodic versions, "Entfernet euch, ihr kalten Herzen" (Get ye away, ye ice-cold hearts), gives us a glimpse of how well

Bach has

al-

ready mastered the gallant tone in his early Leipzig period, even

he combines this period

it

with other tones,

as

is

his

if

wont. Other cantatas from

intended for weddings are "Vergniigte Pleissenstadt,"

BWV 216, with a libretto by Picander; the version of "O holder Tag, erwiinschte Zeit," BWV 210; as well as possibly "Weichet nur, betriibte Schatten," BW^ 202, a work that may also go back to first

Bach's time in Cothen. If these works just

mentioned belong to the genre of the cham-

ber cantata, the three drammiper musica that have survived from the first

years in Leipzig are, according to Gottsched,

operettas," which, however, "seldom find their

These

pieces, rich in gesture

for trumpets

"little

way

to the stage."

and tone-painterly effects,

and timpani; the

singers

operas or

are

all

embody mythological

scored

or alle-

gorical figures.

JEolus Propitiated, which begins "Zerreisset, zersprenget, zertriim-

mert die Gruft,"

BWV 205, was composed for the name day of the

philosophy professor August Friedrich Miiller in August 1725 and probably performed outdoors at his house on Katharinenstrasse.

drammaper

162

The

w«j/Vlich

is

trumpet

blasts

in truth the time

hand") right in the middle of a dramatic invocation of Judgment

Day. In a section of the five

weeks

later,

Year's

dem Herrn

"Singet

Day

Cantata, presented about

ein neues Lied,"

Deum

"Herr Gott, dich loben wir" one verse

in a fouT-p2iTtfa/so bordone setting, while

between these

bass presents in recitativo the reasons for praising

The

arias

of the

as the recitatives.

horizon; but

first

he must

Of course,

at the start

time

lines the solo

God.

modern da capo

BWV

this pattern:

This approach

75,

"Mein Jesus

is

soil

aria

form

is

on the

he deals with the form clear even in the first

mein

alles sein."

Right

he lays out the entire thematic and motivic material,

which comprises

tonomous

the

Bach barely follows

set for

at a

cantata year are just as variously structured

in reflective, multiple ways. aria

BV^ 190, he

of recitative and chorale: the chorus intones the

inverts the relation

Lutheran Te

New

a

two-measure pattern with a moving bass

in itself,

voices immediately

but

is still

part, au-

derived from the melody part. Both

swap themes:

Oboe und Violino

I

The

Leipzig Cantatas

363

This pattern will define the whole at the

words "Mein Purpur

aria

— even the middle

sein teures Blut"

ist

section

("My purple

is

his

which of course normally would contrast with the framing it. So the form is not A-B-A' but A- A'- A". With

precious blood"), sections

such narrowly determined material one might expect a rather aca-

demic composition. But the

feeling

is

dancelike, clearly taking

its

lead from the polonaise, and even the voice part does not slavishly

follow the set two-measure model but starts with a free-swinging

rhythmic theme that derives from the

the character and expressiveness of the text,

of Jesus.

The

model seems

stricdy thematic

and perfectly

Pietist aria

which

is

to have

suits

about the love

been forgotten,

but not quite, of course: the quintessential motif of the aria ritornello can be heard in the bass:

Continue

Here we the idea of

coming

as

see profiled

one of Bachs basic principles of creativity,

making much from it

does at the

start

little

— and not

just in this

of the whole year s

cycle,

it

one

aria:

seems to

have been the determining factor in his conception of the aria per

One

of its characteristics

bass figure. In as possible

is

The

the continuous use of the quasi- ostinato

BWV 76, he works this figure into as many numbers

— not

just in the arias but even in the

part settings that close the 364

se.

Vocal Music

first

homophonic

and second parts of the

four-

cantata:

.

Soprano

Alto

Es dan das Land

und

ke,

Gott,

bringt

Frucht und

lo

-

bes

-

be

dich sich.

sert

In the aria "Hort, ihr Volker" from the same cantata, Bach employs a distinctive rhythmic motif, as a quasi-ostinato in the bass also imitatively in the

two other parts of the

and

trio section.

Violino Solo

Soprano

Continuo

That Bach made use of a technique the time

was sometimes known

he viewed his in the big

work

as perjidia^^

is

a clear indication that

for the first year's cycle as experimental, not just

opening choruses but in the

graph score of

that in the music theory of

BWV 76

aria

form

as well.

The

auto-

contains considerable changes and correc-

tions specifically to the aria "Hort, ihr Volker": only while actually

composing the work does he decide perfidia technique.

^'^

to

He may have been

just as the brief rhythmic

make

consistent use of the

inspired to

do so by the

text:

motif is quickly passed from voice to voice,

the nations with similar alacrity shall hearken unto the voice of

God! But

a

more compelling reason may have been Bach's The

desire to

Leipzig Cantatas

365

form of the

subject the

aria to

an overriding and rigorous composi-

tional principle.

Examples oi perfidia can be found occasionally Bach's contemporaries

Alessandro

—

for

example in the duet "Dio pietoso" from

Scarlatti's oratorio

Ilprimo omicidio (1706) or in Handel's

psalm Dixit dominus, written about

1707.

But generally speaking,

a

organized around a characteristic motif and structured

trio setting

throughout by a contrapuntal setting

Bach did not

give

up

sound a

is

not the ideal form for an

this ideal in the arias for the St.

which he composed the following result

works of

in the

year,

John

aria.

Passion,

but he was able to make the

unwieldy.

little less

Bach's experimentation

is

He

not confined to structure.

also

is

concerned with bringing variety to his instrumentation: for the inau-

BWV

gural cantata

75,

in the aria "Ich

nehme mein Leiden mit

Freuden auf mich," he brings in the oboe d'amore, an instrument unfamiliar to

most Leipzigers

for the solo tatOy as

numbers

The trumpet

more

Liebe," from

employed

from

BWV 76, but

unusually, in the alto solo "Ach, es bleibt in meiner

BWV jj. Despite the generally demanding trio setting,

the melodic feeling here it is all

is

in the cycle not only in the operatic stik conci-

in the aria "Fahr hin, abgottische Zunft"

also, rather

so

at that point.

the

more

is

more of a

surprising that

religious

song than of an

Bach entrusted the

aria;

elaborately

elegiac obbligato part to the trumpet.

Another the

first

much

factor that plays a role in the structuring

cantata cycle

is

and scoring of

the need to spare the boy soprano voices as

as possible in the coldest part

of winter. Thus, in most of the

works performed between the second day of Christmas and the

Sunday

after

Epiphany, there are no soprano

190, 153, 65, 154).^^

An

arias (e.g., in

examination of the cycle

as a

first

BWV 40,

whole

reveals

Bach's tendency to reinforce the choir generally through the use of ripieno (orchestral) instruments. In Leipzig he could no longer

back on the mature voices of female sopranos

and Cothen; but even the

altos, tenors,

choir cannot always have possessed

as

he could in

and basses of the

flilly

trained voices.

fall

Weimar

St.

Thomas

A

detailed

study of the Leipzig performances of Weimar cantatas compared 366

The

Vocal Music

with their original

Weimar

versions

might

more

yield

precise infor-

mation about the special conditions Bach had to deal with in Leipzig.

The

systematic

Bach may have had misgivings about the

ety of form used in the create

first

Leipzig cantata cycle.

possible to

it

Lutheran church music of a more concentrated form and in

He

the process promote the idea of a cycle?

second

in his

Was

great vari-

cycle, the chorale cantatas,

explores this possibility

and in so doing

is

actually

reinforcing a local tradition. In 1690 the pastor of St. Thomas's, Jo-

hann Benedict Carpzov, pubHshed

his

Lehr- und Liederpredigte (Ser-

mons Spoken and Sung), where he remarked

that in his recent

sermons he had not only expUcated the respective Sunday s Gospel reading but in each instance had interpreted "a good old-fashioned Protestant Lutheran

hymn"

and

as well,

after the

whole congregation join in and sing that hymn. tinue this in the following year,

He intended to

and the cantor Johann Schelle prom-

^^

Carpzov was no longer Hving when Bach took could not have been the instigator or cycle

con-

music to every hymn" to be performed

ised to provide "pleasant

before the sermon.

sermon he had the

Bach began on the

first

Sunday

librettist

office

and so

of the chorale cantata

after Trinity in 1724. Is Bach's

author perhaps the former Konrektor of St. Thomas, Andreas Stubel,

whose from

chiliastic, that

office?^7

is,

radically Pietist views caused his

Hans-Joachim Schulze considered

poetically gifted

man

a possibility because

removal

this scholarly

(among other

and

reasons) he

died after a three-day illness on 31 January 1725, just at the point

when

the last three libretti of the chorale cantata cycle set by

were due. Schulze conjectures that

Bach

death could have been

Stiibel's

the crucial factor causing the cycle to remain incompleted^

There was probably only one author involved, who would of course have allowed

of the

libretti,

on

— perhaps

scriptive

to

the author at

words of individual later

Bach

hymn

first

alterations. In the inner sections

remained so

faithfiil to

the original

verses that his texts lack originality, but

at Bach's

and emotionally

make

behest

affecting,

— he made then

his

finally

The

words more de-

followed a kind of Leipzig Cantatas

367

middle road. The outer portions of the cantata did not need

made

texts:

the

first

strophe of a

hymn

tailor-

appropriate for the Sunday in

question would serve as both the textual and musical basis of the

head motif, and one of the of the

would

later strophes

likewise be the basis

final chorale.

new impulses

In this second cycle, the chorale cantatas, there are for

both composer and

a basic

problem more systematically than

might loosely be described

that

in art.

The

chorale

mythos

is

as the

the reading from the Bible:

new

realization

it

achieves

When Johann 1739, "true choral

mean

not

its

song

is

blending of mythos and logos

as

such

made

it is

it is

religious practice

more mythic

says in his

Compleat Kapellmeister of

not properly classified as music," he does

comment simply

just before this, that for

ate "figured" music,

and "executeurs," who more or

what they

Since the chorale

is

follows a

music "two

people" are required, namely, "compositeurs," whose task

cite" in a sense,

than,

even without words.

to disparage the chorale: the

statement he

problem

symbol made sound, and in each

it is

effect

Mattheson

to address

in the first cycle, a

in the sense that

and theology realized in sound, and say,

Bach the chance

listener. It gives

sorts

it is

of

to cre-

less "read,"or "re-

find in the musical notation.

not something composed,

it

does not meet

the criterion of music. Nonetheless even the "most simple of psalms"

can acquire the "quality of figured song"

Here the logos

as creative

mythos and shape

The

it

when

a

composer

sets it.^^

impulse enters the picture, to confront

into a rationally planned

and executable form.

process brings about a structure in which artistic creativity and

the message of

myth work

as one.

This

transcendence and the autonomy of art

dialectical relation is

between

inscribed in the heart of

Lutheranism. Since the Reformation, Lutheran churches have

culti-

vated the genre of choral musical treatments in whatever forms, such as

motets or concertos, were current

With

at the time.

the start of the eighteenth century and the triumph of

modern standard musical forms defined by

their

own

inner logic, as

exemplified by the instrumental concerto of Vivaldi or the da capo

368

The

Vocal Music

the problem increases:

aria,

inaccessible

How can the

composer make use of the

and immutable nature of myth

in musical

forms that are

becoming more and more autonomous?

Bach

He

cycle.

problem with great

sees this

clarity in the chorale cantata

must present the inherently heteronomous

tonomous work of art and,

accordingly, accomplish the "connection

of integral musical forms with the chorale and changes.

line-by-line melodic

its

"^°

In this cycle, in those

movements where he does not con-

first

sciously follow the traditional sequence of the motet, he

from multiple perspectives: he might build overture- or concerto-like form, or he might to a concerted form, the chorale

but

is

in an au-

is

composes

his "house" tell

with an

a story. In contrast

not firmly established at the start

constructed line by line in varying configurations.

An

illumination called The Building of Twelve Abbeys from the

late-medieval manuscript of Girart de RoussiUon shows the different stages of work

does not

mean

to

on buildings dedicated

document any

The

to God.^^

illustrator

particular stage of construction, in

the sense of modern photography, but to appreciate in pictorial form projects setting

honoring

is

God as

a re-creation

in the chorale cycle,

sacred works of art.

wrought with

when Bach

purely as motets, he functions

The hymn in

a similar feeling

like

of reverence;

opening movements

structures his

much

a chorale

an

artist

of the

late-

medieval period. But in those cantatas where he contrasts the chorale setting with a concerted or overture form, he

is

injecting tension into

the work: to stay with the metaphor, this tension respectful

is

that between a

copy and a modern creation, between heteronomy and

autonomy. In the

first

cantata,

performed on the

first

"O

Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort,"

Sunday

after Trinity, the

BWV

20,

chorus replicates the

bar form of the set chorale, the verse sequence a-a-b-a-a-b-c-c. Written as a modified Kantionalsatz (simple ting)

with the verses blocked in

in the

homophonic four-part

clusters, the chorale

is

set-

clearly audible

vocal-instrumental structure, particularly since the soprano

The

Leipzig Cantatas

369

melody voice Still,

reinforced

by

a soprano

trombone {Zugtrompete).

the chorale does not exercise complete control over the section,

w^hich

set

is

A-B-A' final

is

up along the

of the modern French overture in

lines

sequence: grave in 4/4 time, fugal vivace in 3/4, and again a

grave in 4/4.

The adapt self be

chorus of the chorale, as unwieldy as

may

it

seem, must

framew^ork and in the faster middle section

let it-

overtaken by the 3/4 rhythm. In the final grave, even the

lovs^er

itself to this

voices participate in the thematic elements of the overture style.

After the vivace middle section has ended in a dramatic diminished seventh chord, the grave motif from the

one might expect;

again, as

and violins, we hear

rather,

first

section does not start in

during an exchange between oboes

several dramatic orchestral chords, then another

dotted motif, quite different from the beginning. immediately, and

its

The

chorus enters

lower voices take up both these elements, with

the intention of providing further textual interpretation.

ments that

suit the style

of the French overture

fit

The

just as well

ele-

with

the "ganz erschrocken Herz" ("frightened heart") that the chorale

makes mention of here.

Or

is

the entire thing driven by the chorale?

duced these motifs in

of the chorale. To go a

first line

cide to use the overture

ing

—

as

he did in the

intro-

his overture only to help explicate the chorale?

In any event, the entry motif of the overture

from the

Has Bach

form

first

to give the

cycle

—

is

substantially derived

bit further: did

new

Bach deopen-

cycle a dignified

or because the inherendy dramatic

impact of the overture seemed best suited for bringing out the iron voice of Eternity?

He must have discussed this wdth his librettist;

the chorale does not exactly

fit

Lazarus in the Gospel for the

the story of the rich first

man and

Sunday of Trinity

—

poor

more

it is

suited to the readings of the last Sundays of the church year,

for

which

deal with death and the last judgment. Accordingly, he used the

chorale in the prior year at the top of cantata

BWV

60 on the

twenty- fourth Sunday of Trinity.

The opening movement of technically difficult that

370

The

Vocal Music

BWV

Bach wrote

20

is

certainly not the

most

for the chorale cantata genre, but

it is

a

marvel in

little

integration of heterogeneous elements like

its

—

the chorale and French overture

made

Weimar with "Nun komm,

in

beyond the

far

first

attempt he

der Heiden Heiland,"

BWV

6i.

In the chorale cycle, his experimenting with the tension of two

was not confined

styUstic levels

course;

comparison of two cantatas. The

also apparent in a

it is

one opening movement, of

to

motif opening the cantata, "Ach Gott,

BWV

performed only

2,

Trinity, looks

week

a

later,

backward, inasmuch

as

vom Himmel

on the second Sunday

it is

strumental obbligato. But

we

motet

stylus antiquus

as a

composition in

sieh darein," after

motet without in-

a choral

should not be too quick to see this

—

for there

dependent basso continue that in the very

first

is

a largely in-

choral line adds a

chrom.atic ascending fourth to the diatonic descending fourth of the

Phrygian mode:

Tenore

Trombone

'.

Viola

l\t^ \^^ ^

..

—

Ach

Trombone IV

^

''

--

-h-r

r

^

F

p J_=1^

1

vom

Gott,

=^-

^.

J

^ r

Him mel L_.

-.

sieh

..^

-

-

dar

-

w

ein

und

laQ

-B

kp

Ach

Gott,

r 1

Continuo OrganoCbez.)

^-

^!

6

5

^^fS ^^

vom

^^

f

This "exposition" to a contrapuntal harmonic structure^^ cannot be explained simply by baroque compositional and figure theory, for it

also anticipates

some

traits

of concentrated motivic-thematic

work, such as are found in Beethoven's Grofie Fuge, opus

135.

The

compositional historic bridge might be represented by Mozart's

"Song of the

Men

in

Armor" from The Magic

Bach's set text "Ach Gott,

"Das also

Silber,

vom Himmel

Flute,

which

sieh darein," with

traits

of strict

style.^^

In Bach, the backward reference to the chorale and ical

strophe

durchs Feur siebenmal bewahrt," but at the same time

shows some

meaning, and thus to mythos,

cantata

its

recalls

BWV 2

is

is

its

theolog-

unmistakable. For this reason,

the utmost expression of the tension between het-

eronomy and autonomy.

We

see this tension,

of course, throughout

The

Leipzig Cantatas

371

Bach's work: the vocal and instrumental works cannot be conceived

of as separate from each other in

W. Adorno

notwithstanding.^"^

Adorno pecially

is

thinking primarily about the instrumental works, es-

The Well-Tempered

composer

work.35 It

when he

Clavier,

to raise motivic-thematic

way

thus preparing the

ity,"

thinking of Theodor

this sense, the

more with

is

work

praises

Bach

to the level of "universal-

for the concept

of the integrated

respect to Bach's vocal music

suggests that "the voice of a fully independent subject,

from myth simultaneous with

tion

thus, with

its

truth content"

a reconciliation

was more

fully

as the first

art

when Adorno its

emancipa-

with myth, and

developed with Beethoven

than with Bach.3^

But neither

praise

nor censure from Adorno's historical-

philosophical viewpoint does dial position

Bach justice:

between the ages that

vocal and the instrumental area.

vom Himmel

sieh darein"

of mythos

service

just a harbinger

is

integral

work of art.

now

it

me-

both in the

his significance lies,

not just a heteronomous work in the

of the

a fugue

fully

from The Well-Tempered

independent subject and the

return to this thought: the overall concept of the

chorale cantata cycle not only gave

tum;

precisely in his

A choral adaptation like "Ach Gott,

—no more than

Clavier

Let us

is

it is

Bach the composer new momen-

also gave his listeners in Leipzig

more

the large majority of worshippers could not

access to his art. Surely

comprehend

sition in every detail, but they could certainly follow a

his

compo-

work that was

organized about the text and strophic sequence of a well-known

hymn

repeated throughout the work: there was, despite

all

the

com-

positional craft, a clearly perceptible thread to follow. It

was no

arbitrary thread: the congregation

had grown up with

church hymns; they heard them not just in church but also from the itinerant student choirs

them

known

in their devotionals at

as Currende;

and on the appropriate occasions chorales.

They were more

the Bible. 372

The

their favorite chorales,

selected special

familiar with the

A performance practice

Vocal Music

they sang them and read

home. They had

wedding or

funeral

hymnal even than with

of Bach in

later years

shows

just

how important it was to him that worshippers be able to pick out the hymn tune of the cantus firmus, even in complex compositions. In individual voice parts added later on, in the chorale cantatas partic-

he reinforces the soprano voices of the choir with

ularly,

parallel in-

strumental accompaniments. 37

The

chorale cycle contains a remarkable mixture of old and

Of course,

hymns.

But there

them "Was

frag ich

8;

in dir,"

"Mache

BWV

BW\^ 123.

nach der Welt,"

BWV

wohlgetan,"

BWV

numerous newer ones of the

are

mein Geist bereit,"

wenn werd

BWV

115;

ist

ich sterben,"

"Ich freue mich

and "Liebster Immanuel, Herzog der Frommen,"

orthodox and quasi-Pietist factions in the religious

community. Even more than Gott,

among

Pietist aria type,

This mixture gives the impression of a conscious attempt

to satisfy both the

ster

predominant.

is

BWV 94; "Was Gott tut, das

99; "Liebster Gott,

dich,

133;

hymn

the traditional Lutheran

new

wenn werd

scores Bach's

that: the inclusion

ich sterben"

of the songs "Lieb-

and "Ich freue mich

in dir" under-

wish to take part in the topical musical and religious

discourse of the day.

The

first

of these two melodies, the foundation of

included by the organist at Leipzig's Vetter, in the

BWV

8,

was

Church, Daniel

St. Nicholas's

second part of his Musikalische Kirch- und Haufi-

Ergotzlichkeit (Musical Delights for

vocal setting, but not without

making

the Breslau theologian Caspar Vetter, a Breslau native,

Church and Home) a

in a four-part

few comments on

Neumann had composed

had written the melody

for

it

its

history:

the text, and

at the request

of

who wanted a fiineral hymn for 1695, ^^e hymn quickly became pop-

the Breslau cantor Jacob Wilisius, himself. After Wilisius's death in ular,

although in verstimmelter

desires

now

—

all this

changes as the

showing

later

who though

Bach appropriates

final chorale in his

his acceptance

position

mutilated

— form. So

Vetter

of many de-

blessed with

good

for-

notwithstanding ever mindfiil of their death."^^

Eleven years

lar

is,

to publish a corrected version, "for the sake

vout souls in this city [Leipzig], tune are

that

two years

own

Vetter's setting

cantata

BWV

of local traditions of piety.

later

when he

8,

He

with a few thus clearly

takes a simi-

uses the setting "Welt ade, ich

The Leipzig Cantatas

^j"^

—

bin dein miide" by the former organist of

Johann Rosenmiiller weif?.,

St. Nicholas's

as the final chorale for cantata

Church

BWV 27, "Wer

wie nahe mir mein Ende." Both chorales have death

subject: the singing

of certain

citizens,'

as the

of such chorales outside, and inside, the houses

not just

when someone had

died but as a sign of

constant readiness for death, was an important duty of the Currende,

who lies

took the preferences and traditions of certain prominent fami-

into consideration

An

—

interesting case

Bach used

for

BWV

as

is

did their cantor. the

the

133,

hymn

first

"Ich freue

mich

in dir,"

which

strophe of which goes:

Ich freue mich in dir

Und

heifie dich

Mein

willkommen,

liebes Jesulein!

Du hast dir vorgenommen, Mein

Briiderlein zu sein.

Ach, wie ein

Wie Der

Ton!

freundlich sieht er aus, grofte Gottessohn!

I find

And

siifter

my joy in

thee

bid thee hearty welcome,

My dearest Jesus-child! Thou

hast here undertaken

My brother dear to be. Ah, what

a pleasing sound!

How friendly he

appears,

This mighty Son of God!

The

text

is

by the Leipzig poet,

literary scholar,

and

jurist

Kaspar

Ziegler and was published in the Geistreiches Gesangbuch (Halle,

^^^ again

1697)

1698)

— two decidedly

he used for in the

374

in

it

in

margins

The

another Geistreiches Gesangbuch (Darmstadt, Pietist

hymnals. Bach jotted

down

the melody

BWV 133— neither of these two collections had page of the score for the Sanctus BWV of the

Vocal Music

it

first

232^^^

mas

which was heard along with the cantata

services

of

1724.

found dating before

No

tion

—

So Bach seems not

ij^Sl^^

song, and to have based

one of the Christ-

in

printed version of the melody has been

it

on

to have

known

the

a special, perhaps oral Leipzig tradi-

further indication that the second Leipzig cantata cycle

should be seen in the context of the local situation.

Today the most impressive thing about the

cycle

is

the strictness

with which Bach kept his composition within his theme: the integration of old and new. It

is

fascinating, for example, to see

how

he

BWV 2 seems, outwardly at least, to have been the controlling force, in BWV loi, continues to deal with the sty /us antiquus.

the cantata for the tenth

du

While

Sunday after Trinity,

in

"Nimm von uns,

treuer Gott," the antique style conforms to the

first

tion results in "a unique, very

Herr,

modern concerted

of choral motets with the very

principle: the daring interweaving

eloquent musical material

it

heard instrumentally in the introduc-

complex and almost inaccessible com-

position," in the opinion of Siegfried Oechsle.^°

Bach's treatment of the opening section of the cantata for the

fourteenth Sunday after Trinity, Seele,"

amounts

BWV

to a tour de force.'^^

He

78,

"J^su,

sees that the

der du meine

hymn

tune can

be combined with a well-marked ostinato: the familiar bass lamento

from

earlier

music history appears in his

places, in the cantata

form again

BWV

12,

own works

— among other

"Weinen, Klagen," and

later in the Crucifixus section

in parodic

of the B-Minor Mass.

uses the ostinato figure twenty-seven times in

all,

He

sometimes in other

keys and parts, and once in an inversion.

Two

even more distinctive features of this movement are the

combination of choral melody with ostinato and their incorporation into the

framework of a

ritornello.

And,

as if this

concertante setting with a very idiosyncratic

were not enough: for every choral

line

Bach

devises preimitations: these independent motifs vividly anticipate

the message of each verse. that speaks

sorbed on

on

first

all levels

The

—

a

result

is

a

many-layered composition

work whose

subtleties

hearing but in which the chorale

is

cannot be ab-

unambiguously

prominent.

The

Leipzig Cantatas

375

One

of the high points of the second cantata cycle

Jesu Christ, wahr'

Mensch und

quagesima (Shrove Sunday),

Bach

the generation after

"Wer

pastiche

compiled

Graun.

1725.

that

BWV 127, written for Quin-

The opening theme was incorporated

it

Edom kommt" (EC

von

so impressed

into the passion

D

10),

probably

mostly from compositions of Carl Heinrich

after 1750,

It is

so

ist der,

Gott,"

the "Herr

is

worth noting that Bach used material from no fewer

than three chorales in this composition setting: "Herr Jesu Christ,

Mensch und Gott"

wahr'

"Christe,

du

Lamm

is

Gottes"

the opening ritornello;

the basis of the choral section; the tune is

interwoven here too

finally, in

"O Haupt

voll Blut

line in

its first

the continuo, one hears the start of

a chorale repeatedly, in slighdy altered rhythm, tified as

—

und Wunden"

which can be iden-

or "Herzlich tut mich

verlangen nach einem seel'gen End."

The the

ritornello that gives the

head motif

tive: its

hymn "Herr Jesu

with a figure that not only

Christ, wahr'

its

Mensch und

essentially a series

is

structure

Gott";

simultaneously with

it.

distinc-

is

first line

continues

it

also

is

heard

So even before the chorus has begun, the

A

strumental introduction has a structure of great density.

comes

by

duo

with the head motif; by the third bar the recorders take up

this motif,

line

in-

pair of

recorders starts the development; an eighth note later an oboe in

of

of dotted sixteenths, which

development of the head motif but

a further

is

movement

derived from a diminution of the

is

which now

line

is

swapped among the instrumental

becomes the material

parts

and

for the imitative voice setting that

embellishes the cantus firmus.

At

the very beginning, along wdth the recorders, two violins and

a viola have also

come

in with the chorale line "Christe,

Gottes." Although this part

is

measures of the continuo as a pedal point. After

up from the oboes the head motif of the

shortened

first line

und Gott"), but

The

after only

Vocal Music

it,

first

three

the continuo

ritornello

(i.e.,

the

of the chorale "Herr Jesu Christ, wahr' Mensch

chorale "Herzlich tut 376

Lamm

unmistakably harmonized with tonic,

dominant, and subdominant. Bach has composed the

takes

du

two bars

it

transitions into the line of the

mich verlangen."

Flautol

Oboe

I,

II

r^nrmfw^rrj

The Leipzig Cantatas

377

The

attempt to describe just the

first

eight measures of the in-

troduction puts one in the role of a reporter trying to describe a

major event from several different angles simultaneously. But one should not conclude that this complexity makes the music

Bach bathes

or incomprehensible. For light

of a pastorale:

thirds

—

when

difficult

this introduction in the bright

the recorders begin their lovely melody in

in the typically pastoral

key of F

— over

pedal point in the continuo, the impression

is

the extended tonic

of the easy charm of a

pastoral painting.

Beyond the emblematic heaven

as the ideal pasture

level

— Christ

line,

main chorale

is

the three cho-

Here the cantus firmus of

conspicuously foregrounded, especially

"Herr Jesu Christ,

Christ, true

good shepherd,

— the symbolic meaning of

ruses also merits the listeners attention.

the

as the

vs^ahr'

man and God"):

dible almost at every

its first

Mensch und Gott" ("Lord

as the subject

of the head motif it

moment. Along with

Jesus is

au-

this, a central article

Christian faith, Christ's mediating role between

God

and man,

of is

constantly invoked through repeated references to the three topoi: Jesus Christ, man, and

One

God.

could write a chapter on the compositional and theological

significance of the rest of the cantata."*-^ For Friedhelm

Krummacher,

even a book was not enough to plumb the depths of the chorale can-

We

tata cycle.

fiirther course

forgo further analysis here and simply describe the

of

this cantata, the recitatives

exemplary for the whole

cycle. First, a

and

arias

of which are

simple yet carefully worked

out secco recitative interprets in musical terms such characteristic

words

as entsetzet, nichts, Seujzevy

"sighing," aria

and "repose,"

whose

("strikes terror," "nought,"

respectively); this recitative

exquisiteness

the genre and

and Ruhe

is

is

followed by an

the equal of Bach's greatest creations in

whose orchestration and form

are

unique in his work.

A solo oboe's soaring lyric melody contrasts with an almost static accompaniment, eighth-note staccato

figures

regular plucked quarter notes in the basses.

with the vox humana of the oboe.

We

of the recorder duo and

The

vocal line merges

could almost be hearing the

kind of chamber music that can be found in the slow movements of 378

The

Vocal Music

Bach's sonatas and concert!.

A solo part introduces an elegiac,

free-

ranging melody; the other instruments provide a respectful, mea-

accompaniment. After

sured, almost motionless

this introduction

another solo voice enters, the soprano, and immediately becomes intertwined with the instrumental solo. That such an arrangement typical

mean

more of instrumental than vocal Bach composed these

that

sical thinking,

Of course mind

before he

specific

applies

at

autonomous mu-

hand.

models and individual

would get involved with

them up and

calls

settings does not necessarily

structures out of

with no connection to the text he had both

them with

is

details in

But he obviously

a set text.

reference to the text.

The oboe

here surely stands for the soul, and the accompanying ensemble stands for the heavenly

"idyll"'^^

that this soul can expect after death.

This textual reference gets even more aria,

when

"Ach

ruft

middle of the

specific in the

the voice exclaims in the "J^sus tone" of a Pietist

mich

bald, ihr Sterbeglocken" ("Ah, call

deathly tolling bells"), and the strings, silent

till

me

aria,

soon, ye

now, come in for

four measures and two and a half beats to imitate the tolling bells

with an undulating lamento pizzicato:

rm Flautodolcel.

Oboe

II

I

Violino

I.

II

Soprano

Continuo(2 Organo

x)

Krummacher

is

right that

Bach did not intend

tener with a figural imitation of tolling bells,

to divert the lis-

knowing

that a skillfully

wrought "compositional structure" would ensure that such

a setting

The Leipzig Cantatas

379

has an emotional impact."^ But

mere four and

cation to score a strings, to

where

composition had been purely

would Bach have found the nerve or even the

instrumental,

with

if this

justifi-

a half measures (out of ninety-six)

have them play a figure that does not appear any-

movement? Autonomous and

else in the

figural viewpoints

cannot be separated here: Bach does not need a textual justification

how something will

to decide

cluded

sound.

Which

an issue for the interpreter of the text and

The

elements should be in-

not just for the autonomous composer to decide:

is

its

meaning

it is

always

as well.

"Die Seele ruht in Jesu Handen" in some of its idiosyn-

aria

dimension of composition that was new

cratic traits represents a

the time: great feeling expressed in sound. Before that point in sical history,

instrumentation of such delicacy was

bells tolling, especially,

at

mu-

the sound of

rare;

an early and subde example of composition

is

using sound clusters {Klangfldchen).

Nor does

this observation

complete the inventory of the cantatas

Bach appends

figurative images;

tive," that is in fact like a litde

string tremolos aU in

and earth

The

stile

are obliterated

setting

of the

literal

a

number modestly

called "recita-

opera scene: blaring trumpets and

concitato depict Judgment

Day,

when heaven

and Christ appears to render final judgment. words of Christ, which could be

called

an

ar-

His benevolence when addressing the

faithful against

three alternating invocations of the horrors of final

judgment and

ioso, contrasts

death.

The words

"Verily

I

say unto you," addressed to the redeemed

with the ritornello theme from the introduc-

sinners, are underlaid

tion, thus recalling the line

Gott."

The

line lends its

in a different context

The

extent to

symbolic power to this genre picture, which

might

which the

with the sign of the chorale as

such but by

tire

cantata

is

its final

in

F

"Herr Jesu Christ, wahr' Mensch und

also

connote secular struggle and

cantata, is

from

start to finish, is

stamped

shown not just by the ending

chord. This chord

is

C

strife.

chorale

major, though the en-

major: for the cantus firmus dictates

it

thus.

Un-

derstood from the point of view of harmonic function and not modally, the piece ends with a false cadence on the dominant and

not the tonic. 380

The

Vocal Music

Here,

if

anywhere, Bach found his

style in the chorale cantata

variety of material

dominate

On

torale, the

sound of bells

ment Day. All

this

is

the one hand, strict form and

of the chorale; on the

his treatment

ceived, as

it

whole that

is

for the dead, structural

and

figurative

not randomly or casually conclear dis-

between foreground and background.

not surprising that with this work the chorale cantata cycle

It is

end: the various possibilities of the form have

its

and put into

tried out

Annunciation

BWV

—

practice. Six

vsdth the cantata

weeks

cycle

is

BWV

"revival" 4,

rate,

the Feast of the

Morgen-

a choral adaptation

of the early cantata

on the

first

day of Easter,

complete for the time being. Did the Leipzig city

council act in wise anticipation of what lay ahead

purchase Johann

now been

leuchtet der

which impressively combines

i,

"Christ lag in Todesbanden,"

— the

later, at

"Wie schon

wdth concerted form, and with the

any

and Judg-

sometimes seems with Handel, but that makes

tinctions for the listener

stern,"

hymn

tolling the

done by combining

details into a collective

1725

to a classically balanced

he uses modern tonal language to paint vivid images: a pas-

other,

nears

form.

way

when

Kuhnau s musical testament from

with the completion of the

Bach has most decidedly put

first

it

his

refiised to

widow? At

two Leipzig cantata

cycles.

his predecessor into oblivion.

However much we may admire

Bach's highly sophisticated

way

of treating the church hymn, in the chorale cantata cycle in particular,

we

should be mindfiil of the fact that he plies his craft not in some

theoretical stances.

hothouse but in keen awareness of real-world circum-

The opening themes of those

very cantatas that share a ten-

dency for simple four-part vocal harmonic settings are those based on

modern church hymns his

(e.g.,

BWV 94, 99,

8, 115, 133,

and

123).

Despite

treatment of genuinely Lutheran cantus firmi. Bach had no wish

to "arrange" these arialike tunes or alter their metrical flow.

This for-

bearance was a help to those listeners unfamiliar with complicated

music and also met the expectations of the

Although there tatas

composed

is

a large

after the

Pietists

among them.

number of outstanding

two Leipzig

cycles,

individual can-

Bach did not compose

any more cantata cycles of comparable uniformity,

The

as far as

we know

Leipzig Cantatas

381

today.

He

had solved the two main problems of the Protestant

church cantata: presenting both the word of Scripture and chorales in a suitably dignified manner. In the discussion that follows, then,

we speak

not of large-scale successes but of individual trends.

we

First,

ments

should take note of the works composed as supple-

summer of 1725, Bach

to the chorale cantata cycle. After the

gradually composes a half dozen works, eventually to include them,

one by one, in the

choral text cantatas are written.'^^

Most of these

a gap in the cycle, nor can they be

day in the

liturgical calendar.

Sunday worship

service,

Bach's intention to

but

make

had attempted only once betriiben,"

both

and

arias

are not

meant

They may have been composed

as a small corpus

to

fill

of works they

for the

testify to

a specific contribution to the genre of all

in the cantata cycle

occasions"), a task he

itself,

with "Was

willst

BWV 107.

In a chorale text cantata, of course, there verse: the strophes

1725 to 1735 eight

matched with any particular Sun-

choral arrangements per omnes versus ("for

du dich

From

incomplete cycle.

still

of the hymns must serve

recitatives.

is

no

freely

composed

as the textual basis for

This requirement makes the composing of

the recitative sections difficult and the use of da capo forms almost impossible. It

would be

nice to

know which

special genre particularly appealed to Bach.

aesthetic aspects of this

Antecedents of the genre

can be found in the choral concerted work^^r omnes versus and in his

own

early cantata "Christ lag in Todesbanden,"

BWV

4.

For these

Leipzig chorale text cantatas, instead of choosing Reformation chorale texts, he tends to pick

with flowing meters

—

hymns

that are

serially,

there

of a chorale provides

aria type,

quite likely intentionally.

Despite the significance of each work on

performed

more the

is

less

its

own, when they

an undeniable risk of monotony.

text

opportunity for the vivid presentation of

images and emotions than does a good madrigal.

form of the cantus firmus

The

are

is

also confining.

The omnipresent

Maybe Bach wants

to

prove that a church composer can succeed without using modern verse,

and

missions. 382

The

also save himself the trouble

Or

and expense of literary per-

perhaps he had enough of madrigal

Vocal Music

texts,

given that

they played such a dominant role in the third cycle and even the "fourth"

—

so far as

it

can be reconstructed.

Any pronouncements on

each composed over a longer period of time, must be cautious,

cycles,

since the

many

tendencies.

is

gaps in our sources allow only a glimpse of general

With the

third cycle, Bach's eagerness to start every can-

new choral movement has

with a brand

tata

the overall profile of these last two

Now there

disappeared.

often an aria at the top; this spares both his compositional labors

and the

St.

Thomas

choir voices, but at the same time

it

means

giv-

ing up an impressive opening. Consequently, in this period he exper-

iments with incorporating a chorus or an aria into an already existing instrumental movement, or he replaces the opening with a move-

ment from an instrumental

He delivers

concerto.

a masterpiece for the first

day of Christmas,

BWV 1069

opening movement from the overture

opening section of the cantata "Unser

Mund

first

time, he uses

instrumental concertos in the cantata sal in

das Reich Gottes eingehen,"

written for 12

concerto

May

1726.

Lachens,"

worked

into the

movements from

"Wir miissen durch

solo

viel Triib-

BWV 146, which was probably

turns the

first

movement of the

violin

BWV 1052a into the opening movement of the cantata and

gives the violin solo

section

He

is

the

the basis for the

sei voll

BWV no, but a four-part chorus ("unser Mund") instrumental fabric. For the

is

1725:

He

inserts a choral

viel Triibsal") into the

slow movement

melody part

("Wir miissen durch

to the organ.

of his concerto model. In the cantata "Geist und Seele sind verwirret,"

ment

BWV 35,

(i.e.,

it is

likely that

aria

too:

"Geist

fell

the head motif of the lost

1059) for the beginning

ments

he

its

a concerto

move-

Minor Concerto,

BWV

back on

D

and possibly made use of

its

other move-

slow movement might have served as the basis for the

und Seele sind

verwirret,"

and

its

finale

may have been

used as the instrumental introduction to the second part of the cantata.

No

"Gott

less

tober 1725: ing

remarkable an example of this borrowing

soil allein its

mein Herze haben,"

opening sinfonia

movement of

is

is

the cantata

BWV 169, performed 20 Oc-

essentially identical

with the open-

a concerto that has survived, not in

The

its

original

Leipzig Cantatas

383

melody

setting for a solo

Concerto for Harpsichord

Bach melody

inserts a

set to the

new

but in

its

E

Minor,

BWV 1053.

in

in mir. Welt,

siciliano

transformed into a farewell to

praise of divine love: a striking

slow movement,

und

alle

two weeks

this

time taking

its

later

becomes even more meaningful false

unused

final

ability to

movement and

placing

after that, the

Concerto serves him

little

it

at the

top

BWV 49. Three

opening movement of the First Brandenburg as the introductory sinfonia

"Falsche Welt, dir trau ich nicht,"

What

pieces.

BWV 1053,

returns to the concerto

of the cantata "Ich geh und suche mit Verlangen,"

weeks

hymn in make new

worldliness and a

example of Bach s

Bach

its

deine Triebe"

and sometimes even greater works out of already finished Just

as the

The poignant sweetness

of thy affections").

all

of the concertos enchanting as it is

later

aria into the concertos

words "Stirb

("Die in me, world and

arrangement

part,

of the cantata

BWV 52.

remains of a presumptive fourth cycle, the Picander

cantatas, contains three

more adaptations of instrumental concerto

movements. The fragmentary version we have of the introductory

BWV 188, evidendy the final movement of a lost Violin Concerto in D Minor, which later became the clavier concerto BWV 1052. The model for from the cantata "Ich habe meine Zuversicht,"

is

the sinfonia of the cantata "Ich steh' mit einem Fufi

im Grabe,"

sinfonia,

BWV

156, is

Minor, 1056.

the middle

also lost,

movement of

which Bach adapted

Already mentioned above

is

the Violin Concerto in

into the clavier concerto

the

G

BWV

movement of the Third

first

Brandenburg, recycled into the head movement of the cantata "Ich liebe

den Hochsten von ganzem Gemiite,"

The

first

performances of the

place between October 1728 and

BWV 174.

last three

Whitsun

Bach took over the collegium musicum and sibilities.

The

works most 1729

—

likely

the period

significant

new

obvious dominance of instrumental writing

is

took

when

respona signal

that the cantor Bach, except for a few exceptions in the area of

chorale text cantatas,

now

finally bids farewell to the systematic

and

scheduled composition of cantatas, and in his place the kapellmeister

384

Bach now The

takes the stage.'^^

Vocal Music

THE PASSIONS In

its

and

historic

aesthetic significance, the Passion according to

John suddenly appears in the heavens the genre

is

Hamburg, a

like a

new

St.

Of course,

comet.

not without precedent. In the free Hanseatic city of

as early as 1705, for a small

entrance fee one can attend

performance of a passion oratorio given in the municipal alms-

house

— with

a text

by Bach's

later librettist Christian Friedrich

Hunold and music by Reinhard opera.

Although conservative

this intrusion

circles

Hamburg

of the

and the clergy

are

alarmed

at

of the decadent element of opera into the realm of re-

Hamburg becomes

ligious music,

sions in a

Keiser, director

way

a center for performance of pas-

modern concert world: the

that anticipates our

texts

of the works performed are largely freely composed and are set essentially as in

modern opera

In 1712 the a private

World)

und

aria.

Barthold Heinrich Brockes stages

his libretto

Der fur

die Siinde der Welt

music: a major social event attracting

s

listeners.

Four years

later,

own

the Barfiisserkirche

some

am Main

as director

of church

version of Brockes's Passion performed there in

— not

in the municipal almshouse, as originally

planned, because of the anticipated crowds, "to which event the

five

Georg Philipp Telemann, who

had just been called away to Frankfiirt music, has his

and

Sterbende Jesus (Jesus, Martyred for the Sins of the

to Keiser

hundred

as recitative, arioso,

Hamburg patrician

performance of

Gemarterte

—

most renowned foreign musicians decided

many of

to come," including

"Her Serene Highness the Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt."^ Telemann The

Passions

385

writes in his autobiography of a further performance of this passion,

where "guards were posted enter

who

church doors, allowing no one to

did not have a printed copy of the passion."^

Events such

may have encouraged Johann Mattheson,

as this

champion of enlightened music appreciation

that

class, to

same

The

at the

for the bourgois

put on four different settings of the Brockes passion in the

year, 1719,

one each by

Handel, Telemann, and himself

Keiser,

paradigmatic importance of this event can hardly be overstated:

that the audience could

compare the

stylistic

merits and peculiarities

of the competing composers' musical settings of an identical text

makes

it

clear that

it

was musical pleasure and education of the bour-

geois' musical tastes that

mattered here.

The

event was not religious

or even liturgical in the narrower sense.

In Leipzig, things are not this far along. Operas are occasionally

presented

— the

want

local authorities

of cosmopolitanism, particularly

to

at trade-fair

convey an impression season

— but

ducing musical passions that are operatic, one must be

mentioned

in intro-

careful.

Telemann's setting of Brockes's passion

earlier,

sented in 1717 in the

New

Church

—

As

pre-

is

a secondary setting but also a

tryout venue for contemporary religious music. Bach's predecessor

Kuhnau first presents passions which ruses

are straightforward,

and

at the

Thomaskirche

making do with

in 1721

and

1722,

songlike, simple cho-

solos.

But now Bach enters the scene with

his contribution to the

form. Perhaps he did not get quite this far in Weimar;

about the

Weimar

or

Gotha

Passion, previously mentioned. In

Cothen he lacked the opportunity guard of the form, but

here in

we know little

to position himself at the van-

Weimar he

starts to take control.

He

finds a basic text in the Brockes passion: seven of nine ariosos

and

but these appear in more or

less

arias are

based on Brockes's

greatly altered

form

mistakable: gone

is

in the St.

texts,

John

Passion.

sions of the bass aria, "Eilt,

386

The

Vocal Music

is

un-

the overly florid speech and "high" style, replaced

with simpler, more heartfelt language.^

difference:

Their general tone

A

comparison of two ver-

ihr angefochtnen Seelen," shows the

Brockes s Passion Text Eilt, ihr

Geht

angefochtnen Seelen,

Haste,

aus Achsaphs

Fly from Achsapus'

Morder-Hohlen,

Kommt!

murderous caverns,

—Wohin?

And come

— Nach Golgatha! Nehmt

— whereto?

To Golgotha!

des Glaubens

Put ye on of faith the pinions. Flee

Taubenfliigel. Fliegt!

O sorely tempted spirits,

Wohin?

— whereto? To

the Hill

of Skulls.

— Zum Schadel-Hiigel. Eure Wohlfahrt

For your welfare bloometh there.

bliihet da.

Bach s Passion Text Eilt, ihr

angefochtnen Seelen,

Haste, ye,

Get aus euren

spirits.

Marterhohlen,

Go

EUt!—Wohin?

caverns.

— Nach Golgatha!

Haste

Nehmet an

forth

from your torment's

— where — to?

to Golgotha!

des Glaubens

Put ye on of faith the pinions.

Flugel.

FHegt!

O sorely tempted

Wohin?

Flee

— where — the to?

cross's

— Zum Kreuzes-Hiigel.

hilltop.

Eure Wohlfahrt bluht

For your welfare bloometh there!

The

allda.

source of the words for the aria "Ich folge dir gleichfalls mit

freudigen Schritten" has not yet been discovered; the text of the re-

maining ninth madrigal number, the from a textbook

(ist ed. 1675)

aria "Ach,

mein Sinn," comes

by the long-deceased Christian Weise,

the Zittau school principal, poet, and teacher of poetics: Dergrunen-

denjugend nothwendige Gedancken

[.

.

.]

in

gebundenen ah ungebunde-

nen Reden (Necessary Thoughts for Young People in Verse and Prose).

The

aria's text

serves as an

example of how

a purely instrumental in-

troduction can be given a "madrigalian ode" as an underlay.

But who would have been thumbing through an almost year-old text

on

poetics?

Hardly Bach himself,

who

surely

The

fifty-

had other

Passions

387

things to do, but perhaps his librettist Picander,

whose bourgeois name

was Christian Friedrich Henrici, then just 24 but already well known in Leipzig as an enterprising creator of occasional poetry for

and the 1725,

like.

The

first

hard evidence of their collaboration dates to

but Picander might

libretto for the

weddings

still

have been given the job of adapting the

A more

St John Passion.

experienced

librettist

would

not be so quick to attempt improving a text of the highly esteemed

Brockes oratorio; but a young, self-taught poet would not think twice about taking an

By

aria text

from an older didactic work.

offering the revised Brockes text,

est thing in the genre.

He

is

posefully: basing his passion definitely not creating

is

Bach

doing something

also

it is

up the

else,

on Bible quotations and

lat-

quite pur-

chorales.

He

an aesthetically unified, freely composed

passion-oratorio, as later musicologists will

Rather,

serving

is

come

name

to

an "oratorical passion" in which there

is

the genre.

a place

both for

the liturgically traditional elements of Bible citation and chorales

and

for freely

composed

aria texts, so that

may have been

hands, so to speak. This decision instructions as St. it is,

Thomas

most important,

theology and poetics shake in accord with his

cantor not to compose "theatrically," but

his decision.

This matter would be of interest only to historians of music and Pietism were

it

not for Bach's imaginative power, able to create the

contours of a great tively,

work from

a collection

of texts

that, seen objec-

could be termed a clever compromise between tradition and

invention. This

power is evident

right

from the opening chorus, with

the words:

Herr, unser Herrscher, dessen

Zeig uns durch deine Passion,

Zu

aller Zeit,

Ruhm daf^

In every land majestic

is!

us through this thy passion

That thou, the very Son of God, 388

The

Landen

herrlich

ist.

auch in der grof^ten Niedrigkeit, verherrlicht worden

Lord, thou our master, whose repute

Show

in alien

Du, der wahre Gottessohn,

Vocal Music

bist.

In every age, E'en in the midst of deepest woe,

Art magnified become!

The

selection of texts alone

extraordinary:

is

consistent, of

is

it

Gospel according to John in pre-

course, with the theology of the

senting not a patient, suffering Christ but Christ as an omnipotent ruler.

This youngest of the Evangelists

emphasizes more clearly

also

than the others that Jesus himself sovereignly decides, as the incarnate

word of God, on

or dignity.

there

Still,

that deals, as this

the

his is

own martyrdom,

no other passion

never losing his majesty

in the history

of the form

one does, primarily with the Saviors suffering in

opening movement and where

the music

meant

is

to portray

emotion, the emotions chosen are those of pain and suffering.

Also remarkable based on Psalm

8.2

is

the text of the opening chorus.

Its first

half is

(and perhaps also a liturgical formula), but

second half is free verse, which, in

its

linguistic simplicity,

composer any

ventionality, does not offer the

its

even con-

special reason to in-

dulge in tone painting. Bach's intellectual power alone forms from this text a

movement

that,

of the promise that the hinted

at: it is

Where Matthew

wdth one stroke,

Hamburg

the gateway to

else, in all

Passion,

settings

is

the artistic fulfillment

of Brockes's passion only

modern concerted music.

the eighteenth century, besides Bach's

St,

does there exist a similarly large-scale vocal-

instrumental construct, sublime in character, with such powerfully interpretative language

fined

and such symphonic scope? The form

by an opening orchestral movement, whose

forth in the

first

eighteen bars.

It

The

tion but could stand alone.

becomes

is

de-

essentials are set

a foil for the choral sec-

choral setting

the instrumental setting; essential portions of

is it

strongly related to are

composed over

sections of the instrumental introduction.

The way woven time.

No

ity, lies

in

which three

characteristic semantic motifs are inter-

in the stand-alone instrumental

doubt a symbolic

behind

this

movement

is

unique for

its

intent, conceivably to represent the Trin-

compositional method.

The

basso continuo line

The

Passions

389

stands for

God

the father; the

woodwind

instruments, sometimes in

strict

canonic leading, often playing dissonances on the accented

beats,

remind us of the sufferings of his son, through the use of the

"painful" intervals

—

that

is,

and major seventh

tritone

surging

diminished second, augmented second,

intervals; the

Holy Ghost

heard in the

is

movement of strings.

Because Bach's composition spective,

we can

is

always grounded in multiple per-

ignore such Trinitarian speculation and look at the

work in purely symbolic

terms, without detracting at

all

from the pro-

fundity of meaning. In such a view, the basses represent calm, the strings a self-contained circular motion, while the

winds ultimately

depict that dynamic force that gives a direction to these elements of

calmness and self-contained motion, making them "historical":

Flauto traverse

Oboe

I.

Violino

I,

II

II

I,

II

Viola

Continuo

Organo e Violone

Into this complex orchestral movement,

filled

with tension and

dis-

sonance, Bach introduces a large-scale vocal setting, which in a rhetorical

to

gesture

—

short chordal outbursts and surging melismata

God the Son

as a sovereign ruler (Herrscher).

iation"), the

words

appeals

This could be seen

a kind of crowning of Jesus, triumphant even in suffering. imitative gesture, at the

—

Then,

as

in an

"groftten Niedrigkeit" ("greatest humil-

music sinks to an extremely low

register, in

the sense of the

traditional musical-rhetorical device called catabasis.

In

its

details

tive possibilities

the surface

we

and

as a

whole the passage

offers

many

but also provokes questions concerning

are dealing

390 The Vocal Music

interpreta-

its

form.

On

with da capo form; but the fugue motif of

the central portion, at the words "Zeig' uns dutch deine Passion"

("Show us through thy

passion"), does not constitute the expected

contrast to the motif of the framing sections (the

words "Herr, unser

Herrscher" ["Lord, thou our master"]) but

almost exactly the

is

same. Although this duplication does not diminish the power of the

movement,

a

it is

little less

Bach came up with

tion

Matthew

convincing than, for instance, the soluin the

opening movement of the

Passion: the beginning of the St.

untamed,

"fermenting," as

still

The enormous

it

artistry here,

John Passion seems

St.

more

were.

which

Bach was

for

identical with

profundity, continues to be evident in the ariosos and arias of the

Of

John Passion. arias in his

Bach had already written many

course

church cantatas. But his

have spurred him on to greater aside perhaps

first

truly great

efforts, to set

St.

beautiful

work seems

to

himself new standards:

from "Mein teurer Heiland," every

aria

is

unmistak-

ably a treasure.

Their instrumentation

is

sophisticated: the respective arias are

scored for two oboes, two unison flutes, strings, two violas d'amore, strings, viola

two

ting of the

and

lutes,

da gamba, continuo,

two

ariosos flutes,

is

flute,

and oboe da

similarly refined, with

two oboes da caccia and

Wide-ranging instrumentation such

as this

caccia.

two

violas

The

set-

d'amore

strings, respectively.

can hardly be found in

the church music of Bach's predecessors or contemporaries;

it

evokes

the small ensembles of the courtly households, and particuarly those

of early

German

opera,

acteristic, striking

The that

it

tural,

arioso

whose composers favored

settings

"Mein Herz!"

—

a

mere nine bars

would be misinterpreting Bach

—

alone makes clear

to see his thinking just in struc-

symbolic, and representational terms. Sound, and

achieved,

is

no

with char-

instrumentations.^

less

how

it

is

important. First, the static winds are followed by

the strings with their ragged, dark, low-lying tremolo: as they pause, the tenor sings his

tremolo once more. heart,

and the next

eclipse, the

first

"Mein Herz!," and the

The

first

six

measure brings

strings take

up

their

in the agitated, trembling

measures reveal the world's response: the sun in

rending of the temple curtain, the earth quaking, the

The

Passions

391

graves giving surge,

up

their dead.

and the tremolo

The

As

strings

winds

this unfolds, the static

grow more

violent

voice part describes the events occurring with

augmented and diminished take

form

bass

G, held through almost

as well,

and

sorts

all

and jumps. Wild tone

steps

start to

and expansive. of

clusters

is

the product of an extended

six bars,

while chords, dissonant in

their tension

themselves, are played by the winds in their meandering transfor-

G

mation from

new and

major toward

A major.

G

This extended

on

takes

surprising functions in the harmonic fabric, even while

simply being there.

The predominant

sense here comes from the

sound alone, notwithstanding the density of the narration: the descant of the bass beneath the slow progress of the winds, a mixture

of two different colors, and against the strings

— played on an open G

refining vibrato

We sicians

from the

any

in the violins, thus without

hand.

must remember that Bach could not

select his

Leipzig

mu-

but had to adapt nolens volens to conditions as they were.

Even the scoring of the ways that of the

Passion,

ariosos

and

arias described

above

is

not

al-

performance, which possibly took place with-

first

out any transverse

John

left

harsh unison tremolo of

this the

flutes: in light

of the various versions of the St

such a scoring would rather be a "best case."

Each of the

arias

shows

its

character not just through the instru-

mentation but by a process, taken quite

far here,

of reducing the text

to a single idea that can be captured in musical tones

representational,

the aria "Ach,

and absolute

all at

once.

A wonderful

mein Sinn." Bach understands

sion of desperation

and distance from

God

— symbolic,

this text as

example

is

an expres-

and thus works doggedly

with a single compositional pattern, constantly repeating a descending chromatic lamento in the bass.

conne,

calls to

mind

While the

the ineluctability of

basic structure, a cha-

fate,

its

string writing

evokes a feeling of confusion: the individual voices have discontinuous rhythms, written more or

and long note values

The

Vocal Music

one another, with short

in abrupt alternation; the stresses

measure are constantly

392

less against

of meter and

shifting.

I

With

all

the devices of musical rhetoric, the tenor articulates

Peters despair at having denied his savior.

on the dissonance E#-G#-B-C# be seen

at the

The

words "Ach, mein Sinn" can subsequent explosive

as the rhetorical figure dubitatio, the

major sixth

B-G# is

tortured, assaultive

immediacy and

an exclamation and so on. At the same time, the

sound of the tenor part has both

a theatricality.

spective, as Janus-like

manism and ahead

Works of this

indecisive lingering

Once

again

we

see

a rhapsodic

Bachs double per-

he gazes back to the scholarly tradition of hu-

into the

Sturm und Drang

to

come.

concentration, difficult yet comprehensible at the

same time, did not

fall

into Bach's lap; he considered

and reconsid-

ered appropriate models, and took his time in working out the details,

his daily duties notwithstanding.

by comparing, for example, the soprano mit freudigen Schritten" from the

St.

This consideration

is

shown

aria "Ich folge dir gleichfalls

John Passion with the bass

aria

"Ich folge Christo nach" from the cantata "Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen,

Zagen,"

BWV

12.

Bach composed the cantata

court church services and presented

it

in 1714 for the

Weimar

again ten years later in

The

Passions

393

Leipzig, a few weeks before the St John Passion. It

would be point-

the two works up against each other, as a whole, but this

less to stack

comparison demonstrates that he often did not

particular

one solution, even

if it

settle for

succeeded, but continued to search for a bet-

ter answer.

In the bass aria of the

Weimar

was already a key concept: right

version, the

theme of following

at the start, the string part

is

ten as a canon, as if to symbolize this idea; later the vocal part

brought into the canon. Compare phisticated device with the craft

the

St.

this graphic

Bach brings

writ-

is

also

but relatively unso-

to the soprano aria of

John Passion. First he changes the meter from a spirited but

not very characteristic 4/4 to the 3/8 rhythm typical of a

The

passepied.

dancelike character of the aria

is

lively

underscored by the

conventional (though highly unusual for Bach) periodic structure of part A;

forty-eight measures can be easily grouped into four-

its

measure, eight- measure, and sixteen-measure patterns.

Bach lowing

is

as

just as consistent in his

he

is

("joyful steps")-

with the dance element of "die freudigen Schritte" In the

Weimar

trates the idea of "Schritt ical

fiir

bass aria, the ritornello

Schritt" ("step

by

step"),

theme

illus-

and the canon-

entry of instruments and voice illustrates "Folgen" ("following").

But now he

is

not content with this simple construct: not only does

each melodic step follow the the

development of the idea of fol-

first

one

flute voice.

exactly,

and

last,

the second flute measure follows

in bar 5 a series

In contrast to the

Weimar

aria,

independendy of the "Folge" motif. The uously interwoven in various ways in canon.

The message of the

is

the basso continuo

flute

— they

text

of sequences begins in the

and voice

moves

parts are sin-

don't just follow each other

that the souls of the faithfiil

need sometimes to be pushed and pulled into following; the middle section brings this out clearly.

Toward

the end of the

aria,

voices have reached a state of near-perfect harmony: they

the

two

no longer

simply follow one another in docile canon but proceed together, intimately linked in thirds.

There

are only a

few Bach

arias in

which the continuo and the

instrumental obbligato maintain their respective rhythms with such 394

The

Vocal Music

Donald

persistence.

meant cally

in

Grout spoke of a "moto perpetuo"

here:

it is

of unstoppable continuity, both musi-

to give an impression

and

all

J.

in the sense of the continuity of the Christian religion.^ All

Bach

succession.

many subdy

uses

He

somehow

is

different

means

to portray the idea of

able to let the different aspects of this

idea appear as a motif in a thematic development and

movement a closed section overshoots

structure.

A da capo

high point of the

still

suggested, but

assigned goal of mere repetition

its

finale into the real

is

The

aria.

—

give the

its

repeated

it

turns the

fact that this aria,

purely instrumental for long stretches, could be performed as a trio

movement, unlike to

which Bach,

Weimar

its

counterpart, shows clearly the extent

in his first great passion,

was

testing his ability to

concentrate and integrate different perspectives in a comprehensible

form.

Comprehensibility does not necessarily imply the use of conventional

da capo

Bach does not

arias.

the arias of the

St.

moved away from

John Passion

its

reject this

form wholesale, but

we can gauge how much he

formulaic nature.

He

in

has

expressly writes a da capo

only for the aria "Erwage" and in "Eilt, ihr angefochtenen Seelen,"

where the opening

ritornello

is

repeated anyway; but the other arias

evidence a nondogmatic approach to da capo form. Throughout the despairing course of "Ach in

"Es

the

ist

vollbracht"

aria: after

it is

mein Sinn," skilHully

the segment "der

den Kampf" ("The

schlieftt

ends the

fight"),

where the

it is

completely omitted, and

worked

into the dramaturgy of

Held aus Juda

man

fiilfiUed") leads

To In

1721, a

text,

And

ist

vollbracht"

("it

back to the beginning.

the audiences of the day,

and not the

/

fanfares of victory introduce an almost

operatic quality, the setting of the last half line "es is

mit Macht und

siegt

of Judah wins with might

if

they considered only the music

did music of this kind seem religious or secular?

few years before the

St.

John Passion was

first

performed,

Gottfried Ephraim Scheibel, in the previously mentioned Zufdlli-

gen Gedancken, writing on setting religious texts to secular

had opined: "the Affect remains in that, e.g., here

one

/ it is

arias,

only that the Objecta vary /

feels spiritual pain, there, a

worldly one

The

Passions

[.

.

.]

395

just as I

by

am

spiritual

saddened by secular things ones

/ as I rejoice in the

The Tone which

me

pleases

in

can also be saddened

/ so I

one

/ I

can rejoice in the other.

an Opera can do the same in a

Church."^

This work, which appeared in the trade-fair

of Frankfurt

cities

and Leipzig, may have been known to the Leipzig superintendent,

who

in his notes spoke of the "musical arias" of the

that

Bach had

circulated.

Whether he was being

St.

John Passion

a bit condescend-

ing or skeptical toward the self-referential art Scheibel was promot-

we do

ing,

not know. But

artful, expressive

it is

a fact that

Bach not only employs an

writing style in the freely written portions of his

passion but devotes the same attention to his setting of biblical citations

and chorales

—

regardless of whether he

is

quies," the turba choruses, or the cantus firmus It is

setting the "solilo-

movements.

not just respect for the ecclesiastical tradition, particularly in

Leipzig, that causes Bach, unlike Brockes, to leave untouched the

prose biblical portions of his passion narrative artistically inspired, as

— the

decision

can be seen throughout the score.

is

also

Rhymed

adaptations could not have even approximated the immediacy and liveliness

of Luther's

text,

and Bach had no reason, even

to set the parts of the Evangelist, the Savior, Peter, soliloquizers theater,

—

matic music" shown in the Evangelist's his disciples over the cise location

and so on

as direct speech. Bertolt Brecht, the

was fascinated two hundred years

later

first

musically,

— the

master of epic

by the "model of dra-

words, "Jesus went with

brook of Kedron." Brecht: "He gives us the pre-

of the stream."^

This does not mean that in setting the words Bach was particularly

concerned with the location of the brook of Kedron. But he gives

the music, in

its

unadorned

directness, a vividness

and

the senses that lets us see the events in their historical also

having a significance that goes beyond

recitatives,

the actual words in which

The

These

and yet

are not opera

condensations to advance the plot and give the singers

their cue for the next aria.

396

it.

availability to

facticity'

He it

is

setting the doctrine of salvation in

was spoken. This kind of direct yet pro-

Vocal Music

I

found speech

in the tradition of Heinrich Schiitz's Kleine geistliche

is

Konzerten: the music

but has

same time an order of its own. Music could be com-

at the

pared to

organized around the text being performed

is

human

from a

gesture:

distance,

it

seems to have structure

but remains something apart; up close and in the context of specific words,

communicates a concrete message.

it

The opening character.

On

care:

a

like

recitative

of the

John Passion shows

St.

the one hand, the declamation

good

orator.

is

this

double

up with great

set

Bach organizes the statements around

smaller units of meaning; he emphasizes key words like "Jesus,"

"Kidron," "Garten," "Judas," "verriet," and "vm£te" ("dis-

"Jiinger," ciple,"

ing

"Kidron," "garden," "Judas," "betrayed," and "knew") by hav-

them appear on the downbeat of the measure or sung on the high

notes. In general the voice leading

is livelier

and so more expressive

than in an ordinary secco

But he

careful to maintain log-

ical

in

recitative.

musical organization.

C

The

first

is

section of this example

minor; the second section has a

begins each section with a descending third, giving ax

n UT

J

is

framed

harmonic center of F minor; he a heading:

it

»>

Judas.

Jesus,

This parallelismus membrorum contains a third element of Bach's style:

the music has symbolic qualities. Jesus

is

given the major third,

Judas the minor third, and the frame in which lower.

it is

set

is

a tritone

This interval (the tritone) was unnatural to the ancients, the

"diabolus in Musica"; even in Bach's time,

placement,

it

signified

something unusual

when if

given a significant

not uncanny.

Occasionally Bach employs a style for the Evangelist's part that, in

Mattheson's Enlightenment view, should be permitted only in an

aria

and even then only

"where the material

seemed

to

example scription

him

"silly

for a "special reflection"; but for a recitative, just rendered

is

and

tasteless."^

However,

in narrating the scourging is

a reflection

worked-out

less

as speech,"

it

in Bach's passions, for

of Jesus, the graphic tonal de-

of the direct emotional involvement of the

passion audience, subUmated though the artfully

more or

it

may have

been, especially in

arias:

The

Passions

397

6el-te ihn.

As

a rule, for the turbae

— — Bach that

the exclamations of the sol-

is,

diers, disciples, Jews, et cetera

writes directly out of everyday

speech patterns and the dramatic situation. figural writing as well, polyphonic,

and symbolic rus,

qualities.

Looking

Many are masterpieces of

but having both emotional punch

at the "Kreuzige" ("Crucify")

cho-

one wonders what inspired Bach to write such a perfect genre

More than

piece.

has kept

its

sibly hear

the other outstanding numbers in this passion,

dramatic power

it

as a

modern

down to the present day

tone-cluster work.

works of his contemporaries, nor

in the

There

are there

— one can

is

nothing

it

plaulike

it

any known relevant

preliminary works by Bach himself.

He made

the single

word

"kreuzige" the dramatic center and

theological high point of the passion. In a compositional style ap-

proximating fugal form, that contrapuntal, the key

is,

skillfully

polyphonic but not rigidly

word of the passion

is

heard against rhythmic

masses of sound and mordant dissonances, a pandemonium of howling, cursing,

and wild

Very seldom in musical history

gesticulating.

has the expression of passionate hatred been so tellingly translated into music. 9 Naturally, this style historical

is

not without

its

theological-

background: one interpretation of the passion story made

popular in Bach's time by the Rostock theologian Heinrich Miiller, presented here

2.%

pars pro

toto,

called the "Kreuzige" cries the

"mur-

der song of the Jews," continuing that "even today the world possessed by a murderous rage like that of the Jews.

Musically the chorus vari in

may

represent the genre picture of a chari-

an anti-Semitic context." According to another interpretation,

in the stereotypical instrumental figures

"Wir

diirfen

niemand

nicht zerteilen," oiperfidia 398

is

"^°

The

Bach

toten" falls

and the

Vocal Music

soldiers'

back on the

(literally, "faithlessness"),

found in the Jews' chorus chorus "Lasset uns den

traditional musical technique

which

is

the persistent retention of

one figure or compositional technique.^^

The

three

matched

pairs

of

turba choruses could be a reversion to the idea oiperfidia: the Jews' and soldiers'

adamant repeating of the phrases "Sei

denkonig"

and "Schreibe

kreuzige" and

nicht:

der Jiiden

"Weg, weg, mit dem, kreuzige

ihn";

gegrui?)t, lieber Jii-

Konig,"

"Kreuzige,

and " Wir haben ein

Gesetz" and "Lassest du diesen los" ("Hail to thee, king of the Jews,"

"Do not write 'king of the Jews,'" "Crucify, crucify him,"

"We

crucify," "Off, off with

have v^th us a law," "Let this one go

him,

free").^^

chorus can be interpreted symbolically:

Finally, the "Kreuzige"

the diagonal leading of individual voices results in crossing of the voices: the free

composition makes crossing almost unavoidable, but

the text seems to

demand

the opening to the final

nant

— can be seen

as the

it.

D

The movement from

major

—

that

is,

breakthrough to a

the

G

minor of

opening to the domi"cross"-key.^'^

The

Passions

399

There

no polyphonic renditions of church hymns

are

version of the

St.

in the first

John Passion, apart from the inclusion of the choral

section in the aria

"Mein

teurer Heiland."

hymn verses,

trouble with the twelve

So Bach takes

all

more or

distributed

the

more

evenly

less

throughout the work, which constitute the congregations response to the

Word of the

Bible,

and with

and

their reflection in the ariosos

arias.

Despite the homophonic compositional mode, note against

note,

he

finds places to insert different colors, in the sense of

still

"harmonizing

characteristic

styles," to

use

Werner

Breig's terminol-

ogy/5 For instance, the relative simplicity and restrained use of notes foreign to the key, as in "Er

nahm

monlike consolations of the

text,

alles

wohl

in Acht," reflect the ser-

while the chromaticism of "Petrus,

der nicht denkt zuriick" mirrors Peter's anguish at his denial of Christ. In the very

first

chorale,

ing that Jesus must take

is

"O gro£e

illustrated

Lieb," the path of suffer-

by the accumulating

nances: only twenty- two of the forty- two downbeats of the

normal

are

harshness.

triads or sixths

At

even dares to

the

word

alter the

—

melody

twenty are dissonances of varying

fiilly

Bach

"Marterstrafie" ("the martyr's way")

melody chromatically from

normal version.

its

If we consider overarching criteria such as composition, turgy, theology,

disso-

drama-

and symbolism, do the separate sections of the St

John Passion taken

as a

whole constitute

form?

a large

One

should

not approach this question before appreciating the scope of the work, its is

wealth of wonderful

detail. It is true for

for every great, rich, living

the masonry

is

impact of the

joined

may

work of art:

detract

the

St.

John Passion

to look too closely at

as

it

how

from the pleasure and emotional

edifice.

Nonetheless, the question regarding general principles of order

and

structural sense in the

in a

nuanced way. There

is

work

is

justified

and should be answered

a case for skepticism here.

particular, the passion oratorio,

does not allow

This form in

much leeway

for

thinking in formal or symmetrical terms, even though theological (or

perhaps Neoplatonist) Bach scholars will

But the highly atorio's

colorfiil

insist

drama of biblical testimony

one fixed and unchanging measure, and

400 The Vocal Music

on searching is

it is

for

it.

the passion or-

difficult

enough

and chorales so that they "answer"

to arrange arias

as precisely as

possible the preceding Bible passage, let alone allow of being spaced

evenly throughout the work.

Bach dismandes the

passion's symmetrical

and closing choruses, which had become

framing of opening

by follow-

a firm tradition,

ing the actual final chorus with the simple chorale "Ach Herr,

This need not have been his

lieb Engelein."

have been the wish of the Leipzig text.

As

cleric

scale

task

it

was

dein

could

artistic decision; it

whose

works of this

a general rule, vocal

lai?.

to vet the

were composed for a

performance, a situation that could change from time to time

specific

and indeed often

did. It

hard to imagine that Bach would have held

is

any preconceived notions about using a large-scale format.

On

the other hand

it

should be kept in mind that Bach always

wants to secure some kind of logic for his compositions on a larger formal

level, as

wish to achieve

he does not

explicitly

work, he

a great artist

is

Even where

the last mentioned example illustrates.

cyclic organization in a larger

of form, with the

arching order almost casually

—

that

impose over-

ability to

perhaps not with ultimate

is,

consistency but with an inclination toward unity throughout. Klaus

Hofmann

has taken a look at the

St.

John Passion

mind: he finds the keys chosen such that they "form a

up

with

arias

this in

of thirds;

series

to the fifth of the ten aria settings, they are descending, then as-

cending."^^ This calculus

Gottes Sohn series; as

We is

its

not perfect: "Durch dein Gefangnis,

uns die Freiheit

Hofmann

chorale but

there

ist

is

words

kommen"

says himself, not only are

more

like a

need not be disturbed by small

composed

as a

such as

this:

irregularities

St.

John Passion but that was

paramount importance: Bach eUminated

revision the following year. In

passion with care. Also, this naively dramatic

erature

it

well into this

evidence of an underlying principle that played a role in a

evidently not of

Passion

was

fit

hymn.

more extensive tonal organization of the

more

doesn't

— although

this

and

any

case,

he arranged the

work should

in

eclectic in nature

it

in his

arias in the

no way be considered than the

St.

was once the unanimous judgment

Matthew in the

lit-

dominated by Spitta and Schweitzer. The

Passions

401

The more open-minded we form of the

scale

John

St.

from them: they prompt

Smend saw

Friedrich

bers i6e to 27a of the

more

large-

we can

derive

the "heart" of the passion consisting of

pairs

of turba choruses,

postulates a mirror- symmetrical arrangement of these

In a

num-

Neue Bach-Ausgabe}7 Expanding on the above-

bers about a central axis nis."

benefit

thought and research. In 1926

fiirther

mentioned correspondences of the three

Smend

on the

are to other theories

Passion, the

num-

formed by the chorale "Durch dein Gefang-

work appearing

a

few years

later,

Hans-Joachim Moser

postulates a similarly symmetrical arrangement of "tonal surfaces. "^^

Picking up this idea and criticizing

at the

it

same time, Eric Chafe

(himself criticized in turn)^9 differentiated three tonality centers that

Bach used in symmetrical arrangement: one each the sharped keys, and the "natural" key of Bach's passions are unequal St.

C

for the flatted keys,

major

/A minor. ^°

Robert Schumann found the

sisters.

John Passion so much "more daring, more powerful, more poetic"

than the

St.

Matthew

Passion:

how

the choruses, and

"How

dense,

how

totally brilliant in

masterfiiUy done!"^^ But even this original

view does not obscure the

fact that in the

St Matthew Passion Bach

takes a giant step toward classicism. This can be seen even in the bretti:

while the

St.

John Passion

is

a compilation based

known Brockes

text,

a structure that

was planned and conceived from the

himself tist

may have

the libretto of the

St.

Matthew

set the theological direction

on the weU-

Passion exhibits outset.

and asked

Bach

his libret-

Picander to work from Heinrich MiiUer's Geistreicher Passions-

Schule of 1688,

Here

is

which

is

visibly present

throughout

as the model.^^

an example:

Heinrich Miiller

Matthauspassion

Am Abend /

Am Abend da es kiihle war,

da der Tag

kam

li-

die

kiihle

worden war

/

Sunde der Menschen

Ward Adams

Fallen offenbar;

ernstlich ans Licht /

am Abend nimmst

sie

Christus

wieder mit sich ins Grab 402

The

Vocal Music

/

Am Abend driicket ihn [den Satan]

daft ihr nicht

mehr

der Heiland nieder

gedacht werde.

Am Abend kam die Taube wieder

Um die Vesper=Zeit kam

das Taublein

zum

Kasten

/

Noah

und

siehe /

ein Oel=Blat hatte sie abgebrochen

und

At

evening,

become

when

in

At

the day had

revealed.

first

evening, Christ took

it

down

And

it

dem Munde. when

eventide,

it

was

cool.

faU

made

manifest;

eventide the Savior

overwhelmed him.

never again be thought

of.

dove

at vesper-tide, the

Was Adams At

with him into the grave,

That

trug ein Olblatt

cool,

Sin of Man was

The At

Munde.

trugs in ihrem

Und

At

eventide the dove returneth,

Its

mouth an

returned to Noah's ark.

And

lo! It

had broken off an

olive branch.

And bore

it

in her

Picander bers.

He

mouth.

may w^ell

olive

branch

now

bearing.

have used other models for individual

bases the final chorus in particular

on

his

own

num-

previously

published passion libretto of 1725: Erbauliche Gedancken aufdengru-

nen Donnerstag und Charfreytag (Edifying Thoughts for

Thursday and Good in every

that

is

meets

way: only

Friday).

now

is

But

his new^ passion verses are superior

Picander in a position to create a libretto

poetically deft, replete with images totally

modern

allegorical figures

way grounding also in

agreement

in his

famous

criteria.

and

work

solely in the older

(for a change!)

poetics,

ideas, a libretto that

So with his introduction featuring the

"The daughter of Zion and

his

Maundy

the

faithflil,"

he

is

Brockes passion.

in

no

He

is

with Johann Christoph Gottsched:

Versuch einer Critischen Dichtkunst (1730),

Gottsched expressly wanted the oratorio genre to have not just bibUcal characters but also "allegorical figures from religion; such as faith,

hope, charity, the Christian church, the spiritual bride,

The

Passions

403

Sulamith, the daughter of Zion, or the faithful soul."^^ Should these last

two

figures,

which indeed appear only in the printed

libretto

and

not in Bach's score, have even been mentioned in Gottsched's poetics

with reference to Bach's

St.

Matthew

Passion}

Picander uses the pair to give his text a consistent structure and to give the

Of course

choruses. St.

composer a chance

Matthew

Passion: the other level

of the chorale

meet

levels

"O Lamm

voices,

faithfiil

is

come

work of art

is

is

choir,

is

built right into the

where the daughter of Zion

when

Adolph Bernhard Marx can combined

said this about

cycle, or

new

to

the passion

still say,

effect as the Strasbourg

see."^"^

any single section of the

has the opening chorus of the

quality? Despite

St.

Matthew

basic polyphonic struc-

its

there the impression of strained contrapuntal work;

the seven lines of the cantus firmus

much

uses the

the text

two choruses

It is

is

fit

in very naturally.

the section's clear form as

mental message.

The

its

secret

is

conversational, direct,

librettist

and

moving voice

Kommt,

Den

ihr Tochter, helft

Brautigam. Seht ihn.

Die Glaubigen: Wie? Tochter Zion: Als wie ein

404 The Vocal Music

and

parts.

and composer did not discuss the

Die Glaubigen: Wen? Tochter Zion:

is

Bach

clear,

in detail:

Tochter Zion:

and

in brilliant fashion to lay out the text's fiinda-

diction

hard to imagine that fit

The

dialogic principle.

easy to understand, despite the several

music-text

is

"This rich

instead, the section flows along with an elegiac expansiveness,

not so

and

together. All this, including the instrumental

Would Marx have

nowhere

of the

opening chorus: the singing

which Goethe taught us how

Passion attained a

level

that of the Bible passages

Gottes unschuldig"

as simple in its total

Chorale Cantata

ture,

one textual

a highly differentiated construct. Yet

rediscovered in 1829,

cathedral,

is

in the

middle of the eight-voice double

and the

in dialogue or multiple

his verses represent only

These two

chorales.

compose

to

Lamm

mir klagen, sehet!

.

Cantus Firmus unschuldig.

O Lamm Gottes

Bestatigung hinzutretend):

(als

Am Stamm des Kreuzes geschlachtet.

Daughter of Zion: Come, ye daughters, share

my mourning

.

.

See ye!

The

Faithful:

Whom?

Daughter of Zion: The Bridegroom

The

Faithful:

behold Him.

How?

Daughter of Zion: Cantus Firmus:

Upon

there,

.just like a

.

.

lamb

O Lamb of God unspotted

the cross's branch slaughtered.

Even more than the opening chorus of the

movement

is

minor

key,

it

as the

embodiment of "pure pas-

of course, and in contrast to the pastorale's

Hght, dancing quality almost every melody note

cantus firmus,

whose

text deals

point invokes ideas of nature, but the nature is

the impulse of a fundamental

Brahms sought the

first

for decades before

bars of his

But we

first

are getting

took httle notice of

is

Lamb

with the

velously smoothly into the rolling 12/8 meter.

scape. It

is

traits

The opening

beginning, such as it

minor.

The

vealed as

new expression

new

it

visual

G

major

is

earlier is

compared

to the

Leipzig cantatas, has

a great deal more. In the is

the symbol of be-

becomes

grief.

sent into battle against elegiac

power of this genre

unfolds,

in

departures but was immediately struck by

shining rescue ship sent out onto a surging sea of

Archaically bright

pedal

ahead of ourselves. Bach's audience probably

of gallant-courtUness. But there

like a

mar-

symphony.

cantus firmus, written into the score in red ink, lief,

fits

The

that of a primal land-

new

he could give

John Passion or the

St.

harmonized. of God,

the musical gesture of restrained grief, which,

opening of the

John Passion, the

of great vocal-instrumental symphonic music.

a piece

Doris Finke-Hecklinger sees torale,"^5 in a

St.

scene, the

relativized;

immanent

E

logic re-

another force takes the

helm, opens up the closed form, crosses the frontier of the aesthetic

The

Passions

405

norm, and

steers a

new

course. In the theology of Bach's day, the

cantus firmus points to a heavenly Jerusalem as a counterpart to the earthly one,

from which the lamentations of the two choirs

are

heard.^^

After these metaphysical thoughts, to observe

self,

some of

its

let

fine points.

us return to the music

Bach does not repeat the

pedal point of the orchestral prelude at the choral entry: yield to the ritornello theme,

it-

now it must

which moves from the woodwinds

to

the basses and then the tenors, while the soprano and alto in turn

begin a soaring lament, with melismata sometimes extending over six bars

fully

—

a small detail in a score

even in

whose depths cannot be plumbed

many pages.

Alto

With sion,

the decision to use a double choir in the St

Bach has created

a great deal of

Matthew Pas-

freedom for himself. Not only

does the introductory chorus attain a dimension previously un-

known, but

also the final chorus,

nieder," gains in

"Wir

setzen uns mit Tranen

importance where the choirs

call

out to each other,

"ruhe sanfte" and "sanfte ruh" ("rest thou gendy" and "gendy

Of course,

this section

is

largely defined

rest").

by the melancholy rhythm

of the saraband, which can be heard more clearly here than in the final

chorus of the

St.

John Passion. Both rhythmically and formally,

Matthew

Passion approaches that kind of

the final part of the

St.

dance

Mattheson's words, needs "lauter

that, in Johann

haftigkeit" ("nothing but upright seriousness"). ^^

framing portions

may be

406 The Vocal Music

stylized,

but they are

The

still

steiffe

Ernst-

instrumental

quite real dance

movements with congruent choral insertions

fit

halves of twelve bars each,

and the

smoothly into the dance's periodic pattern.

Amazingly, Bach gave his great work a connotations are secular.

The works

whose musical

finale

outer sections one could almost

take to be from an orchestral or keyboard suite,^^ while he ends three

of the four versions of the St John Passion with a chorale. So the

Matthew Passion has an ending

as refined as

which neither a Mattheson nor

a Scheibe could have

it is

St.

modern, and one in found anything

to object to.

Did Bach

When

later feel the

he takes up the

sion, instead

St.

Matthew

end the

Passion again, in the 1736 ver-

of the simple chorale "Jesum

uses the wide-ranging chorus to

need for a counterbalancing force?

nally used in 1725 to start the St.

von mir" he

ich nicht

"O Mensch, bewein dein

This grandiose but

first part.

lafi

difficult

Siinde grofi"

movement,

John Passion, thus gets

origi-

its final

placement. Clearly here Bach not only abandons the principle of

commentary choruses but

multiple ensembles in the great

plodes the dimension of "reasonable" architecture a

and Scheibe. This process could chorale-text cantatas of the

fondness for

skillfiil

The double Bach

attest

—

same decade

la

in the context

—

Mattheson

of the purely

to a new, late-blooming

choral adaptations.

choir plays a modest role in the turba choruses.

realize at the first possible

opportunity

auf das Fest"

priests in "Ja nicht

—

—

down?

turbae,

He

avails

mosdy

that setting

up two choruses

in brief interjections

geht uns das an," "Gegruj[?.et

that to

"Andern hat

do with

own temple The choruses

and choruses of

us,"

"My

destroy,"

seist du,"

weigh

"Der du den Tempel Gottes

greetings to thee,"

"He brought

essentially syl-

"Weissage uns," "Was

er geholfen" ("Foretell

it

to us,"

"Thou who

"What

has

dost God's

others salvation").

central idea of murder in the is

to

himself only modesdy of this option in the other

labically declaimed, emotionless statements:

zerbrichts,"

Did

the chorus of high

might not make the setting more dramatic but rather tend it

also ex-

two almost identical "Kreuzige"

written as a dense four-part setting. Here

we do not have

The

Passions

407

of howling, cursing voices

a confusion

rather, the soggetto traces the figure

below through

all

St John Passion;

as in the

of a cross

as

it is

up from

led

the voices, "in accordance with the rules, so to

speak, like the pitiless cruelty of the ultimate punishment," as

Platen sees

An

it.

Emil

^9

eighteenth- century composer wishing to create a

modern

passion but one that avoids the danger of being theatrical faces the

question of recitative

Passion.

how

to deal

and the

The

aria.

with those forms that dominate opera, the

Bach

sticks to the

Evangelist's message

tones nor as an opera secco, but

path he took in the

St.

John

is

set neither to the old lesson

more

in the stylus luxurians, already

distinguished from opera secco by musicologists of the seventeenth

century for

its

speak of the

greater rhetorical emphasis. For the

many

subtle nuance: the cross: "Eli, Eli,

figural, pictorial,

warum

are translated into

du mich

hast

verlassen?"

God, why hast thou forsaken me?"). Bach wants clear that the

German words

his musical text

He

not

Hebrew- Aramaic words spoken by Jesus on the

lama asabthani"

Gott, mein Gott,

moment let us

and symbolic elements but of a

to

German: "Mein

("My God, my

make

it

musically

present a translation, so he translates

from B-flat minor to E-flat minor.

does this in as

literal a

way

as possible: except for the special

phrasing of the word "warum" and the fact that the original notation

408

The

Vocal Music

starts

above the

auxiliary ledger line, while the "translation" (in

first

on

the tenor clef) starts

the notation of each

it,

variation

from the

make both

lengths to

text

to set the translation as

But for

original.

this case

fit

to

the

an unconscious

Bach went

and notation of the

down

would have

the accidentals and the continuo numbering! It

normal flow of composition

identical

is

to conspicuous

translation identical to

the original.

Moreover, there

is

no

"halo,"^° that

paniment that Bach normally

Matthew

Passion.

He

set

around

this time, in his St.

St.

Matthew

John Passion

hard Keiser does the same in his

recitative free

Matthew

Passion,

St.

(ca. 1700).

Christi with

A

that provide a tremolo lament for long intervals.

St.

in the St

Also

Passion performed in Riga, Jo-

hann Valentin Meder accompanied the Vox

In his

words

Jesus's

could have found a model for this instrumen-

tation in Alessandro Scarlatti's Latin

around

the string quartet accom-

is,

two

violins

little later.

Rein-

Mark Passion.

Bach

at pains to

is

keep his secco

from any associations with secular music: he reserves

the secco for relating the biblical events only, the words of which are written in red ink in the definitive score.

Thus he had

to find

another compositional form than the secco to set the ten freely com-

posed

recitatives that

nity to create a

Picander had planned.

new method, known

"motivic accompagnato."^^

would be wrong

to call

But the accompaniment and such

a speechlike

The

them

He

took the opportu-

in formal

voice leading

is

terminology

as

recitative-like, so it

ariosos, as they often are nonetheless.

to the voice has

an ostinato rhythmic motif

sound that the corresponding numbers could

be described figuratively as symbols or genre pictures, and some could be given specific

down

titles like "river

of tears," "suffering," "bowing

before," "silence," "scourging," or

"Good Friday

Bach's style of composing in one sense atic art

is

evening."

rooted in the emblem-

of the baroque: the voice delivers the epigram, and the instru-

ments present the

pictura. It

is

both highly modern and almost an

anticipation of the Schubert song with

its

characteristic stereotypical

gestures in the piano accompaniment:

The

Passions

409

Bach:

The made

increased importance of the madrigalian recitative,

evident in the

John Passion

St.

called arioso) "Betrachte

meine

Seel'"

vv^ith

and "Mein Herz," has conse-

quences for the whole aesthetic concept of the in

no fewer than ten

from opera that the Instead,

Bach

cases, this recitative

gives the

two

St.

Matthew

work dispenses with

is

first

the two numbers (there

the idea

Passion:

coming

simply a musical passage to an

a linkage in

which the

first

aria.

can be un-

derstood as an introduction to the second. This represents inherent progress in the work,

where (except

for the

tered like set pieces,

when compared with

two

In contrast to aria

can be seen

and large prano

410

The

out. this,

the ten pairs of motivic accompagnato plus

as regular

chamber music

"Er hat uns

accompaniment

Vocal Music

Passion,

to "Ich folge dir gleichfaUs" does not

alien

interludes, for is

wohlgetan"

selected. is

which by

Thus, the so-

accompanied by two

oboes da caccia, which then combine with a leadmg three-voice

John

and the rapid sequence of numbers from "Von

a sophisticated set of instruments

recitative

St.

ariosos just mentioned) the arias are scat-

den Stricken meiner Siinden"

seem well thought

the

for the next aria, "Aus

flute to

form

a

Liebe wiU mein

Heiland sterben." This admittedly unusual tone color evokes another world more strongly in a passion oratorio than

it

would

in

an opera

or secular cantata. In the rush of events of the passion, the Evangelist

has just had Pilate

"What

say,

evil

has he done?," and a curtain

opens on to a scene of meditative music: one could almost be in a

Then

baroque painting.

cloister or a

break in again: "They shouted

St.

aria,

crucified!'"

artistic

insight that in his re-

Matthew

Passion he retained this

pairing of recitative and aria, although he

oboes da caccia: the recitative

inets for the

him be

the more, 'Let

all

It speaks for Mendelssohn's

presentation or revival of the

the events of the outside world

the instrumental introduction

is left

had is

to substitute

untouched, and in the

intact too. It

was not only

Mendelssohn who sensed something of the magic of the lau's

aria.

Bres-

music director Johann Theodor Mosewius learned of

Men-

delssohn's feat in the newspapers

the third performance

He

A clar-

on

work

rehearsed the

vj

and hastened

to Berlin in time for

April 1829, after traveling day and night.

a year later with his Singakademie in Breslau

and wrote a "musical-esthetic interpretation" of the

which he discussed the

sion in 1852, in

lyrical

St.

Matthew Pas-

dimension of the

aria

"Aus Liebe will mein Heiland sterben":

Here

there

is

not a hint of anything external, one must engage

oneself completely with music like

plore

its

musical

one must seek out

atmospheric mood, in which, I might almost still-life

and ex-

say, such

paintings are opened up to our inner feelings,

and where

the emotions can attain true inner understanding

Once

allowed to happen, once the core of deep poetry hid-

this

is

den within

is

revealed,

and flows

feelings, then one returns to

joy and pleasure.

it

again

into the realm

and again, with ever greater

called

atmosphere comes mostly from the bas-

horn section with the second oboe da caccia

Only

rarely does

Bach write

which means there

of senses and

'^^

What Mosewius set

this,

is

a vocal section without a continuo,

nothing in the bass

reasons: in this case he

as the lowest voice.

register,

often for symbolic

wants to signal that the Savior, his death The

Passions

411

imminent, no longer stands firmly on the earth but already ing a higher plane.

Thus

near-

is

the basset horn passage can be considered

"baroque topos of innocence."^^

as a

Besides the establishment of a firm coupling of the aria and the

new forms of dialogue

motivic accompagnato, the

add

bretto

importance of the

to the

arias.

Bach

uses

given by the

li-

them repeatedly

through the passion, having the chorus of faithfiil women break right into the recitatives

and

of the Daughters of Zion

arias

numbers "Ich will bei meinem Jesu wachen / den

"O Schmerz! Hier

ein";

Ursach haltet,

aller

Plagen"; "So

Herz

/

mein Jesus nun gefangen

ist

ist

as in the

so schlafen unsere Siin-

zittert das gequalte

bindet nicht"; "Ach, nun

—

mein Jesus hin?

/

Was

ist

die

/ Lafit ihn,

Wo

ist

denn

dein Freund hingegangen"; "Sehet, Jesus hat die Hand, uns zu fassen, ausgespannt,

zur

kommt

[.

.

.]

/wohin?"; and

Ruh gebracht / Mein Jesu, gute Nacht."* The name "Jesus" appears mosdy at the midpoint from the

dividual soul {die Seelenbraut)

der Herr

of the above

tradition of baroque mysti-

cism and Pietism. Picander and Bach use freely

composed

texts

of the

bitrary sequence of texts ingfiil

St.

and more

like a subplot

the corpus of arias here

higher plane than in the

like

the

an

ar-

providing a mean-

St.

show compositional

John Passion}

The

John Passion could hardly be improved on

an element of classicism can be found in the the earlier

work simply cannot

the later

work has an almost

be with

my Jesus

watching

level

St.

skill

on

a

of quality of the

— but even

in the arias,

Matthew Passion that

claim. In the arias of the

the figurative and thus spiritual element

*"I will

make

this topos to

Matthew Passion seem less

paraphrase of the biblical narrative.

Does

sion,

ist

they are modeled after the dialogue between Jesus and the in-

texts:

St.

"Nun

is

St.

John Pas-

in the foreground;

sensual sound. Perhaps this difference

/

Here trembleth the tormented heart

That slumber may our /

What

is

sins enfold";

the reason for

all

"O

pain!

these great tor-

my Jesus now been taken / Free him, hold off, bind him not!"; now is my Jesus gone! / Where is then thy friend now departed?"; "See ye, Jesus hath his hand, us to capture, now outstretched / Come! [. .] Where to?"; "Now is the Lord brought to his rest. My Jesus, now good night!" ments?"; "Thus hath

"Ah,

.

412

The

Vocal Music

is

the result of a

the

St.

more

intensive study of Italian music.

Many arias

of

Matthenjo Passion have a cantabile tone, almost supersaturated

with pure sound.

Let us compare two numbers based on a dotted saraband rhythm: "Ach, mein Sinn" and

"Konnen Tranen meiner Wangen." In the

aria (described above)

from the

guish and despair

is

St.

John

Passion, the expression

almost unpleasant to listen

the alto voice in the second

to,

suave and sensual.

is

first

of an-

while the line of

The melody

stays

oriented about a vertical axis with a descending bass line, and the

mordent-like sixteenth- note figures ranean, almost folk music. aria's ritornello

The

make one think of Mediter-

dotted eighth figure that defines the

and doubtless depicts the scourging ofJesus

presses melancholy, but the general effect

In "Ach, mein Sinn" there

not

fit

the

is

is

more moving than

not even a hint of da capo:

turbulent emotional gesture. But in

aria's

clearly ex-

it

harsh.

would

"Konnen Tranen"

the da capo seems almost a matter of course: the impact of the aria

on the

listener

is

autonomous form.

that of an

It still

has figurative

elements: the whiplike sound of the scourge, the sound of teardrops, the sound of the sobbing Daughter of Zion. But these figures could

be generalized: the music would lose none of

easily

power

if it

were being

The combining of powerful sical effect

where

in

figural

language with a

does not result in a work that

Bach

it

expressive

its

set to another text of equal emotional impact.

does); the

work

is

is

rich, sensual

difficult to

pleasurable.

mu-

absorb (as else-

This change

may be

seen as part of a trend toward the classical, where no one element

comes ways

to the fore but rather

where the flow of the music

itself is al-

in control.

In 1729 Bach incorporated important parts of the Passion into his funeral music for Prince

St.

Matthew

Leopold of Anhalt-Cothen The

Passions

413

(BWV 244a).

has been asked whether he

It

ting such a sublime tical reasons:

work

to other uses.

felt

any scruples

at put-

There may have been prac-

the music had to be ready soon after the prince's death.

The music had to be approved in advance and rehearsed weU to problems; so

it is

new four-part

possible that there

this,

the idea that the music from ten beautiful arias

of the St Matthew Passion and heard in a religious

The

rite

its final

may have

chorus would once again be

pleased the composer more than

original

com-

greatness through such adaptation.

How more

successfiil arias

The

The

blithely did Bach's contemporaries transport their

position lost none of

414

it

noble pathos of these sections in particular was

well suited to the courtly traditions of mourning.

much more

to complete a large

composition.

Apart from

worried him.

was not time

avoid

its

from one opera to the

Vocal Music

next!

SECULAR CANTATAS AND THE CHRISTMAS ORATORIO In the same year as the

St.

Matthew

Bach

Passion,

creates another

vocal work of mourning: the Ode on the Death ofthe Queen, Christiane

Eberhardine: "La£, Fiirstin, la£ noch einen Strahl," refined courtly sound, ter

of the

St.

Matthew

which had played

BWV 198. The

a role in setting the charac-

dominates the entire work.

Passion, here

It is

no accident that the university chronicler emphasizes the composiany element of genuine Lutheran church

tion's "Italian style": it lacks

music, making use of neither Bible passages nor scale concerted or extensive fiigal

hymns nor

large-

development; instead, the score

contains a sequence of chamber- music-like recitatives and arias and

predominantly homophonic choruses. bild groi^er Frauen"

ginning each of

its

is

The

halves has a

theme with

homophonic

instrumentation

is

work

Heldin so vergniigt,"

two

planned in the score. Bach

calls for

Geton," to portray the sound of

is

two

known

to be the

"Wie

two gambas and

recorders, probably

"Der Glocken bebendes

bells tolling the

death knell in

all

as well as the

and recorders.

Viewed both chronologically and which

So the impres-

employs two oboes d'amore and strings lutes,

and

not obscured.

is

in addition to the

to brighten the sound. ^ In the recitative

above-mentioned gambas,

fiague be-

exceptionally refined: for the aria

starb die

pitches, he

du Vor-

a lyrical quality

final section.

sion of musical flow that dominates the

lutes

dir,

something of an exception, but the

transitions quickly into a

The

chorus "An

model

aesthetically, this Trauerode,

for the missing St.

Mark

Passion,

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

415

BWV

247,

music.

The work,

forms a bridge between Bach's Lutheran and secular alternating

represents a paradigm shift.

between sacred and profane mourning,

The

occasions for which

Bach

creates

innovations in his Leipzig vocal compositions tend less and less to

be the Sunday and feast-day services in the Thomaskirche and Nicholas's

Church and more and more another kind of function:

St.

cer-

members of the electoral ruling house and other high-ranking persons. Of emonies in connection with academia and musical tributes to

coMVSt ^olus Propitiated,

BWV 205, and "Vereinigte Zwietracht der

wechselnden Saiten" ("United Division of Strings Ever Changing"),

BWV 207, had already appeared (in 1725 and 1726, respectively). the years after the completion of the

seen as a time of transition, ally shifted

from the

when

first

two cantata

cycles can be

the emphasis in Bach's

of Thomaskantor to that of

role

Still,

life

gradu-

director musices

and future leader of the collegium musicum.

With

the two last-named compositions

we come

ular vocal works. Current scholarship identifies the

to Bach's sec-

Hunt

Cantata,

BWV 208, of 1712-13 as the earliest of these: one of Bach's earliest efforts at Italian cantata style

and da capo

aria.

The

last

of these

is

the

burlesque Peasant Cantata, "Mir hahn en neue Oberkeet" (dialect for

"Wir haben nor"),

eine neue Obrigkeit" or "We've got a

brand-new gover-

BWV 212, a work of cryptic humor. Among these dozen other

works can be identified at the courts

— mostly

lost cantatas in praise

of Cothen, Weissenfels, and Zerbst

tival pieces for

fes-

Leipzig University and school occasions; twelve fes-

tival pieces for

the Saxon electoral house; eight other cantatas of

various types; and four

wedding

cantatas, to

the high-spirited Wedding Quodlibet, gestive

of personages

— around nine

work probably meant

that the fragmentary score

for a

which should be added

BWV 524, an extravagandy sugBach family occasion (assuming

was not just written out but

actually

com-

posed by Bach).

The two "Non

sa

che

come down

416

Italian solo cantatas sia dolore,"

traditore,"

BWV 203, and

BWV 209, occupy a special position: both

to us in manuscripts

The Vocal Music

"Amore

of dubious authenticity.

The music

does not point to Bach as

man composer who was would be

It

its

at

author

home

—

it

was

likely written

by

a

Ger-

in the Italian cantabile style.

pointless trying to construe a stylistically unified cor-

pus of any degree from the works that have survived; even sketching lines

of development

gave

rise to

is

problematic, since the original occasions that

them, and thus the types of work Bach considered writ-

The

ing for them, are so various.

which was

first

To keep from bogging down

this great variety^

the term only to the

drammiper musica

period between the St

Matthew

Bach's selection of the term are in

general term "secular cantata,"

used in the nineteenth century, cannot do justice to

no way lyric

in detail,

we

restrict

that originated mainly in the

Passion

and the Christmas

drammi makes

solo cantatas but impressive

Oratorio.

clear that the

works

and substantial works

of a genre most closely related to chamber opera. Besides the two

BWV 205

above-mentioned cantatas,

and

207, this

group includes

the following works presented between 1728 and 1736: "Erwahlte Pleiftenstadt,"

BWV

216a ("Leipzig the

Contest between Phoebus and Pan,"

Chosen

BWV

201 ("Geschwinde,

Winde" ["Now hasten,

geschwinde, ihr wirbelnden

"The

City");

ye winds of con-

BWV 213 ("Lai^t uns sorgen,

fusion"]); Hercules at the Crossroads,

laf^t

us watch him"]); "Tonet, ihr

uns wachen" ["Let us tend him,

let

Pauken! Erschallet, Trompeten,"

BWV

214 ("Sound,

all

ye drums

now. Resound, aU ye trumpets"); "Blast Larmen, ihr Feinde,"

BWV

205a ("Blow uproar, opponents"); "Preise dein Gliicke, gesegnetes Sachsen,"

BWV

215 ("Praise

ony"); "Auf, schmetternde

now

Tone

thy blessings,

O

fortunate Sax-

der muntern Trompeten,"

BWV

207a ("Resound, pealing notes of the vigorous trumpets"); and "Schleicht spielende Wellen,"

BWV 206 ("Glide, glittering waters").

(Works with numbers having the In most of the

Greek

antiquity:

—

a come from earlier settings.)

drammi per musica the

ApoUo,

Hercules, and so on. present day

suffix

Pallas

They

characters

come from

Athena, the wind gods. Pan, Midas,

retell

the myths, relating

them

for instance, inyEo/us Propitiated, a cantata

to the

performed

on the name day of the Leipzig professor August MiiUer. The date

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

417

a

August

is 3

raging

1725,

and the wind god

autumn winds from

summer wind,

is

feels

once again

their enclosure.

But Zephyrus, the gende

of rough autumn, and Pomona, goddess of

afraid

the orchards, fears for her harvest. Finally Pallas delay, so that she

can hold her celebration on

of the muses, in the

when he

The

is

like loosing the

warm summer

air.

Athena begs

for a

Mount Helicon, home

But i^olus

is

appeased only

told that Miiller will take part in the muses' celebration.

which

chorus,

at first depicted the raging

winds,

transformed

is

August ... blest be thou,

into a students' choir: "Vivat

O

learned

man!

One might be tempted to of the

new

arena Bach

Thomaskirche and

move from gospel,

work is exemplary

entering, exchanging the gallery of the

is

St. Nicholas's

Christianity to

Church

humanism.

hymn, Lutheranism, Christian

He

podium

for a secular is

dealing

now

—

not with

doctrine, the repentance of

the preparation for death, or the certainty of faith but with

sin,

Greek mythology and Virgil's

Georgics.

He

grace, beauty, culture in

smile at this, yet the

is

its

translation to Ovid's Metamorphoses

also dealing

— and not

least

and

with an interior world, with wdth questions of aesthetics,

"The Contest between Phoebus and Pan," about the

as

right kind of

music: King Midas, setting himself up as judge of matters he knows

nothing about and in his ral

total

ignorance preferring the harsh natu-

tones of Pan to the "lovely lays" of Phoebus,

is

given

ass's

ears in

punishment.

Bach may have enjoyed having some academe through

his

influence

on the

life

of

involvement with humanistic themes and com-

missions for works associated with them: as composing sacred cantatas

and passions constitutes participation

setting the

drammi per musica

signifies participation in the current

discussion of education and culture

One

in religious discourse, so

— with

its

high and low points.^

can imagine him relishing the composition of a libretto that

deals with the

punishment of someone who thinks himself an expert

on questions of art, music

The all

sorts

418

The

libretti

in particular.

of the drammi per musica offer a composer

like

Bach

of enticements to enter emotional and performative areas Vocal Music

would not be so

that

central idea

middle

when compared jects.

this

style,

to the

which by

very nature

its

high or sublime

The

spiritual texts.

the "charm of melody" in Phoebus s song

is

generally, a

works with

accessible to

more

or,

uncomfortable

is

sub-

style reserved for sacred

In the secular works of his Leipzig period. Bach

is

make

able to

genre completely his own, and thus can be receptive, more than

in his sacred music, to a gallant

An which

and sentimental

style.

example: the bass aria "Riihmet Gottes Giit und Treu,"

in

similarity to the operatic style of Johann

its

Adolph Hasse

can be considered an "extremely rare concession by Bach to popular taste"

—was

"Dem

originally

it

mu£

Gerechten

composed

wedding cantata

BWV 195, or did

das Licht,"

older, secular context?^

for the sacred

it

stem from an

Let us remember the comments of Lorenz

Christoph Mizler and Johann Abraham Birnbaum in

both

1738:

writers feel that they can prove Bach's ability to write "perfectly in

the latest fashion" by pointing to a secular work, namely, the cantata

"Willkommen, 13,

ihre herrschenden

which unfortunately It

was not the

Gotter der Erden,"

BWV Anh.

I,

is lost.

be-all

in the latest fashion, but

and end-all of composing it is

definitely

for

Bach

to write

And

one aspect of his work.

such writing was done more easily for an audience that expected secular

music than in the church, where opinions

were divided in

dram m i per

this regard.

So what

is

— even Bach's own

the musical gain in writing

m us tea?

Without becoming an opera composer. Bach the dramatic genre and thereby opening

musical expression. Even the pitiated, has

The

work. plete

first

is

contributing to

up further dimensions of

of the Leipzig drammiJEolus Pro-

one of the most powerfiil instrumental settings

choral introduction was

composed

in

aU his

practically for a

com-

baroque orchestra: besides strings and continuo there are two

flutes,

two oboes, three trumpets, timpani, and

in this setting

—

— uniquely

for

Bach

three horns. In the martial final chorus, this total

ensemble

is

used over and over again

almost as

if

the director musices wanted to

the beginning by using an ensemble

as a single

make

mass of sound.

It is

a big impression at

worthy of an opera.

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

419

The

recitative after the

chorus

is

dramatic as well;

it

has i^olus

of the winds appearing in impressive musical decor. To the

as lord

powerful entries of the brass instruments, Bach adds swift runs in the flutes and strings, including the basses. Other musical elements

of the plot are painted in musical terms: the raging winds of the

opening chorus, ^oluss

murmuring zephyrs,

fierce laughter, the

Athena's joking. That these emotional effects and genre pictures are

meant more

for the opera stage than for the choir stalls of the church

does not rule out the

drammi

stylistic

are free

mophonic or

overlaps between the two.

The

choruses in

of strained contrapuntal passages; they are ho-

loosely polyphonic.

Bach

relies

on catchy themes and

natural articulation, as in the opening "Tonet, ihr Pauken! Erschallet,

BWV

Trompeten!,"

214:

the

first line is

sung unison by the

chorus, not a particularly artful setting but nonetheless a lively excla-

mation taken up by aU voices together. First, the choral

motif is played by the timpani; Bach has taken the

imperatives of the text

literally;

the timpani, which after aU can play

only intervals of a fourth, are thought of thematicaUy with this limitation in mind: their interval

This

section.

is

a

is

transformed into the basis of the whole

new kind of figured

writing:

Bach does not employ

musical rhetorical figures, does not compose symbolically or in pictures but naturally

and turning

it

— taking

the sound of the instrument in question

into a phrase that

is

as

memorable

as

it is

engaging:

Timpani

Flauto traverse

Oboe

I.

I,

II

II

Violoncello

Violone

Continuo

This

is

a language understood even

by the musically unsophisti-

cated; the listener can follow without sorting through subtle levels of

420

The

Vocal Music

meaning: the text speaks of drums and trumpets tives

of courdy ceremony

— and

these representatives appear.

lo!

This kind of music could be called "easy to posed to be just

that.

We

and

it is

com-

shift:

the

com-

like,"

see here another paradigm

position's aesthetic orientation

the music

as the representa-

changes from object to

listener.

No

than the

listener.

Instead of reflecting

philosophically or laying out agendas,

it vv^ants

to give the listener the

longer

is

vv^iser

chance to enjoy music by making

ment

for

As

its

a part of himself

— simple enjoy-

ow^n sake.

back

far

it

as 1722, in a discourse

on nature and reason

in

music

Wolfenbuttel cantor Heinrich Bokemeyer, Johann Matthe-

v^ith the

son demanded that melodies be "original," simple, and pleasant.^ generation

later,

Bach's son Carl Philipp Emanuel declares

composer

"obligation" of the

"to be able to feel

w^ants to arouse in his listeners."^

The

all

highest art

is

it

A

to be the

the emotions he to be able to re-

musical language the listeners' feelings: thus the epoch w^as

alize in

called the "era of feeling" (the literary genre

mized by Klopstock's poetry)

Empfindsamkeit epito-

— and not because the music of

this

trend necessarily reflected w^hat the v^ord means today, sentimentality.

Old music. style,

father

is

this

broadly subjective view^ of

When he declares himself open to a sensual, listener-oriented

he does not mean that

essence of art. so

Bach did not share

He

can

this is all

he

that this

vv^ants,

w^rite in the latest style, to

be

sure,

is

the

but doing

not his goal. Note that even the w^orks of his theatrical or

middle

style retain a fair

degree of figuration and development.

chorus "Tonet, ihr Pauken! ErschaUet, Trompeten!"

is

The

not just an in-

troduction scored for these instruments but a sophisticated construct

of all kinds of motifs.

We

return to the

The master composer cannot be two drammi per musica of 1733,

denied!

"Lafit uns sor-

gen, la£t uns w^achen" and "Tonet, ihr Pauken! Erschallet, ten!" his

On

B-Minor Mass

to the Elector

of Saxony

an appointment as court composer. ber and 8

Trompe-

27 July of that year Bach dedicates the Kyrie and Gloria of

December

— not

least in

hopes of

The performances of 5 Septem-

reinforce Bach's w^ish to be

remembered

at the

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

421

Dresden court not just

as a religious

composer but

as a secular

one

as

well.

In composing the two drammi, was

it

his intention

set to recycle essential sections as parodies for a

perhaps even asking his religious text while

librettist

six feast

original verses?

days between 25

6 January 1735, he produces a major sacred extent of parodies pressly calls

But

it

—

major sacred work,

Picander to consider an alternative

composing the

pened, for each of the

from the out-

December

work consisting

especially of the above

an "oratorium," a term that

Whatever hapand

1734

to a large

two drammi

He

ex-

not unusual for the time.

is

of 1732 Johann Gottfried Walther defines

in his musical lexicon

"oratorium" as "a religious OperUy or musical representation of a

reli-

gious story." This definition can hardly be stretched to define a cycle

of six cantatas. Historically the merging of

genres created a

new genre

two not

particularly

well-known

that could be termed an oratorio in Bach's

Christmas "history," known primarily through Heinrich

sense: the

Schutz's composition,

and the

institution

known

as

Abendmusiken

—

the evening concerts of Liibeck that Bach's teacher Dietrich Buxte-

hude had brought into

These took place on

existence.

several

Sundays each year during Advent, providing a framework for the occasional performances of cyclic works like the five-part Himmlische

auf Erden (The Heavenly

Seelenlust

Allererschrocklichste

Soul's Earthly Bliss) or

und Allererfreulichste (The Most Dreadful and

Das the

Most Wonderful). Bach keeps Oratorio,

BWV

this generic 11,

term

as well in

the length of a cantata, and in 1738, cantata

"Kommt,

fliehet

und

eilet,"

when he

on Bach's

republishes the Easter

owes

its

creation to a clever

part: putting earlier secular

BWV 213 and 214, one aria

is

derived from

works (besides

BWV 215) to new use for

cantata performances during the Christmas season.

composed

for a specific event

manent context 422

The

is

his Ascension

work of about

BWV 249, as the Easter Oratorio.

Superficially, the Christmas Oratorio

calculation

composing

for the Feast of Ascension in 1735, a

Thus music

saved from oblivion and given a per-

that the original occasion could not offer.

Vocal Music

The new

context

each one of the

the de tempore, that

is

six cantatas

the church calendar:

is,

of the Christmas Oratorio can in future

be performed on the Sunday or feast day for which

But Bach

also provides a larger context: a story

narrative. Calling

with a great

it

it

was written.

with a continuous

oratorium, he presents the people of Leipzig

new work

form of texts

that took the

specially printed

for the occasion.

Here Bach shows himself to be

tal

new

using his beautiful

ically,

to a

new

Bach employed the

way he approached

From

that

a small

greatest artistic discretion, moreover, in the

parody, that

drammi

the

choruses for the is

— namely, Christmas music. The form

of music often took was the pastorale or shepherd's music.

this type

This

open the por-

secular music as a key to

genre of sacred music, one long associated with charm,

sweetness, nature, and joy

music.

composer who thinks theolog-

a

first,

third,

body of

is,

the reworking of existing vocal

BWV 213, 214, and 215 he uses the opening and

fifth part

and

secular music, written at

same period of time, integrated

in style

of eight

a total

more or

and well suited

less

the

to the festive,

warm, and generally bright tone associated with Christmas. Bach had

arias.

What

tested out in the secular realm he soon applied to the reli-

gious realm as well.

This process was not mechanical. In the second

part, instead

of

using an opening chorus, for which he could certainly have found

something to create a parody from, he wrote a new instrumental pastorale.

In similar fashion, he wrote a

part. Originally

BWV

213,

new

final

chorus for the

he had intended to parody the

final

"Lust der Volker, Lust der Deinen,

Friedrich"; his librettist

strophic pattern.

But

had come up with clearly

a rewrite

fifth

chorus from holder

bliihe,

of this to

fit

the

Bach had second thoughts about

whether the original form, a gavotte-like round song, was an appropriate foundation for

an opening chorus on the words "Ehre

Gott, gesungen" ("Let thy praise be sung,

O

composed something new, and more ambitious,

The

for the

new

madrigalian recitatives introducing the arias of the

parts are also

new: "Nun wird mein

liebster

sei dir,

Lord") and instead

Brautigam,"

text.

first five

"Wer

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

will

423

die Liebe recht erhoh'n,"

"Was Gott dem Abraham

verheiEen," "So

geht denn hin, ihr Hirten," "Immanuel, du sMes Wort," "Wohlan,

Name

dein

soil allein."

In the St Matthew Passion tradition, they are

accompagnati carefully worked out with an eye for textual and musical unity. If the its

musical quality of an aria

original secular character,

preceding

recitative,

wrote choral

a spiritual context

more

by the

where Bach

of words and music.

he goes a

further with the madrigalian

little

than he has gone before: he uses the

the chorales, rative.

was put into

liturgical association

five instances

recitative

it

particularly in four cases,

combining original verses with hymns, thus

recitatives

emphasizing the In

most

retained any traces of

still

clearly

recitatives to integrate

than he did in the passions, into the nar-

Thus, the bass comments on the hymns of praise sung by the

heavenly hosts: "'Tis meet, ye angels, sing and triumph,

today have gained such fortune! / yours, /

We

chorus,

"Wir singen

can

Up

rience he gained in

with the help of his

in

ety, are

John or

tives, arias,

voice to

the cue for the final

is

composing the drammi per musica (and perhaps librettist).

Bach took an

numbers

Matthew

is

additional step: with the

almost completely a work of

in the Christmas Oratorio, despite their vari-

more carefuUy balanced St.

This

That we

deinem Heer." Perhaps because of the expe-

exception of the sixth cantata (which parodies), the

We'U join our

then!

as well as ye rejoice."

/

Passion.

against one another than in the

Beyond the

effort to distribute recita-

and chorales appropriately thoughout the Bible

sense the care that each

number proceed

St.

logically

story,

we

from the preced-

ing one and that the different text and music genres be divided up

evenly throughout the libretto. This

is less

enment fashion than Bach's acceptance of Bach

as essentially chaotic

a concession to Enlightit:

Scheibe's criticism of

and bombastic simply does not apply

here.

On lar

the contrary: along with those numbers adapted from secu-

new ones composed

works, some

sound remarkably iano rhythm,

424

natural. Especially natural

a pastorale in 12/8 time.

rus, this piece

is

especially "for Christmas"

With

is

its

the sinfonia in

sicil-

inspired double cho-

one of the outstanding examples of the pastorale

The Vocal Music

genre: against a rural shepherds' idyll7 invoked

by four oboes playing

a bassett-horn section with folksy melodies over a

more

hears a

refined, "angelic

round" played by

bourdon flutes

bass,

and

one

violins.^

Flauto traverse Violino

I

Flauto traverse Violino

Flauto traverse

Oboe d'amore

Oboe da

Violino

I,

I,

II

I,

caccia

I,

II

Bach turf:

II

II

is

a length ahead of his contemporaries even

on

their

home

not only does he know^ how^ to depict an earthy pastorale in

keeping with the passion for nature just then coming into fashion, but he links his depiction of real scenes to a reference to the paradise, that

one place where mankind's yearning

peace can be finally

satisfied.

As Albert Schweitzer

fields

for nature

of

and

has noted. Bach

combines here, in one topos, the adoration of the heavenly hosts with that of

human

shepherds, in a theologically convincing way,

without the need of outside biblical expertise.^ Musically, the thematic linking of these two realms, the salient compositional feature Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

425

—

of the section, anticipates sonata movement structure with

its

two

contrasting themes, exposition, development, and recapitulation. ^°

In the

Donner

sind

Matthew

St.

Passion's

mighty double chorus "Sind

Wolken verschwunden?," Bach

in

But though impressive,

litde nature portrait.

mains more an abstract figuration: the

Blitze,

has already offered a

this

tone painting re-

text speaks not

of actual thun-

der and lightning but of the shock that the Savior's betrayal and

does not unleash a storm from heaven!

arrest

The

"storm chorus"

makes sense only as the portrayal of the anguished emotional Jesus

disciples."

s

The

can be understood without taking such logical detours:

drop for the shepherds in their host.

for

Here the music sound:

its

is

not so

field,

of

the back-

the angel, and the heavenly

much important

not just for the earthly but also the heavenly

One

it is

for

its

figuration as

supplies "local color" in the clearest possible

it

state

from the Christmas Oratorio

pastoral sinfonia

way

locale.

cannot value the philosophical and musical importance of

the sinfonia too highly. In "Great

German Music of the Eighteenth

Century" (1907), Wilhelm Dilthey v^ote that tains "every possible depiction yet to

Of course

there are a great

this

come of our

number of instrumental

movement conlove of nature.

"^^

pastorales in the

seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. But surely no composition exists

that so explicitly combines the pastoral topos, the local color,

with a

real idea

—

the idea of peace

ment of the highest sistent

level that

form throughout.

is

It is a

at

—

resulting in a sinfonia

move-

once painting in music and con-

musical character presented as the

process of musical thinking.

One cannot compare something like the gracefijl Pifa dance) section of Handel's Messiah with a

work of this

(shepherds'

level;

an apter

comparison would be Haydn's portrayal of Chaos in The Creation or Beethoven's Pastorale symphony, which point to

even

illustrate

thing spiritual. Sixth

it,

in that they

The

pastoral bells in the

Symphony should be heard

scending of nature.

426

imbue

The

Vocal Music

German

idealism, or

sensual experience with somefirst

movement of Mahler's

as a last reminiscence

of this tran-

Pastoral local color dominates the

mas Oratorio

— another

final chorus,

whole second part of the Christ-

novelty for Bach! In the ritornello lines of the

"Wir singen

dir in

deinem Heer," he does not

revert to

the introductory sinfonia just to give a clear and logical completion to

the thematic cycle of Shepherds; but for the two accompagnati that deal v^th the shepherds' chorus he again picks

oboes, repeating once aria "Schlafe,

more the bourdon

mein Liebster" has

up the scoring with four

bass line

and

The

ostinato.

and subde

a particularly sensitive

in-

strumentation: while the original, secular ritornello was played by the strings, here it

given to the oboes. In contrast to the original, and

is

quite unusually, he accompanies the voice with a flute that doubles the

melody one octave

higher, brightening the

whole sound.^^

After the pastorale, the previously mentioned chorus of the

heavenly host, "Ehre portant rus,

sei

Gott in der Hohe,"

new composition in the

but Bach uses

it

is

probably the most im-

Christmas Oratorio.

It is a

only in part to advance the plot; he sees

significandy as the bearer of a universal message that

Gloria of the Latin mass.

liturgically in the

turba cho-

The

also

is

section

it

more

anchored

is

remark-

ably rigorous in a formal sense, despite the emotion in the individual voices. figures,

on

The continuo

part consists largely of running eighth- note

continuing until the words "und Friede auf Erden" ("peace

earth"),

when

it is

replaced by a pedal point similar to the basset-

horn section from the pastorale.

The former

symbolizes the power and eternity of God; the

ter provides a hint

dom

finds

on

of the peace that

earth.

The

man

could have in

God

but

lat-

sel-

instruments are introduced in different

ways: the opening staccato phrases have a sharply stimulating effect,

while the legato at the words "und Friede auf Erden" contributes a great deal to the

Menschen

sudden

shift

of mood. In the

final section

ein WohlgefaUen," written as a canon, the instruments'

only fijnction

is

The continuo calls to mind unum Deum" and "Confiteor"

to support the voices.

one of the two sections, "Credo in

from the Credo of the B-Minor Mass, composed sei

Gott

"und den

in der

Hohe" chorus

is

not at

all

later.

But the "Ehre

in the stile antico;

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

it

is

427

composed

and varying fashion, somewhere between the

in a pleasing

middle and high

alia

breve

style.

We turn again to the opening choruses, which are composed almost

in the gallant style,

and to the

time in their original

arias, this

form:

Tonet, ihr Pauken!

Klingende Saiten, Singet

erfiillet

Lieder, ihr

itzt

Trompeten!

erschallet,

die Luft!

muntren Poeten!

Konigin

lebe!

Konigin

lebe! dies wiinschet der Sachse.

wird frohlich geruft.

Konigin lebe und

Sound,

Resonant Sing

viols,

now your

Vivat regina!

und wachse!

drums now! Resound,

ye

all

bliihe

make

swell

now

the

all

ye trumpets!

air!

anthems, ye vigorous poets,

How happy the

shout!

Vivat regina! the hope of the Saxons:

Long

Thus

live

the Queen,

the opening chorus of

of the text

at face value

— namely,

flourish

and prosper!

BWV 214. Bach takes the exhortations

and composes music expressly coming out of

those words. Is anything lost tuted

may she

when

the words with

another, religious text

Riihmet, was heute der Hochste getan! Lasset das Zagen, verbannet die Klage,

Dienet

voll

Jauchzen und Frohlichkeit an!

dem Hochsten

La£t uns den

Triumph,

Namen

mit herrlichen Choren,

des Herrschers verehren!

rejoicing, rise, praising these days

now,

Tell ye what this day the Highest hath done!

428

The

Vocal Music

substi-

which the Christmas Oratorio begins?

Jauchzet, frohlocket! auf, preiset die Tage,

Stimmet

is

now abandon and

Fear

Join, filled with

banish complaining,

triumph and gladness, our song!

Serve ye the Highest in glorious chorus.

Let us the name of our

ruler

now

honor!

Is it a loss that

the instruments mentioned in the text

trumpets, strings

—

now

cred text,

have thought that he

are

no longer expressly apostrophized

in the sa-

may

originally

merely appearing "in person"? Bach

so:

wanted

— timpani,

deleted text lines in the score invite us to surmise

to start the religious version as well with the

words

"Tonet, ihr Pauken." But then he opted for a text that accounted far better for the festive

mood

of the music than did the original birth-

day tribute to a Saxon queen.

Bach s tations,

tonal language

because

is

well suited for the use of parodic adap-

has a depth unaffected by superficial connections

it

of word and sound, and an openness that allows linguistic additions of varying

specificity.

As music

it is

precise but cannot be assigned to

any detailed portrayal of a particular emotion or image. Ludwig Finscher (1969) put

it

this

way:

The wealth and complexity of even the

the simplest composition of

Thomas cantor create a musical connection above any

interpretation

and any parodic

cal craft extending

beyond the

and not lack of definition making

it

adaptation, a

set text.

—give

open to various

the

Wealth

''surplus''

textual

of musi-

and complexity

—

work a multivalent quality

texts, different interpretations,

and a

shifting accentuation of meaning}^

Not

the parodies are equally successful.

all

words of the

aria "Bereite dich,

Did

the original

Zion, mit zartHchen Trieben, den

Schonsten, den Liebsten bald bei dir zu sehn!" ("Prepare thyself,

Thy fairest, thy dearest soon with thee to see") cause problems? Surely many a listener must have wondered, hearing the words "Deine Wangen miissen viel schoner prangen" ("Thy cheek must now this day bloom forth more fairly"), why the Zion, with tender despatch

/

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

429

moment

cello at just that terns.

The answer

begins to labor and trace serpentine pat-

to the puzzle

Hercules at the Crossroads, the

is

of course in the original text of

drammaper musica where Hercules, wa-

vering between Virtue and Lust, forswears the

latter:

Ich will dich nicht horen, Ich will dich nicht wissen,

Verworfene Wollust, ich kenne dich

Denn

nicht.

die Schlangen,

So mich wollen wiegend fangen,

Hab

ich schon lange zermalmet, zerrissen.

I will

never heed thee,

I will

never

know thee,

O decadent Vice, thy face I know not! For the serpents

Which within Have

the cradle sought

me

long since dealt destruction, dismembered.

I

Finscher sees no problem in wriggHng serpents and blooming cheeks finding shelter under the same musical roof: the music was in-

deed "composed to the words, but is by the same token a composition of

intrinsic value."

An

idea such as this invites contradiction:

it is

doubtful Bach would have ever composed the conspicuously serpentine bass

Hne

if it

had not been

exceptional case there material

is

is

called for

by the

text.

disagreement demonstrates

That even

in this

how receptive his

generally to alterations of text and changes of meaning.

This receptiveness in no way means that Bach the vocal composer was indifferent to a set

text.

On

the contrary, the text was an

extraordinarily important source of inspiration to him.

scholar

Hermann

As

the text served the ars inveniendi, the art of invention. tions

Bach made

the music

Kretzschmar pointed out three generations ago,

in this

image of something

else

way

derive their

The

inven-

meaning not from being an

but from within themselves.

Consider also that the system of parody sketched here was aes-

430

The

Vocal Music

workable only because there were sufficient works

thetically

that

Bach might

use.

When working on an important project, he ob-

viously selected his parody original with great care.

exception to everything: for the Christmas Oratorio

is

beauty and

all its

written,

flissy,

down

But there

is

detail, the sixth part

an of

not wholly convincing as the keystone of an

— probably because

work

otherwise very carefully wrought

suddenly less

hand

at

Bach,

decided to use a complete cantata that he had just

to the recitatives

and

final chorus.

In this effort he did

not even have to rewrite the original instrument parts to this cantata

(BWV 248Ar[a,

since lost) but through insertions, cross-references,

and erasures was able to put the

entire thing in the oratorio. ^^

Toward

the end of his work, he was apparendy short on time or resources and so

had

to

pending

make

sure he could complete his great project without ex-

energy on

flirther

it.

In estimating the extent of Bach's use of parody overall, Fried-

helm Krummacher s observation, following Werner Heumann, that "almost half the extant vocal work" biased: here "model"

works alone,

and "copy"

most

at

is

are

a quarter of

affected

by

added together.

them were

seems a

it,^^

Of the

affected;

and

little

original in this

quarter there are cantatas, for example, that contribute merely a single aria as a

parody

now

Let us turn

BWV

211,

to

two chamber

and the Peasant Cantata,

are quite different

per musica. Here carefully

original.

cantatas: the Coffee Cantata,

BWV 212. Musically these works

from the works that Bach himself

we do

drawn and imaginative character

we

drammi

studies with an element of

farce.

Once

works

like this.

much

in

artists

such as Jacques Callot, in his Capriccio

again

called

not find splendid, gallant compositions but

note that in music history he alone created

In the plastic

arts,

Dutch genre painting

one finds

as in the

quences of both cantatas could be seen

as

parallels to

them not

so

drawings or etchings of series.

such a

The

series:

aria se-

one could

even see these cantatas as part of a group. Both works are humoristic

almost in the Romantic definition of the concept: to quote Jean

Paul, they attest to a "higher

comic universal

spirit,

which

is

neither

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

431

the denouncer nor the gallows priest of individual fools"^7 but a spirit that loves

The

and despises the world

was written around 1734

Coffee Cantata

and Bach in

all

at once.

likelihood presented

it

in

to a text of Picander,

Zimmermann's Coffeehouse

with his collegium musicum. Even Schlendrians

first aria,

"Hat man

nicht mit seinen Kindern hunderttausend Hudelei" ("Don't ones children cause one endless

trials

and

tribulations"), indicates this.

tion, begins

sixteenths,

wdth repeated eighth notes; the strings accompany with

and

their inexact unison reflects

with genial strokes of the

pen Schlendrians bumbling, buU-in-a-china-shop

p^ A

The

growling like a honey bear about his daughter's coffee addic-

father,

Violino

jt

style:

I

'>"«T

P p

p

p

p

sei

-

p

|

p

p

Hat man nicht mit

^

Kin-dem

nen

p

i^^tTr/c/

hun-dert-tau

-

send

Hu

de

-

i

-

r lei!

Continue

But one should not think that the strings rial,

is

just

sixteenth- note figure in the

an accompaniment to the voice

part:

it is

intrinsic

mate-

turning up in the introduction to the aria and later in the continuo

as well. Schlendrians tic

ously

It also

becomes

goes with the words

Tochter Liesgen sage" ("What

theme and

a

"Was

ich

is

maintained continu-

immer

alle

I'm ever daily saying to

Tage meiner

my

daughter

Liesgen praying"), but only because Bach was aiming not for a

likable,

gallant style but rather a

good-humored

slighdy pathetic lament

perfecdy illustrated by the wavering ca-

is

caricature.

Schlendrians

dences on the word "Hudelei," with no one cadence quite

Schlendrians clumsy continuo Sinnen," suits the 432

The

text;

Vocal Music

but

it

would

aria,

also

"Madchen,

die

like another.

von harten

be usable for a religious text

"Sunder mit verstockten Sinnen!" In

like

fact,

"Empfind

the aria

ich

Hollenangst und Pein" from the cantata "Ach Gott, wie manches

BWV and the aria "Ach, wo hoi' ich Armer Rat!" from BWV 25, are both similar in this respect. Meanwhile, the

Herzeleid," cantata aria's

charm

3,

results directly

a figuratively

from the obstinacy with which

and harmonically

strict

theme on

exclamations "Madchen," "leichte nicht," and

by pauses,

rated

are certainly

The composer arias

—

"Ei!

meant

The

"trifft

man,"

all

sepa-

to be parodistic.

has given his daughter Liesgen two flattering

Wie schmeckt is.

lavishes

a trivial subject.

der Coffee

sMe"

— and an

elegant min-

uet v^dth flute accompaniment, but with the intent also to affected the girl

it

The

aria

is

show how

in three-bar, not four-bar groupings.

Moreover, metric, musical, and verbal accents are in constant conflict

with each other triple time!

—

The

and harpsichord music

other

aria,

"Heute noch," accompanied by

concertante, has a special

charm.

a proper, lilting pastorale in itself;

is

meter changes into

at least until the strict trochaic

On

on the

strings

one hand, the

other, the meter,

something approaching a French gigue, lends the song a coquettishness, given a certain

ach, ein

emphasis by the delighted

Did Bach have

a secret

sympathy for

not just for pleasure but because rights

and duties of

with her sewing a "fashionably tive

of "Ach, ach,

cries

Mann!"

a wife

at the

it is

a Liesgen

more

satisfying to exercise the

and mother than

to be a spinster sitting

window, envying every

wide whalebone

skirt"?

who wants a man

woman walking by in

In any event, he adds a posi-

ending not foreseen by Picander. Liesgen gets her "trusty sweet-

heart" and can continue to swill

Mausen nun auf

down

"Die Katze

coffee, for

nicht" ("the cat won't stop catching mice") and die

Tochter

lastern"

("why should anyone

lafit

das

"Wer wiU

criticize

our

Mama get away unscathed? Bach

daughter now")

when Granny and

sets the closing

bouree as a rondo with figured variations, in the folk

music tradition; so the

now

finale

ends quite simply but

still

retaining the

familiar playful three-bar divisions.

We can read the

Coffee Cantata as

we might

but the Peasant Cantata (1742) presents us wdth

read a

many

book

for fun,

puzzles.

Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

Here 433

two middle-class men (Bach and Picander) put in part to officer

honor

nobleman, the

a

their heads together,

local district captain

and revenue

Carl Heinrich von Dieskau, on the inheritance of his estate at

Klein- Zschocher, but in part to describe in detail the wretched con-

words

ditions of the peasants with key

like

"Armut," "Strafen," and

"Militardienst" ("poverty," "punish," "military service") and to

pointed jokes about their

new lord. This

is all

make

done within the genre

of a burlesque cantata, the text of which the honoree presumably approved in advance.

Given the works many enigmatic

details,

we do

not

know how

the collaborators in this "social play" viewed their respective roles. It is

at

only certain that Bach was taking aim not just at peasant music but

town and even court music

Does he make the handiwork of his

as

weU, without openly taking

"Flicken" overture purposely bad to

sides.

mock the "low

social inferiors, the 'Beer Fiddlers' heedlessly play-

ing away undaunted, incapable of either imagination or elaboration?"^^

and

Or

is

this a case

citations "fiiU

of virtuosic play with allusions, references,

of sympathy and

—

that rarity in serious music

flillofhumor"?^9

None of

the seven song or dance fragments can be positively

identified as folk music, but there can be

no doubt that here Bach

taking a hard look at the folk and their music, while to write an attractive

of the few

who

and endearing work of music. In

many

the Peasant Cantata

its

value.

is

is

one

sections with dancelike or songlike qualities,

not merely a collection of genre pictures;

it is

concerned with thematizing a section of the social world of the

a musicophilosophical

composing

—

commentary on

as Picander's text

is

This seemingly harmless composition

is

styles

this point on.

pects of music and 434

he

But everything he approached

period, seen in musical terms. In this sense

from

this

seriously.

Despite the

more

is

managing

took the trouble to study in depth the peasant music

of his time and also promote

he took

still

The

Vocal Music

Bach more

is less

it is

society

music about music,

and a discourse on

a discourse

on peasant

life.

a transition to the late work:

concerned with reflecting

social as-

concerned with the essence of music. This

essence

is

which Bach

the purpose of The Art ofFugue,

is

working on

intensively at the time of the Peasant Cantata.

Compositions that could be compared with

works

would not be

this

Leopold Mozart's Bauernhochzeit (Peasants' Wedding)

like

but the third movement of Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony or the tempo di minuetto from his Eighth Symphony. In the

first

of these

two, the peasants playing away on their fiddles are obviously a part

of the nature that the composer ter,

with

distractions

its

symphonist

who

and

is

calling up; the

false entries,

despite his lofty ideals

and so here he just shows

it

as

minuet

in the lat-

shows the sarcasm of

still

a

cannot save the world,

it is.^°

References to the Pastoral of course cannot explain the meaning

of the Peasant Cantata: while

we

are well informed,

from Beethoven's

ov^Ti

testimony, about the joy and religious inspiration that he de-

rived

from nature, we know nothing of the motives that caused Bach poor but not unsympathetic cousins.

to see the peasant musicians as

We do know why the quodlibet, was placed

at the

an amalgam of folk-song melodies,

end of the Goldberg

Amazingly, Philipp Spitta,

who

Variations.

after all

had an

expert's insight

into Bach's greatness, relegated the Coffee Cantata to the "same

genre" as Johann Nicolaus Bach's student

und Bierrufer.^^ But of the Quodlibet,

this

work Derjenaische Wein-

work is more properly placed

in the

company

BWV 524, for which Bach, as noted earlier, wrote

out the manuscript and perhaps composed. In exactly the years it

might have been presented

Neumeister wrote in

und galanten

at a

Bach family wedding, Erdmann

his introduction

Poesie zugelangen

when

Die

allerneueste

Art zur

reinen

(The Latest Method of Writing Pure

and Gallant Poetry) that the quodlibet was coming into fashion "the gallant successor of the old

drunken

of proverbs, sayings, and dirty jokes" not a bad description of the

word

"gallant."

We would

biographically, if

we

little

all

litany ... a

thrown

as

sung potpourri

together.^^

This

is

occasional work, even including the

be missing something, not musically, but

did not have this fragmentary collection of

notes, probably richly larded with allusions to

members of the Bach

family! Secular Cantatas and the Christmas Oratorio

435

THE MAGNIFICAT AND THE MASSES "One need only look at the masses of Stolzel, who

died only recendy,

who died a few days ago men in Germany who could

or the masses and the Magnificat of Bach, in Leipzig ... to discover that easily take

on

a

composer

These remarks of

we have

like Perti."^

a certain

anonymous

who we

A.,

reason to think was Johann Friedrich Agricola, least in Bach's circle

make

of students there existed quite

about his Latin church music, although ception of the Magnificat

it is

unclear

have good

clear that at specific ideas

— with the

— who commissioned them and

to

ex-

what

extent they were performed during his lifetime. Agricola lived in

Leipzig from 1738 to

with composing his

1741,

own

Thus Agricola could

see for himself how

attached to this genre at that time. self,

Bach was absorbed

the same time that

Latin masses and adapting those of others.

Was

it

much importance Bach

Bach who compared him-

with regard to Latin church music, to the renowned

composer Giacomo Antonio

Perti?

One

Italian

mass

particular issue will not be

missed by any scholar engaged with Bach's Latin church music:

at

every step of the way, one will confront the topic of parody, that

is,

setting older music to a

new and

pointedly, in his Leipzig period

quite different text.

Bach was drawn

wrote fewer and fewer original compositions for

The original,

Magnificat in E-flat Major, is

marked by the verve of the

BWV

The

Vocal Music

to the

more

form but

243a, probably

and

it

it.

early Leipzig years.

festive scoring for three trumpets, timpani,

436

To put

a pair each

wholly

With

its

of oboes

and

flutes, it is impressive,

room

for the stylus gravis

theme makes its

one often finds

clear that this

it

contrapuntal decorum,

is

first

sung, with

all

w^orldlier

cantata cycle.

drammiper musica. Even the

first

chorus

of some religious dictum

cal adaptation

in this form.

no Leipzig sacred

seems

it

opening movements of the later

with a concertante energy that leaves no

—

The

very

first

cantata: despite

all

even than most of the

The is

it is,

style points to the

clearly not the

musi-

hymn

being

rather, a

the loveliness and joyfiilness that go with singing.

The omnes generationes chorus reminded

the British

Bach scholar

Sanford Terry of the corresponding section of a Magnificat^ ascribed to

Tomaso Albinoni;

the American Bach scholar Robert L. Marshall

points out parallels between Monteverdi's and Bach's choral settings

of "sicut erat in principio."^ But the question of putative appropriations of other

was aiming ears

works by Bach

for

important than the fact that he

is less

an Italian sound, which would be modern to Leipzig

and audibly distinguish the work from the

the Magnificat does not use da capo form:

using

it

in his Latin sacred music.

This

text,

cantatas.

Of course

Bach generally avoids Hke that of the masses,

obviously does not lend itself to repetition driven purely by considerations of musical form.

In "sicut locutus est" the ticoy

but

this

oboes, in the

work has an

remains an exception.

The

a capella section in stile

trio

"Suscepit Israel," where

D major setting, play the traditional recitation sound of

the Magnificat in long valued notes, like a cantus firmus, strict as it

looks

Soprano

—

II

there

-

tu8

flexible diction

surprising.

The

exalted.

not as

a gallant quality in phrases like this one:

mi

of the Latin

line

and the

clarity

of detail are

tenor aria "deposuit potentes," equally passionate

and dramatic, describes

humble

is

is

21

da

The

an-

Hanns

how

the exalted shall be

Eisler

humbled and the

was so impressed by

this that

openly modeled a song for his Brecht cantata Die Mutter on beite, arbeite, arbeite

mehr" ("work, work, work more") The

is

it:

he

"Ar-

the bitter

Magnificat and the Masses

437

message, for simple work

kicked off their thrones: that

Do

The

not enough.

is is

powerful must be

the answer revealed in Bach's music!'^

the four choruses relating to the feast of Christmas consti-

tute a foreign

body

in the total liturgical context? Marshall thought

that bringing these things together in one

composer s challenge" and that

it

At the same time, Bach

sically.5

challenge: he wrote his

worked both

"a

Lutheran

theologically

and mu-

confronted, and met, an even greater

— not

major Latin church work

first

Roman

traditional style of the

work was

in the

German Lutheran

church or of the

heartland but as a composition sui generis: fresh, worldly, figural

music, but of great emotional power.

We have already discussed individual movements from masses of the early Leipzig period. Like the earlier version of the Magnificat,

they were written for the worship services of Leipzig. But as early as the Kyrie and Gloria of the later

go beyond Leipzig and

its

B-Minor Mass,

churches, even if that

mass of 1733

their first hearing: the short

is

Bach's aspirations

where they got

is

dedicated to the Prince

Elector of Saxony. Obviously Bach wanted to expand the horizon of his authentically

Lutheran church position

—

in the secular as well as

the religious realm.

In Bach's Latin masses the question of parody critical for

already

an aesthetic evaluation but

known

in the nineteenth century that the

from the Credo on, consisted

largely of parodies

other works. In the meantime

we

is

perhaps not

of great relevance.

still

It

was

B-Minor Mass,

and adoptions from

have also had to give up the idea

that the Kyrie and Gloria are original compositions.

Bach

essentially

honored the Saxon Elector wdth a bouquet of parodies. Partly on the basis

of corrections shown in the autograph

tulates that the first Kyrie,

from the

fifth

score,

been a parody of a C-minor section of a cantata.^

Wolff suggested

that a

known

Earlier,

Christoph

work ofJohann Hugo von Wilderer may have

served as the model for the

could have

Joshua Rifkin pos-

measure on, could have

first

Kyrie, a

G-minor mass

that

Bach

in Dresden.7

The duet "Christe eleison" can also hardly have been original, and so 438

its first

The

soprano part cannot have been composed for the voice of

Vocal Music

Faustina Hasse, court singer at Dresden.^ Seizing on Rifkin's idea,

Mai willkommen"

Klaus Hafner discusses the duet "Seid zu tausen

from the

lost celebratory cantata

"Entfernet euch, ihr heitem Sterne,"

BWV Anh. 1.9, as a possible model.^ Rifkin and Hafner surmise that was

the original for the second Kyrie

on

Bible texts. Picking up

chorus "Ehre

Gott

sei

"Gloria in excelsis

Cantata,

it

on German

their ideas, Alfred Diirr considers the lost

in der

Hohe,"

BWV 197a,

as the

Deo" and "Et in terra pax."^° While

largely kept the next section, the

discussion,

a cantata chorus

"Laudamus

te,"

model

for

scholarship has

out of the parody

has determined that the opening chorus of the Ratswahl

"Wir danken

dir,

Gott,"

BWV

29,

the original for the

is

"Gratias agimus tibi" and also that the opening

theme of the cantata

"Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgend ein Schmerz sein," the original for the "Qui

tollis

"Domine

"Quoniam

deus,"

"Qui

Sancto Spiritu" are

sedes,"

BWV 46,

is

peccata mundi." Moreover, the tu solus sanctus,"

and

"Cum

suspected of being parodies.

all

Parodies or adaptations of older works are also found in the four

BWV 233-36, which were certainly composed in the late 1730S. In the Kyrie of BWV 233, Bach apparently back on a short masses

fell

vocal piece from the first

or Miihlhausen period, in which the

soprano sang the Lutheran Kyrie "Christe, du

Since sion

Weimar

German

Lamm

Gottes."

could not be sung in a Latin mass, in the revised ver-

Bach scored

it

as a cantus firmus to

be played in unison by horns

and oboes.

Bach and

1726,

79, "Herr,

zu,

relies

mosdy on

among them deine

composed between

sacred cantatas

"Gott, der Herr,

ist

Sonn und

alles

BWV

BWV 102, "Siehe BWV 179, and "Es

Augen sehen nach dem Glauben,"

daE deine Gottesfiircht nicht Heuchelei

wartet

Schild,"

1723

auf dich,"

sei,"

BWV 187. He considers choruses in strict style

especially apt for Kyrie settings as well as for

more modern

the process of adaptation, entire sections are

composed anew, voice

arias.

In

leadings and harmonic progressions are improved, vocal parts are

made instrumental and

vice versa, proportions are changed,

casionally a piece will acquire a to the

melody

new

and oc-

character through tiny changes

line.

The

Magnificat and the Masses

439

All this offers us a view, indirectly but with great

what composition meant

many

clarity,

of

to Bach: continuous development, in

different directions, using an original,

open-ended model

that exists only as an idea in the final result. Seen in this way, the five

short masses profit from the experience

working with existing material.

1730S in

Bach gained

Of

course, the text of

the mass makes his job easier: the Latin language, with phrases, can be

molded

to

fit

almost any model.

portance that the original version of a section

emotion that

the mass text.

fits

Marshall compared the "Qui ria

with

its

To

tollis"

in the

It is

its

short

of primary im-

is

defined by a basic

clarify this

with an example,

from the B-Minor Mass's Glo-

original:"

Schau-et

und

doch

se-het, ob

ir-gend ein Schmerz

wie mein Schmerz

sei,

Alto

mi-se - re - re

Out of the Bach

bis

noble and dignified stride of the original "Schauet doch,"

creates a

more

quence for "Qui is

no -

not unknown:

exciting

tollis." it

The

and passionately

articulated tonal se-

soggetto that they share, incidentally,

points ahead to The Art ofFugue and the Musical

Offering

Some the

transformations go

A-Major Mass,

flirther.

As

a pattern for the Gloria of

BWV 234, Bach selected the section "Friede sei

mit euch" from the cantata "Halt im Gedachtnis Jesum Christ,"

BWV 67.

It

was

originally called an aria, but this

appropriate, since

"it

term was hardly

presents a scene of operatic explicitness unique

in Bach's work."^^ After nine bars

of instrumental prelude, the Vox

Christi begins in measured tones with the blessing "Friede sei mit

Euch!" ("Peace be with you"); the chorus answers energetically,

"Wohl uns, Jesu,

hilf uns

440 The Vocal Music

kampfen und

die

Wut der Feinde dampfen.

Holle, Satan, weich!" ("Oh, Joy, Jesus, help us battle and foes' great rage,

Hell and Satan,

tiphonal exchange between the

The most ment if

Bach's

method

Vox

the

followed by an an-

is

Christi and the chorus.

sharp-eyed scholar would never suspect that a move-

structured in this

the original

This

yield!").

dampen

way could be

work were not

He

in detail.

the parodic model for a Gloria,

extant.

But

it is,

and we can follow

uses the nine-bar orchestral prelude to

the aria for the opening choral section "Gloria in excelsis Deo."

Thus, the

original's "Friede sei

available for setting the

Then the

words

mit Euch" sung by the Vox Christi

"et in terra

is

pax hominibus voluntatis."

chorus comes in with "Laudamus te" instead of "Wohl uns,

Jesu, hilf uns kampfen."

Did Bach show was too hard"

here, as Philipp Spitta thought, that "no task

for him, except that

he "almost utterly destroyed the

splendid poetry of the original"?^^ This

viewpoint of the original. If

would be astonished by the

drama of the composition tion

we knew

much from

seen too

new

creation,

the

we

gestural richness, the freshness, even the

— elements

from the Gloria to the

is

only the

"et in terra

that especially help the transi-

pax" and that are anything but

standard fare in mass settings.

Nor

is

this the

those parts of the since early

fall

of

end of the parody

B-Minor Mass 1748, trying to

story. Its last

that

make

chapter concerns

Bach had been working on a full

mass from the short

mass of 1733 dedicated to the Prince Elector in Dresden: the Credo,

Hosanna, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei. Let us ments

in the stile antico

start

from the Credo, "Credo

and "Confiteor." In view of

with two move-

in

unum Deum,"

their idiosyncratic qualities,

one might

think them original compositions. Each text emphasizes the ele-

ment of unity: "Ich glaube an einen Gott" and "Ich bekenne mich zu einer Taufe zur Vergebung der Siinden" "I believe in

this

one baptism

for the remission

("I believe in

one God,"

of sins"). Bach expresses

thought musically by basing both parts on the respective Gre-

gorian melody: the Credo from the ously from bar

start,

the Confiteor conspicu-

73:

The

Magnificat and the Masses

441

75

Basso

Con

Con-fi

It

-

fi

-

-

te

u

or

-

num

ba

-

pti

-

sma

u-numba-pti-sma

te- or

cannot be maintained with certainty that he did

Knowing

1748-49.

that he favored the

years around 1740 brought

Wollny thought an also likely/5

"Credo in in the

-

stile

Wolff to consider an

earlier version

this first in

antico particularly in the earlier origin/^ Peter

unum deum" was

of the "Credo in

In contrast, Wolfgang Osthoff takes the view that the

unum Deum"

F-Major Credo,

of the

finds

its

chief model

BWV 1081,^^ which Bach probably composed

in 1747-48 as an addition to a

more important than

B -Minor Mass

mass by Giovanni Battista Bassani. But

detailed considerations Hke these

observation that Bach's setting of the "Credo in a classic Palestrina setting (though

Wolff thinks

is

the general

unum Deum"

is

not

self-evident), but

it

rather a highly sophisticated combination of traditional and

modern

elements. Such a style assumes not only two hundred years of musical

development

As

as well.

after Palestrina

but forty years of Bach's composing

Siegfried Oechsle showed, such a style,

which combines

a motet cantus firmus treatment with running instrumental bass

and

modern harmonic thinking, cannot be the result of a naive traditionalism.

The

complexity of the piece

is

actually the compositional ex-

pression of the universality that characterizes the

B -Minor Mass

as

a whole.

"Patrem omnipotentem"

is

of the cantata "Gott, wie dein 171.

A

an adaptation of the opening chorus

Name

so

ist

sketch fitting the music of "Et in

auch dein Ruhm,"

unum Dominum"

up in the 1733 autograph for the dramma per musica Crucifixus has

its

original in the choral

Sorgen, Zagen" of the eponymous urrexit"

442

The

is

Vocal Music

BWV

turns

213.

The

segment "Weinen, Klagen,

Weimar cantata

modeled on the chorus of a

BWV

secular

BWV

work

12.

"Et

res-

— perhaps iden-

with the

tical

lost

homage

cantata "Entfernet euch, ihr heitern

An aria from the lost cantata "Wiinschet BWV Anh. Jerusalem Gliick," BWV Anh. 4, has been claimed as the parody Sterne,"

1.9.^7

1.

Spiritum Sanctum. "^^

pattern for "Et in

exspecto resurrectionem" tata "Gott,

man

is

The

original

"Et

for

the second section of the Ratswahl Can-

lobet dich in der Stille,"

BWV 120.

For the Sanctus of the B-Minor Mass Bach took a Sanctus

movement he had composed for Christmas

The "Osanna in

1725.

based on the head theme of the lost cantata "Es lebe der

celsis" is

Konig, der Vater im Lande,"

no conclusive evidence

BWV Anh.

To

1. 11.

date there has been

in support of early speculation that the

music

of the Benedictus originally belonged to another work. But

been documented extensively that the

alto aria

"Agnus Dei"

terned after the aria "Entfernet euch, ihr kalten Herzen." "Auf,

entziickende Gewalt,"

siift

BWV Anh.

1. 196,

the Wedding Cantata, had already been transplanted by

The "Dona

Leben."

tion

tibi"

nobis pacem"

of the B-Minor Mass,

is

is

The

has pataria

Bach

mein

to the

liebstes

a reversion to the "Gratias ag-

itself a

parody of the cantata sec-

BWV 29/2. Are there any parts

at all that are original

compositions from the

years 1748-49? Perhaps the "Et incarnatus est":

loose sheet of paper and inserted

it

ening

its

text as needed.

What

poser?^9

There

composed

make

it

a section

length-

of its own?

with the

"O

And

clemens" seg-

Battista Pergolesi's Salve Regina in

in his later years. Yoshitake

borrowing.

a

garnered

unum Dominum,"

C

minor,

Kobayashi holds the view that

the "emotive expressivity" of Pergolesi's music "partial

He

on

borrowed the movement from another com-

are remarkable similarities

ment of Giovanni

later.

it

caused him to change his original in-

tentions for "Et incarnatus est" and there a chance that he

Bach wrote

into the score

the words from the previous duet "Et in

is

it

originally part of

Ascension Oratorio, to the words "Ach bleibe doch,

imus

ex-

prompted Bach

to his

"^°

"To improve something already existing seemed

to the late

Bach, and perhaps even the middle' Bach, easier than creating

The Magnificat and

the Masses

443

something

totally new."

Another truth

work on solo

Schulze re-

is

that

is it

the

Bach stayed with and continued

to

tried-and-true models.

"Agnus Dei, qui

B-Minor Mass. The Welt Siinde

how Hans-Joachim

is

one of the truths about Bach's work.^^ But

spectfully phrases

truth?

This

tollis

One of many examples

is

the

"Lamm Gottes, das der ("O Lamb of God, who

alto sings the entreaty

erbarm' dich unser"

tragt,

of this

peccata mundi, miserere nobis," from the

taketh away the sins of the world, have mercy

upon

us"),

with a ges-

ture of impassioned, intimate pleading, to music of almost un-

earthly beauty. This

with

comes from

a piece

composed

for a

wedding,

this text:

Entfernet euch, ihr kalten Herzen. Entfernet euch, ich bin euch feind.

Wer Der

nicht der Liebe Platz will geben, flieht sein Gliick,

Und

ist

der haftt sein

Leben

der argsten Torheit Freund.

Ihr wahlt euch selber nichts

als

Schmerzen.

Go far from me, ye cold-hearted Go far away, I am your foe.

ones.

Who ever will not make room for love, he

flies

He

is

from happiness, he hates

own

life.

the friend of the worst kind of madness.

Ye choose (trans.

The

his

for yourselves nothing but sorrows.

John Hargraves)

original music for this aria,

"Piango gemo," has been

lost; as

which

is

reminiscent of Vivaldi's

mentioned, though. Bach used

it

ten years later with another text in the Ascension Oratorio, "Lobet

Gott

in seinen Reichen." In the

earth,

is

new

text, Jesus,

departing from this

implored with these words:

Ach

bleibe doch,

Ach

fliehe nicht so bald

444 The Vocal Music

mein

liebstes

Leben,

von mir!

Dein Abschied und dein

friihes

Scheiden

Bringt mir das allergroftte Leiden,

Ach ja,

so bleibe

doch noch

hier;

Sonst werd ich ganz von Schmerz umgeben.

my dearest life

Ah,

stay

with me,

Ah,

flee

thou not so soon from me!

Thy parting and Bring

me

Ah yes,

thou.

thine early leaving

the most egregious suff ring,

then stay yet here awhile;

Else shall

I

be with pain surrounded,

Z. Philip Ambrose)

(trans.

Again, more than ten years

Agnus Dei. Given

Bach transforms the music

later,

the totally different liturgical context, he

have made structural changes to the music that go

ehmination of a few coquettishly sighing for

him

to

must

far

beyond the

figures. It w^as

only logical

eHminate the da capo form here, which had already done

some damage

to Gottsched's symmetrically arranged verses

their adaptation for the Ascension Oratorio. Since

principle rejected the use of da capo it

into the

would be out of place

goes further: against his

in the

form

Bach

to

matter of

in his Latin sacred works,

B -Minor Mass. But

own model, he

as a

and

the adaptation

has the voice begin with a

broad legato address before returning to the original ritornello theme at the

words "qui

toUis":

AJto

A

di.

De

gnus

qui

tol

Ach. blei

-

i

lis

be

pec

ca

doch

-

ta.

qui

tol

pec-ca

mem

heb

lis

ta

ates

pec-ca

mun

Le

-

-

di

ben.

The Magnificat and

the Masses

445

was probably

It

easier for

him

to keep

working on an old model

new composition. But that could be put

than to write a

another way:

attempts need to be finished and put into a definitive final

initial

context.

The

which was directed

gesture of pleading supplication,

at

cold hearts in the Wedding Cantata^ and at Jesus as he departs this

world in the Ascension

Oratorioy

now directed

is

Lamb

at the

of God

heavenly mediator who decides on eternal salvation or damna-

as the

tion. Jesus

is

the final authority to which this plea of

be addressed, and

this authority

is

all

pleas

must

ultimately the best repository for

Bach's musical gesture of supplication.

To put

this idea

selects

more

generally:

Bach cannot conceive of a

bet-

music than the universality of a large mass. So he

ter context for his

from the wealth of

existing

works and individual sections

those that are particularly deserving of "promotion."^^ In this late

survey of his teristic"

own work,

found

its

place

everything that worked well or was "charac-

— whether from Weimar

or gallant. In

what other genre could

grated, or so

many different

facets

a large mass! Despite the work's

consciously

or Leipzig, erudite

stark contrasts be so

of diminishing

inte-

of style brought together, than in

variety.

Bach, from the beginning,

composed wdth the aim of spiritual unity

Is it a sign

weU

in

mind.

creativity that at the very

end of the

mass he completely repeats the music of the Gratias to the words the is it

Dona a

nobis pacem, or

is it

problem that he places

and interludes

in the Kyrie

good far

theological sense?^^ Stylistically,

more importance on

and Gloria than he does

the

B-Minor Mass?^^ With

are

two insufficiendy contrasting sections run

composer with

what

are

we

a

to

Mass composed

the

in

Hosanna

the preludes

in other parts of

and the "Pleni sunt coeli," together,

which

a

more sovereign plan would not have done?^^ And

do with the earliest,

fact that the portion

the Sanctus,

is

of the B-Minor

the very part where

word

and sound, theology and music, come together most powerfully? Despite such questions, the B-Minor Mass logical and compositional legacy

—

the

summa

is

both Bach's theo-

of his work in honor

of God, and in honor of himself: what composer before or since him has with such supreme confidence extracted the quintessence from 446 The Vocal Music

his

own work? Seen from

B -Minor Mass even

is

composed not from

could never be exhausted by a single performance,

Bach had intended such

if

achievement

meaning of the

this perspective, the

a thing.

His

last, great,

the expression of his universality; for

any one situation or

stand but in which

we

also sense another language,

scends our ability to evaluate

he

His music comes

listener.

we under-

wider perspective and so speaks a language that

a

crowning

illustrates that

it

one that tran-

aesthetically.

it

The music of the B-Minor Mass

is

no way

in

Of

retrospective.

course

it

does not have the lightness of Pergolesi's Stabat Mater,

which

is

also a

much of He

thought

does not greet is

work of

it

is

revisions

and one that Bach obviously

not alienated by the modern church style but

with open arms

either;

he remains in between.

probably more uncompromising, more polarizing than,

Dresden

colleagues, in the

way he

sets various styles against

He

say, his

one an-

other in his "great Catholic mass." But even by Bach's time, the mass

form facet,

positively

and

it

shimmered with every conceivable

would continue

variety of stylistic

so through the history of music

— one

need think only of Mozart's Requiem or Beethoven's Missa Solemnis.

With

regard to the timelessness of the

B-Minor Mass, Bach was

a participant in an aesthetic discourse that

France at the time, dernes.

The

remain;

all

known

"ancients" insist

the

new can do

sively classical antiquity.

was being

as the Querelle des

on the primacy of the is

imitate

But just

a

it.^^

Here

few years

term Gothic underwent an upgrading. ^7 To be

old:

"old"

on

carried

Anciens

in

et des

Mo-

value

must

its

means

exclu-

after Bach's death, the "a real

Goth

in the art

of music,"^^ as Johann Adolph Scheibe saw Bach's antirationalism

and antinaturalism, became a compliment before the century was over.

Even

atorios, city

is

Friedrich

Wilhelm Zacharia,

librettist

overcome by a "holy Gothic shudder"^^

of Goslar with

its

of sentimental orat the sight

of the

"old-fashioned walls and towers," and Johann

Friedrich Reichardt in 1782 transposes Goethe's view of the Stras-

bourg Cathedral onto musical history: to him Bach represents a Gothically sublime

human

art,

developed sense.^° Finally in

though not yet

1821,

in the

Carl Maria von

The Magnificat and

most highly

Weber

speaks

the Masses

447

glowingly of Bach's "sublime

which has erected

spirit,"

a "truly

Gothic cathedral of art."^^

When Felix Mendelssohn rediscovered the motivated not least by the

spirit

St.

Matthew Passion^

of Prussian Protestantism, the "great

Catholic mass" had long been around: Carl Philipp

Emanuel Bach

had brought the work into public consciousness through

Credo

ration of the

for

performance

as early as 1786.

his prepa-

A score

is

dis-

covered in Haydn's estate; in 1810 Beethoven requests a copy from his publishers Breitkopf and Hartel. Eight years later the Swiss musician

and publisher Hans Georg Nageli announces the printing of the

work of all times and

"greatest musical art

Today to us

there

a double aspect to the

is

on one hand

as the epic

and more sources

are being discovered

Virgil, for instance,

Bach

falls

rience

it

back on

as

it

Is it

— the

is

we

the other hand, take

it

expeas

it is

similar to our twofold experience of the Bible:

with historical derivations and textual analyses; others is

the message of the

the work's spiritual and theological unity? Is

of its tonal language?

number

available only to those tries to reconcile

Is it a

section.

B-Minor

it

the uni-

mysterious order of measure and

who

believe?

Here

a view of the

is

these perspectives.

Bach subsequently made the "Et incarnatus pendent

more

difference being that

we do not question; we own existence.

versality

Credo that

appears

ancient poet for which

own production. On

his

look for God's message. But what

Mass?

It

in the light of our

This response test it

B -Minor Mass.

took his inspiration from foreign sources, while

myth, whose origin

and interpret

some

work of an

nations. "3^

est" into

Moreover, in the B-Minor Mass there

is

an inde-

emphasis

not just on the central Christological messages of crucifixion and resurrection but also

on

Jesus's incarnation as a

formerly eight-part Credo

now

"Crucifixus etiam pro nobis,"

{stile

which one can look

The

Vocal Music

at as

The

standing apart

center.^^

antico with liturgical cantus firmus)

Chorus: Patrem omnipotentem (concerted) 448

being.

has nine parts, and the statement

from the other movements, moves to the

Chorus: Credo

human

Duet: Et

in

unum Dominum

Chorus: Et incarnatus

Chorus: Crucifixus

est

(concerted)

(modern motet movement)

(strict style)

Chorus: Et resurrexit (concerted) Aria:

Et

sanctum (concerted)

in spiritum

Chorus: Et expecto (concerted)

One

can take pleasure in this symmetry and imagine that Bach in-

tended

it.

It

makes the work

a dimension richer, but does the reve-

lation contribute to the

musics fascination? That v^e experience

music not in an instant,

as

vv^e

a chateau, but over time

makes

might the well-proportioned facade of it

almost impossible for our senses to

take in symmetries that were developed on paper. Hearers of the

Credo

mainly that the two solo numbers, which in an

will notice

ideal overall plan

longest, while the

Most riety

would assume subordinate two solemn sections

positions, take the

in stile antico pass quickly.

important, the audience has to deal wdth an enormous va-

of styles, which are more

difficult to assimilate

sions or the Christmas Oratorioy

dramatic thread. This

is

owing

than in the pas-

to the lack of a continuous

true even of a single, liturgically coherent

portion of the mass like the Credo.

Stile antico alternates

with

stile

moderno in a breadth of variations unusual even for Bach, and in be-

tween

are character pieces like the specially

tative

section

"Et incarnatus

est,"

composed,

which

itself

totally

medi-

brings together

different linguistic levels, in just as simple yet fascinating a way.

Above

a bass written as a continuous organ pedal point or a calmly

striding line arise

two

different voices: the choir

and the

violins.

The

choir presents the liturgical text in categorically objective language, illustrating the incarnation

of God as a descending third, seventh, or

other widely spaced interval.

through a

The

voice of the violins maintains,

series of modifications, from beginning to end, a motif of

lamentation. It speaks^"^ as

Drang symphonies;

if it

came from one of Haydn's Sturm und

the allocation of function to the voice and or-

chestra melodies acts almost like a road sign pointing to Wagner's

much

later

music dramas. The Magnificat and

the Masses

449

Violino

I, II

There may be comparable patterns seldom have two such different in

characteristics

one movement, in so concise and

meant

in earlier

works of Bach; but

been brought together

classical a

Was

manner.

to be Bach's final compositional legacy? It

would

this

attest to a

sympathetic relation of Bach to the incarnation of God in Christ: his

Or was Wilhelm

Cross had already been composed into the piece! Dilthey right, as the

but

when he

described his impression of the "Incarnatus"

"middle-point of the whole mass" in these words: "no color,

like a light in

which

all

colors are one:

it

has no change, every-

thing quietly set in the same quavering tones. Here there fering,

is

no

suf-

and no joy."^^

Bach and the Dance of God, a book by the English musicologist

and composer Wilfried Mellers that appeared space to the

dance before

God

is

much

in 1980, devotes

B-Minor Mass. To compare Bachs ultimum a wonderfiol insight. It brings out

opus with a

many

differ-

ent aspects of the work: in the space of the church, the timeless for-

mula of the mass, the quintessence of the worship

up

like a

symbol.

The composer lets

bol. Its individual parts

need not be

his

service,

music dance before

strictly

is

raised

this

attuned to one another;

they are connected by the formula Missae, and their purpose

meet the theological richness of the mass with forms, styles, and expressions. 450

The

Vocal Music

sym-

a

is

to

wealth of musical

But we should not look for

a cyclic idea in the

B -Minor Mass

in

terms of the structural- analytic categories of modern musicology

Such an idea was an

alien concept for the time:

Beethoven's Missa Solemnis\ theological

and thus

The

cyclic idea

in

of the B-Minor Mass

is

also musical-philosophical:

Bach puts

on a genre spanning ages, nations, and confessions. he has extracted from the formula of the mass the same time this

work finds

hard to find

it

it is

is

his

mark

The work of art

autonomous, yet

at

ultimate authentication precisely in

its

the truths of that formula.

In 1907 with respect to the

B-Minor Mass, Dilthey

declared

wonderingly that Bach "excludes the chorale [from the mass], contradicting the architecture of

all

his other sacred music," to

immerse

himself in the "universal, objective character of the mass." In and for the Protestant culture of his age, he construes the Kyrie of the mass

formula

as

an expression of the need for salvation and the Gloria as

celebrating God's guarantee of it.^^

This point of view, hardly ecumenical

— indeed,

almost too

narrowly concerned with the phenomenology of religion

— was and

remains a thorn in the side for advocates of a renewed Reformation theology. All the same, in resorting to the mass,

Bach

realizes

one

of his creative goals: the objectification of a subjectively created work. In this context, the

full

mass

offers better opportunities than

genuinely Protestant sacred music, which in Lutheran theology

must give precedence

to proclaiming

and interpreting the word of

God. Bach, who concerned himself over cantatas, passions, feast days

a lifetime in his sacred

and oratorios primarily with the Sundays and

of the church calendar, with concretizing in music the

message of the day, here

finally finds his

way

definitively to the

essence of the worship service, an essence that Luther never re-

garded

lightly.

Of course,

the desire to objectify subjectively created art

ways intermingled with another

desire: to give subjectivity to a

form (here the mass) that transcends ages, nations, and Art of Fugue gave Bach the chance to play out the instrumental realm.

is al-

The B-Minor Mass

styles.

The

this dialectic in

is its

The Magnificat and

counterpart in the Masses

451

the vocal realm. These two splendid examples of his late sure his place in

Western musical

categorical thought of the

thought of the modern age.

from grace;

452

The

Middle Ages and the

What

for the latter, a road

accursed land of freedom.

Vocal Music

history: centered

follows

is

work en-

between the

individualistic

for the former a

fall

of no return to the promised and

THE MOTETS The

on Bach's music has often been

verdict of history

right: the

motets are an example. In November 1789 the choir of St. Thomas's surprised

"Singet

"Now

Mozart on

dem Herrn

here

is

his w^ay

though Leizpig with

a

performance of

and he reacted with these words

ein neues Lied,"

something one could learn from!"^ In

"The Music of the Future," discussing Richard Wagner praises

its

"lyrical verve

roars along "as if through a sea of

his i860 essay

this motet, his "favorite,"

of rhythmic melody," which

harmonic waves. "^

In the mountain range of Bach's work there are places in which,

beyond

essence of a thing

motet of

1727,

all

"Singet

peaks:

considerations of time and form, the

revealed.

is

many

The

dem Herrn

pinnacle of absolute vocal music.

purely a capella double chorus

ein neues Lied,"

The

text,

BWV 225,

is

a

taken from Psalm 149,

provides a matchless opportunity for the composer:

Singet

dem Herrn

soUen ihn loben.

Kinder Zion seinen

ein neues Lied, die

Gemeinde der Heiligen

Israel freue sich des, der

sei'n frohlich iiber

Namen im

ihn gemacht hat. Die

ihrem Konige,

sie sollen

loben

Reigen; mit Pauken und Harfen sollen

sie

ihm

spielen.

Sing ye the Lord a

new

refrain; the

telling his praises. Israel joyful

assembly of saints should be

be in him

who

hath made him.

The Motets

453

—

Let Zions children

them be with

rejoice in

psalt'ries

rejoice

is

their

mighty king;

praising his name's honor in dances; with timbrels

— the

let

and

unto him be playing.

The whole work is one and

him who

great exhortation to sing, play, dance, praise,

listener

the singers are doing

all

need not understand the exact words, since these things with the music!

Bach has one

of the two choruses repeatedly interrupt the continuous text and simply cry out, "Singet, singet." This

is

Hke the jubilation that to

Saint Augustine was the essence of veneration for

of "absolute" singing.^

made

One

Exodus

in his bible in

sing in praise of God."'^

is

reminded of a marginal note Bach

15.2021: "First prelude,

The

and dancing"

in

two choruses

to

passage concerns the prophetess

Miriam and the women following brels

God, the concept

her,

who form

a train "with tim-

honor of the Highest.

In contrast with his other motets. Bach dispenses for the most part with detailed textual interpretation, except for the varying nu-

ances in

how

are expressed.

to

the singing, playing, dancing, praising, and rejoicing

There

is

certainly

no

setting the theology of

Romans

music or of taking the "stony road." Theology and music flow

together from a single impulse: the laus Dei, praise of God. In the tradition of Luther's

psalm readings,

the congregation praising

God: God

laus

Dei does not

also praises his

just

own

mean

actions

through the hearts and mouths of mankind.^

The

first

section in particular expresses the original conception

of multiple choruses.

Bach seems

collective unconscious: surges

quiUity in motion. singing,

We

to call forth

what we have

of sound, directed yet

see at once that this

is

infinite, tran-

not two choruses

sometimes together, sometimes in alternation, but two cho-

ruses in collision.

even in the

There

is

hardly another case in music history

brilliant eight-part

where two choruses fiiUy interwoven.

are vested

with such individuality and yet so

On the formal level, this work is

regard.

The

Vocal Music

— not

Magnificat of Heinrich Schiitz art-

superior to Bach's

other multiple-chorus motets, though they are hardly

454

in our

weak

in this

Soprano

Alto

Tenore

Basso

Soprano

Alto

Tenore

Basso Sin-get,

How subtly, Zion"

worked

is

sin

sin- get.

-

sm

get,

-

sin

get,

-

get.

almost imperceptibly, the dance fugue "Die Kinder into this polychoralic setting,

structure of the entire

though

it

defines the

movement. At the fourth entry of the theme,

the fligal setting extends into the second chorus.

The

result

a con-

is

glomeration of voices extending across eight parts, then compressed into four; the result of this concentration

Bach brings

Wagner

this

segment

jokingly called

is

that in just five dense bars

to an end, thus freeing the its

work from what

Muckengeschwirr ("swarm of buzzing

gnats").^

Bach's formal mastery the motet but in

chorale

"Wie

all

its

is

evident not just in this

architecture. In the

sich ein Vater erbarmet"

dich ferner unser an" alternate.

"Lobet den Herrn

in seinen

doings") with blocks of

The

section of

second section, the

and the

nimm

aria "Gott,

third section begins at the

Reichen" ("Praise the Lord in

words

all

His

homophonic double-chorus singing and

ends with the four-part fugue "Alles, was HaUeluja."

first

Thus Bach has taken

Odem hat, lobe den Herrn,

the three-movement Italianate in-

strumental concerto, which he already translated into his organ

works in Weimar, and adapted

it

to his vocal

music

in

an original

The Motets

455

movement; the

fashion. "Singet" constitutes the extensive opening

combination of chorale and cal

aria

then takes the place of the slow,

middle movement; "Lobet den Herrn in seinen Reichen"

relatively

uncomplicated introduction to the dancelike

ment, faintly reminiscent of a passepied, "Alles was

Of course, Bach would into a

work of many

layers.

not be Bach

The head movement

the

is

move-

final

Odem hat."

he did not turn

if

lyri-

all this

displays the prin-

of double choruses in every imaginable variation. Using the

ciple

medium of architecture as well as pure sound, he opens up new musical space in a way not previously known. Quite different from the comparatively naive Venetian use of multiple choruses, this

new

ternation between the expansion and the contraction of the

body of

sound

what

is

gives rise to this truly spatial

The second movement is

dimension in the music.

not content with just one song: two differ-

ent types of lyric are presented in choral opposition.

ment

unites the

two choruses

end of

clear that the

all

The

in a four-part fiigue,

music,

found in a pure, harmonious

if

not

its

beginning,

final

making is

movequite

it

always to be

setting.

Bach's sense of proportion

and ends

al-

is

always evident: the motet begins

in triple time, not just to lend a dancelike flair but because

of the originally theological context of triple time, or tempus perfectum. His proportionality goes

movement and of the retains a kind

fiirther:

the sixteenth notes of the

final fiigue are in the

same tempo,

so the motet

of kinetic symmetry.7 In view of his liking for clear and

obvious proportionality,

it

should not be overlooked that he wrote a

note in the autograph score asking that the

middle section

another verse, and with the two choruses swapped

ond

first

— using

— be sung

a sec-

time.

Among the score's many niceties are the nuanced section endings. The

last

measures of the

stage the psalm text's

first

movement

drums and

harps.

all

The second movement

not end with the choruses united but with the Abgesangy that

is,

the last two lines of

but drag onto center

first

does

chorus singing an

its final aria,

for the second

choir has already bid farewell with the words of the chorale "Sein

End, das 456

The

ist

ihm nah"

Vocal Music

("his

end

is

near").

A quiet ending, perhaps

but at the same time

the upbeat to the flashy final

it is

movement

"Lobet den Herrn in seinen Taten." Bach saves the soprano's high

measure of the closing

note, B-flat, for the third-to-last after this risky stunt

is

complete can the

final

only

fiigue:

note of jubilation be

sounded.

The second movement which was

from some other

combination of

its

Lutheran chorale with a modern strophic

texts: it pairs a traditional text,

remarkable for

is

either written for this occasion or religious text adapted

was a fragment

by Bach. This combination

is

unusual for the genre but offers some interesting possible theological interpretations: the large, represented

two choruses seem

by the

to juxtapose the church at

community who

chorale, with those in the

personally struggle with their faith. against the ecclesiola (the

"little

The

is

not played off

church," or smaller

community of

Ecclesia

saved within the church), as the Pietist view would have tellingly characterized.

The

Bach sharpens the cal plane.

He

that the orthodox

of faith

God

down

to the level of the indi-

personally for His protection.

on

a musi-

Pietist, a

melody

contrast between chorale and aria

gives the aria,

would

both are

chorale goes confidently forward, while

the aria brings the generalities vidual believer, beseeching

it;

whose

text

criticize for

warbling tunes of the Pietists

—

is

far

from

sounding

like the flirtatious,

beginning.

at least in the

As

the

composition goes on, he moves the aria in a more hymnlike direction,

approaching the chorale both musically and theologically.

Gott,

Why

nimm

dich fer

meant

un

ser

sich ein Vater erbarmet" ("As

show") but ends with "Also der

it

ner

an.

does the motet contain a strophe that begins with the

words "Wie

ihm nah"

-

("E'en so to be a

is

man's

life

New Year's

Mensch

vergehet, sein End, das

passing, his

service in

doth a father mercy

end

to

him

is

Was

near")?

which one should sing

a

ist

"new

song" but at the same time remind the listener of the transitoriness

of earthly

life?

We do not know, but no

matter:

may

this

model of a

The Motets

457

motet remain for us the epitome of divine

praise, a

pure work of art

with no other purpose!

The

other three double-chorus motets, understandably, suffer in

comparison with "Singet

dem Herrn

ein neues Lied"

—

particularly

the funeral piece "Fiirchte dich nicht, ich bin bei dir" ("Fear not,

am

BWV

with you"),

228.

The

phonic sections, contrasts with the second

homo-

having extended

first part,

part,

which

is

I

set for

only

four voices but contrapuntally: the three lower voices sing the prophet's words "denn ich habe dich erloset" ("for

two

you"), while the soprano sings sollt'

ich

mich denn gramen" ("Then why should

movement

ing a chorale tune into a motet

I

have redeemed

verses of the chorale

is

"Warum

I grieve").

Bring-

a familiar practice in

Lutheran church music, and a Bach family tradition besides. But particular

motet stands

cally reflecting as

on

far

above the norm of the genre by

this contrast,^

and

its

this

specifi-

counterpoint distinguishes

it

being anything but music written casually for an itinerant student

choir to sing at a funeral.

motet form into a

The attempt to

single piece

is

typical

distill

various aspects of the

of Bach

— though probably

of a younger Bach: the strained chromaticism of the second part of the motet doesn't quite

fit

the text "Ich habe dich erloset" ("For

have redeemed you") and indicates the labored quality of the work

I

as

a whole.

This work could date from Bach's Weimar period, especially since the chorale inclusion lasse dich nicht,

is

reminiscent of that in the motet "Ich

du segnest mich denn,"

anonymous motet comes from which Bach wrote

bars of

model

for his pupil Philipp

visions

by Bach) wrote the

The motet "Komm, mature sound. While

BWV Anh.

— perhaps

David Krauter, who

Jesu,

as a

(apart

compositional

from

period, gallant pressiveness, as

458

The

its

few

re-

komm,"

BWV 229, has a much more

the polychoral structure of "Fiirchte dich

work

is

supple diction and almost gallant quality. For this

most of

all

opposed

Vocal Music

a

of the work.

nicht" seems forced and the counterpoint strained, this

charming, with

This

a score of 1712-13, the first fourteen

in himself

rest

III. 159.

impUes

singability {Sanglkhkeit)

to structure

and counterpoint.

and ex-

Singability,

—

in the

modern

sense,

is

evident throughout the work.

sehne mich," with their parallel thirds and as

The words

demonstrate

sixths,

does the second, longer half of the motet, on the text

rechte Weg." This ruses,

and

its

composed

is

modernity

performed twice by the in part

is

an

aria in 6/8

"Du bist der

time for two cho-

alto in the

second chorus on the word

mich

schliefi ich

final

leben,

Hande und

in deine

zu guter Nacht!" appended to the main section.

not a

this,

manifest in part by the long series of trills

by the strophe "Drum

sage. Welt,

dition

is

as

"ich

The

ad-

chorus in the sense of a Kantionahatz (simple

four-part harmony) but

— highly unusual

3/4 time of a minuet, with

all

Bach

for

— an

aria in the

the small declamatory, rhythmic, and

melodic piquancy^ then befitting a modern religious or secular strophic song in the style of Pietism.

The

earliest

known

source of the motet

the score written out by Christoph

twenty years

of melody,

tics

ity

later,

this

of the closing

in his

is

a manuscript

Nichelmann

copy of

in 1731-32.

book of 1755 on the nature and

Over

characteris-

same Bach scholar praised the harmonic

original-

seen as capable of expressing the "passion

aria: it is

required by the text," not only because of the composer's artistic expertise but also because

he was so "moved" by "impressions" that the

harmonic sequence made on him, that the melody flowed out of preexisting "feeling" as if from a "spring. It is

no accident that

this writer,

a

"^°

who

is

arguing from the

musical-aesthetic vantage point of sentimentality {Empfindsamkeit),

chooses just this aria as an example of expressive and easily comprehensible music. In hardly any other of his major vocal works does

Bach

so consistently keep to a style that

pressive in the sense

whether we

call it

meant by

as a

both singable and ex-

Enlightened contemporaries

gallant or merely a temporary response to a

trend." Also ear-catching fold exclamation

his

is

is

"Komm"

the music's rhetorical drama: the four-

given to both choruses

is

meant not just

climax in the traditional figurative sense but also as a gesture of

direct verbal power. in the

He could certainly have found this type of thing

motets of his day, and there are parallels in the opening cho-

ruses of the St. John Passion

and the B-Minor Mass.

Of course Bach's The Motets

459

rhetoric

do

is

architecture, too: the question

begin?")

I

"Wie fange

ich an?"

("How

answered in a way that points ahead to the classicism

is

of Vienna.

Compared with the counterpoint section "denn ich habe dich erfrom "Fiirchte dich

loset"

path"

is

direct

and

nicht," even the depiction of the "bitter

clear, despite its

labored chromaticism and dimin-

ished seventh intervals: the voice pairs in a canon on fourths, as well as the steep

ten bars. is

more

Then

the contrapuntal figural style gives

oratorical

and amenable to the

once again, "Der saure

serts,

a

path they seem to be climbing, come to an end after only

homophonic

phrase; the

breathless pauses the

senses.

way to

The second

chorus sings during

words "zu schwer

— zu

was he composing

for

its

seemingly

schwer." There are parts,

easily lost in the vocal fabric; here they are audibly fiineral

chorus as-

Weg — wird mir zu schwer," but now in first

comparable subtleties in Bach's polyphonic chorus

Bach wrote

a style that

but they are

brought out.

motets largely on commission. In

someone who was

this case,

aesthetically in tune with

the Pietist aria and therefore wished a simple but expressive, indeed, a

modern composition? Perhaps

thing totally different from,

with

texts in

Mein

Siind'n

a person

mich werden kranken

memorial

sehr,"

service for

Johann Maria Kees on

not in the same league.

form

i8

still

July

rhetorical quality of "Komm, Jesu,

superior to that of its sister work, "Singet

tect bar

which could

be heard

thanks to an endowment. Bach once performed one

Although the

turally

who wanted some-

the late-sixteenth-century motet

Latin and German, "Turbabor sed non perturbator /

at Bach's time, at a

was

it

say,

The

dem

1723.^^

komm" may be

Herrn,"

it is

analytically trained eye

architec-

may

in the structure as a whole, ^^ but the progress

section to section

is

really felt

more

in psychological terms:

de-

from

from the

melancholy yet rapturous invocation of Jesus to the deep sighs over the travails of

life

to the lively conviction of faith in the dancelike

final refrain.

"Der Geist precisely dated

hilft

unser Schwachheit auf,"

BWV

226, the only

motet of Bach, takes a middle road. Bach wrote

it

for

the burial of his rector, Johann Heinrich Ernesti, which took place 460 The Vocal Music

on 20 October

in the university church

mon,

at the

Romans,

1729. Since the funeral ser-

wish of the deceased, was to be on the eighth chapter of

seemed appropriate

it

Though not

to choose that text for the music.

unexpected, the rector's death came quickly;^^ thus one

can assume that Bach began the composition only the evening of the

day the rector died. If this was the

then Bach had a mere four

case,

days to write and rehearse the piece.

Given the time

constraint,

it

would not be surprising

if

he

adapted previously existing work. This has indeed been conjectured:

model

the

for the

has been thought, was a secular composition for just two

hilft," it

voices. ^5 Revising

time.

opening double-chorus movement "Der Geist

Nor can

scribes the

it

such a composition would of course have taken

be ignored that the distinctive opening phrase de-

moving of the

spirit in a

fashion that occurs in other vocal

works dealing with the Holy Ghost, Freude," at the words "der Geist aber yet

is

as in the ist

motet

"J^su,

meine

das Leben" ("the Spirit

still

living").

The Herzen

third section of the motet, the four-part fugue

"Der aber

die

forschet," contains corrections in the autograph, especially in

the text chosen for the music. These are not always happy choices,

even in the

die Heiligen" ("Because

the tata

model

words "Denn

final version, particularly at the

he intercedeth for the Saints").

words "Sondern der Geist

Finally, the

selbst vertritt

Stylistically,

come from

for this section in strict style could have

from the Leipzig period.^^

er vertritt

a can-

second section, on the

uns aufs beste mit un-

aussprechlichem Seufzen" ("rather, the Spirit himself intercedeth for us, ineffably sighing"),

was evidendy written down

in the conceptual

sketch and thus should be considered as original.^7

There

are indications that

and that he wrote the Bible the

word

"selbst."

Bach wrote

text

he

set to

it

this

middle section

last

from memory: he forgot

In correcting this error afterward, he had to

change the tonal sequence of the theme, thus destroying

its

symmetry. Nonetheless, the section marked "Fugato"

highly im-

perfect characterization)

is

the motet

s

(a

original

showpiece: a five-to-six-part

genre piece on the theme "Seufzen" ("sighing").

The

total

of nine

The Motets

461

theme

melisma effect

commented upon

entries are

in such variety

by the sighing

of the countervoices that the whole section has the

figures

of a single unutterable

groaning and sighing

much

graphic effect of so

somewhat lessened by its being embedded

is

a contrapuntal section.

The

sigh.

The

I

in

compositional style hearkens back to the

expressive madrigal art of the old Italians, but with

its less

flowing

and rather more figured melody, and the consistent use of motifs, this

is

authentically Bach.

It is

odd

"Der aber

part final fiigue

There was but

is

Bach went to the

that

die

trouble of writing

Herzen" separately

down

the four-

for each chorus.

a ready supply of score paper available for such purposes,

that a sufficient explanation, or did

end the work

The

in eight parts?

Bach

final chorale,

originally intend to

"Du

heilige Brunst,"

probably taken from a lost Pentecost cantata, constitutes the end of a motet^^ that cannot conceal

its

ness and rhetorical power, does

What the

perfect

motley ancestry, nor, given

need

it

and

telos; it is realized in time,

pleasure. Architecture exists

on paper and

process in time.

to.

at its

we

less

it

its

reception history, the form of "Jesu,

admired than

its

architecture.

in alternation

with variously

When we

hymn

"Jesus,

set texts

from

Paul s Epistle to the Romans.

An

observation of the work's architecture shows that

its

sections are arranged in axial symmetry: the opening chorale cally identical

with the

finale chorale

motetten (proverb motets), "Es

"So nun der Geist," are allow

(2

= 10); the

part (4 =

The

8);

ist

(i

=

nun

11);

is

eleven

musi-

the two five-part Spruch-

nichts Verdammliches" and

as musically identical as their differing texts

two Spruchmotetten "Denn das Gesetz des Geistes"

and "So aber Christus

462

its

attainment can bring aesthetic

find variously set strophes of the

meine Freude" appearing St.

the goal of a composition,

perceived only as an abstract plan, not as a

is

Throughout

form,

its

is

is

meine Freude,"

a sort of design survey of a composition;

is

meine Freude" has been look

Form

for theologians.

is

great-

form of "Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied"

for composers, the perfect architecture of "J^su,

BWV 227,

its

in

euch

ist"

correspond in that both are three-

the other four chorale arrangments

Vocal Music

fit

into the

symme-

i

try only because they are

work

the

consists

all

the same genre (chorales); the center of

of a great five-part

nicht fleischlich, sondern geistlich"

The grand

men

old

bert Schweitzer,

had

fligue

on the

text "Ihr aber seid

(6).

of Bach biography, Philipp S pitta and Al-

litde to say

about motets and did not

any of this was worth mentioning. After World

War I, when

chitecture of Bach's keyboard music, in particular

was beginning to be noticed

feel that

— by August Halm,

the ar-

The Art of Fugue,

Wil-

Fritz Jode,

helm Werker, Wolfgang Graeser, and Erich Schwebsch, among others

— enthusiasm began

when one

started to

to

grow

examine

for the miraculous structure evident

meine Freude."

"Jesus,

Of course

those

music scholars and lovers of Bach with more of a musical-aesthetic orientation wall always maintain that the order of a composition,

while not unimportant, itself

— but even they

secondary compared with the composition

is

wdll appreciate, if not admire, the music's cyclic

element.

For sus

and

this

is

clearly a cycle

— where

a setting of five verses

a

hymn

from Romans

setting ^^r omnes ver-

8 are

not merely spliced

together but transformed into a structure of nuance and sophistication.

What brought Bach to write

motet, although the complete

copy and thus

it

One might worked on and

it

like this? It is a fianeral

work comes down

cannot be dated. But

to us only as a later

who commissioned

almost think that Bach commissioned

for decades.

five voices

something

That

there

is

much

it

it?

himself

switching between four

and that the "Gute Nacht, o Wesen" section presents

the cantus firmus in a different version from that of the other sections,

which was the normal version

in

ments, numbers

i,

3,

and

7,

are to

The

three choral

at that

point incomplete? Bach

may

berg Variations,

where

a series

work has

its

of canons

score, or

was the

not have created this tex-

tuaUy and symmetrically unique work until already existing materials. This

move-

be found in a copy dating from

were they copied from an already existing

motet

hymn

Weimar, suggest that the

composition was not created in one piece.

1735:

He

late in life,

basing

it

on

counterpart in the Goldis

interleaved with free

variations.

The Motets

463

The

text

is

impressive for

theological intensity. Its stern yet

its

impassioned delivery of the apostle Paul's doctrine of justification coupled with intensely

felt

choral verses,

love of Jesus, that were written

by the

Guben, Johann Franck. The melody Criiger, publisher melica.

lay poet

and burgomaster of

by the Berlin cantor Johann

is

known hymnbook

of the widely

is

imbued with the joy and

That the concerns of orthodoxy and Pietism

Praxis pietatis

are thus

brought

together in unique fashion does not imply that Pauline theology here is

to be aligned with orthodoxy, or that the poetry

is

to be aligned

with Pietism. Rather, the combination provides an adequate sampling

of the theological currents of Bach's time.

Combinations of

this

kind are to be found in

many of

Bach's

cantatas but seldom with such dramatic effect that Schweitzer could

speak of "Bach's sermon on living and dying."^9 ceived by

Bach

It is a

sermon con-

himself, not just musically but also theologically: if

the motet in fact derives from preexisting materials, then only he

could have undertaken compiling the final

text.

He may

been a master poet, but he could certainly produce a theological texts,

which

in

art, as

we

of densely

series

form could be compared with an opugarden or

lently structured yet symmetrical

If

not have

palatial estate.

look at "Jesu, meine Freude" as baroque representational

symbol of divine order and the sec-

a likeness of worldliness, a

ular order of the state that derives

from

it,

we

should not forget that

works of prose and poetry

in Bach's day emblematically arranged

were published and read in great number. For the musician, what

and remains important

is

what the composer does with

is

his textual

models.

One

notices immediately that

idea of symmetrical arrangement

genres and styles into play.

Only

Bach

— he

the

is

not focused simply on the

brings his entire repertory of

first

and

last chorales are in fact

musically identical, which makes good sense, since the

with the motto

it

opened with:

and next-to-last section

"Jesu,

poem

closes

meine Freude." The second

are nearly identical,

and

this

could easily be

for formal as well as architectural reasons: eleven sections, a rather

long span, need a clearly marked frame. 464 The Vocal Music

In the inner sections (3-9), variety choral strophe

is

the guiding principle.

Each

unlike the others. "Unter deinen Schirmen" might

is

be read as a Kantionalsatz (simple four-part harmony), even though

und

the "Krachen"

"Blitzen" ("thunder

and lightning")

in the text

is

depicted graphically by the independendy led voices accompanying

And

this section.

in

"Weg mit

although the soprano presents the melody simply

and bass parts lead

alien Schatzen," the alto, tenor,

of their own,

as if

lives

they were the accompanying voices in a figured

organ chorale.

The

section "Trotz

its

alten

Drachen"

is

cantus firmus

"binding. "^°

words "Trotz," "Furcht," "Toben," "Singen,"

brummen

and

"sure peace," "abyss," "fall silent,"

and interpreted with great

(

the

first

to have

This text has provided a

and tone painting: the

treasure trove for rhetorical musical figures

Verstummen,

motet-like to such a

Brahms was proud of being

degree that Johannes "discovered"

dem

Ruh," "Abgrund,"

"sich're

spite,

rage,

tear,

and "complain")

smgmg,

brought out

are

but the strophic pattern

intensity,

is

not

destroyed in the process.

The Bach

choral adaptation "Gute Nacht, o

largely dispenses

with rhetorical and

votes himself wholly to the valedictory

Wesen"

little

miracle.

coloristic touches

and de-

mood

is

a

of "Gute Nacht." This

four-part basset-horn section with the tenor part as foundation suggests a

mood

in thirds as

it

and

of weighdessness; the two sopranos sixths, paint

an intimate picture of the Christian soul

bids a final farewell to the world and

weaves the cantus firmus, transposed the whole,

ment

is

a

result

reminiscent

now of the on

and the

now

is

The

painfiil

down

its

pomp. The

harmonic

five

The moveWeimar period,

frictions.

gallant style of the Leipzig motets. It

was probably based

in various different contexts^^

movement of the

alto part

a fifth, into the fabric of

of an organ chorale of the

model that Bach used

ample, in the third

concertante, often

violin sonata

numbers composed on the Romans

—

for ex-

BWV 1021.

text

do contain the-

matic material derived from the cantus firmus of the chorale, but their

main concern

sage "Es

ist

nun

is

presenting the words clearly.

nichts

The

Verdammliches an denen, die

Pauline mes-

in Christo Jesu

The Motets

465

sind" ("there

is

in Christ Jesus")

Why

now no condemnation

therefore is

sung

at the outset in

syllabic style.

three times in a row, inserting

it

He

grand pauses between the repetitions? not argumentatively: is

an expressive,

are

does Bach emphasize the word "nichts" ("no") with such

pathos, by having the chorus exclaim

that

them which

to

it is

not so

much

is

composing

rhetorically,

Paul s reasoning as his passion

being underscored. Bach takes on a very modern look here, by

forceflilly

For

using such suggestive effects in setting a prose

all its

manent

textual concerns, the musical setting has

logic; this suits this

setting of the

music well for

words "So nun der Geist

auferwecket hat" ("The dead"). This time

it is

since the reference

is

spirit

the

its

own im-

later (tenth- section)

des, der Jesum

von den To ten

of him that raised up Jesus from the

word

"des" ("of him") that

God, the emphasis

to

its

text.

is

is

emphasized;

justified.

Further on in these two related sections, imitative and

phonic parts

alternate.

homo-

For the sake of rhetorical emphasis Bach's

writing gets more discontinuous, not to say wilder, than one usually

encounters in seventeenth-century Spruchmotetten Schiitzs Geistliche Chormusik.

norms

for the

But

motet genre have

can move more freely in

lost

this field

That he made use of

this

in the

—

meantime, the traditional

some of their

than

freedom

for example, in

validity.

in, for instance, is

So Bach

the cantata.

seen in the two numbers

wdth matching orchestrations: "Denn das Gesetz des Geistes" and

"So aber Christus in euch touches

— hardly motets

ist":

both

are trio settings

in the traditional sense.

with concertante

Along with

their

neighboring chorale strophes, they form brief episodes flanking the

broad middle section of the motet, the setting of its central message, "Ihr aber seid nicht fleischlich, sondern geistlich" ("Thou art not of

the flesh but of the spirit").

While

the four above-mentioned Bible-passage settings have sig-

nificant portions devoted to direct discourse this center

is

solute music:

composed its

as a five-part fiigue,

fugal structure,

which

book, determines the form, and the text

was not

incorrect in calling

466 The Vocal Music

it

is

is

and

textual presentation,

and so

not at

it is

all

fitted in.

a piece of ab-

according to the

Werner Neuman

an "organ fugue for the voice. "^^

The

key words

and "geisdich"

"fleischlich"

("fleshly," "spiritual") are

promi-

nendy displayed: so although Bach does not think twice about

—

ing a fugue

the queen of musical forms in his eyes

of his motet, he

still

As we conclude tecture of the

motet

—

insert-

into the center

takes great care in his treatment of the text.

these observations,

it is

just as important as

is

evident that the archi-

its

form. Bach

is

able to

introduce a great variety of ways to handle chorales, texts, and lan-

guage in the this variety tifies

it.

medium of pure

with a

total

choral composition, because he frames

concept that, while formally extrinsic, objec-

Just the regular alternation of choral strophes with Bible-text

settings provides a necessary stability in

movements

dividual

are.

At least with

view of how different the in-

repeated hearings of the cycle,

subtler symmetries are able to clarify

its

its

consistency as a whole.

We can speak of two high points in Bach's motet output: the one defined by the direct and sensual perception of form in "Singet

is

dem

Herrn," the other by the formal architecture reflected in "Jesu,

meine Freude." These all

are the

two complementary great

of

Bach's creative work.

The motet volume of the New Bach

Edition contains two other

motets besides the ones mentioned already:

Lebens Licht," 230.

Each

Christ, is

qualities

falls

BWV

ii8,

meins Lebens Licht"

scription:

it

Jesu Christ, meins

and "Lobet den Herrn, aUe Heiden,"

somewhat outside the norm

something between

"O

is

a cantata

a fianeral

for this genre.

work written

movement and

three trumpets

—

— two horns known

implies that the

"O

Jesu

in 1736-37

and

a motetic choral tran-

should be seen in the context of the

cantatas. Its original scoring

BWV

late choral text

as litui,

one cornet,

work was performed outdoors,

ei-

ther in a fiinerary procession or at a graveside. This practice does not

accord with the normal ritual of Leipzig obsequies and indicates that the occasion of composition

The down to ity is in

was out of the ordinary.

four-part song "Lobet den Herrn,

alle

Heiden" has come

us only from nineteenth-century sources, and

doubt on

of Bach's motet

stylistic

style.

grounds.

It

does not

While possessing some

one more the sense that

it

was meant

fit

its

authentic-

the image

we have

gallant traits,

to be a retrospective

it

gives

on the

The Motets

467

—

motet form in general. The author of this work, which very

skillfully

is

in places

composed though without evidence of great

delibera-

may have been

tion,

a son or student

of Bach's

— Friedemann Bach

or Johann Gottlieb Goldberg. It

may

not be entirely due to the vagaries of transmission that

the core of Bach's motet genres, too, that did not as did the cantata or

erate

468

work

demand

Vocal Music

regular production of new works

organ choral forms, for instance

number of exemplary

The

consists of only five pieces. In other

pieces.

— he

left a

mod-

PART THREE

THE INSTRUMENTAL WORKS

THE ART OF THE TOCCATA As

a

composer of sacred vocal music, Bach took

tradition.

his place in a long

For nearly nine hundred years composers had been setting

Bible texts, ornamenting Gregorian cantus firmi, or transcribing

hymns. Even those hallmarks of the modern passion and cantata

—

recitative

and

aria

— did not come out of

religious

the blue but were

borrowed from opera, where by Bach's time they had already

flour-

ished for two generations.

Even an acreage

that has been so long

and intensively cultivated

can yield one great final harvest, one that puts earlier results under critical

and productive

new can be

scrutiny,

one

after

which nothing

created. Against this background,

Bach

is truly,

radically

in Albert

Schweitzer's phrase, "an ending."

Systematic thinking about music has limits vocal forms: to the extent that a given set text reflection

of

music into

and not

social reality

its

service

—

is

its

it

forces

texts

and

socially de-

forms, general outline, and matters of

A composer can relativize these matters or make us

unaware of them, but he can never ignore the

own

taken seriously as a

just as musical material,

sumptions that surround the act of composing:

time and timing.

applied to the

not in every particular, surely in the as-

if

termined contexts dictate

when

fact that a text will in-

sist

on

No

one would contend that Schubert's genius was constrained by

the

poems of the

its

rights, that

it

wants something from the composer.

Winterreise; but

we can

still

be happy that he also

The Art of the Toccata

471

produced works without any obvious textual connection: imprompsymphonies.

tus, sonatas, quartets,

The

instrumental genres of music are

age of Bach.

still

relatively

young

in the

An instrumental ensemble music totally independent of

vocal models, and

on the same

comes into being only with

level as the vocal

Corelli,

music of the period,

Albino ni, and Vivaldi. The

arts

of modern keyboard and organ music of Cabezon, Gabrieli, Byrd, Sweelinck, Frescobaldi, or Froberger are no more than three or four generations old.

Bach

likely felt, or instinctively

there lay a challenge, that he

would one day

mediate models and teachers

—

Pachelbel,

knew, that here

far surpass his

most im-

Bohm, Buxtehude.

The music of the keyboard instruments in particular is young Bachs home turf Whether out of necessity or desire, he has decided against a university course,

way to

which would

certainly have

smoothed the

a cantoral position. Instead he accepts, at age eighteen, an or-

ganist's position

— not

in order to relax in a modestly

but comfortable post but to pursue a career

As

as a

keyboard musician.

organist he can claim a perquisite that he

been granted

as cantor: three or four

compensated

would hardly have

months' leave to go to Liibeck

to visit the greatest living organist, there "to understand

various things about his art." Begreiffen

\^begreiffer{\

means more than the study of

may well have been known in manuscript form to the young Bach; it means to find out as much as he can about the professional life of a leader of the new music in north Buxtehude's compositions, which

Germany.

Certainly, after taking this journey, the longest of his

life,

he better understood what was required to become an important organist.

Such

works

for his

a person

own

would

see himself as a virtuoso;

repertory and thus play a role as a composer in

defining keyboard and organ music; the instrument, he

That even later a teacher,

would get

finally,

to the essence

in his early years

from the perspective of of music per

and that Johann Christoph Bach incorporated

manuscripts for study,

472

is

concrete proof, as

it

Instrumental

Works

his collection

his

of

were, that people gen-

thought that Bach would have a career

The

se.

Bach was an expert on organs and

younger brother's keyboard and organ works in

erally

he would write

as

an organist.

He

could have been thinking of Dietrich Buxtehude and as

models

cobaldi,

—

but also

who

like

a

keyboard expert and writer of

the writing of instrumental music of all types.

catas

Reinken

of the internationally famous Girolamo Fres-

Bach was not just

virtuoso pieces for clavier and organ but also a

which Bach would copy down

Musically

Adam

and canzones of

composer trained

Thus

his

in

famous Fiori

in 1714, contains both toc-

a very clavier-like nature within his "organ

masses," as well as classic examples of a strict style that originally

evolved for vocal music but that

now invested

instrumental music as

well with prestige and dignity.

Performing for an audience musician, but

it

is

part of the job of every practicing

has a special significance for lutenists and keyboard

work of

musicians: soloists have the chance to produce an entire

music on their own, to give their fantasy free reign without concerning themselves with other players. Inspiration, invention, and execution

meet

The of a

in ideal fashion.

simplest kind of performing traditionally

recital:

instrument.

comes

at the start

the artist introduces himself and the possibilities of his

At

the

same time,

like the

"prepares," testing his finger dexterity

rhapsodes of antiquity, he

with rapid runs and the tun-

ing of his instrument with lighdy struck chords. In Italy since the

middle of the sixteenth century as the toccata,

in south

German

this improvisational art

and Frescobaldi was

Germany

its

master. It

as well, particularly

was known

became widespread

through the

efforts

of his

pupil Johann Jakob Froberger. It was brought to north Ger-

German

many, where south and traditional north

combined

in different

century, probably

styles

were being

ways around the middle of the seventeenth

by Matthias Weckmann. Typically, toccatas and

preludes classed as stylus phantasticus are

fiill

of contrasts, surprising

changes, and alternating segments of "free" (without bars) and

"bound" {gebunden

—

i.e.,

having bar

Another important feature

is

lines

and meter) imitative

the pedal obbligato, a north

play.

German

innovation.

When

Bach was young, the toccata and organ prelude were

their zenith as the

epitome of

the fantastic style.

There

are

at

famous

The Art of the Toccata

473

examples of the genre by Buxtehude and Nicolaus Bruhns, among others, tral

which

in manuscript

Germany

as well.

The

form quickly became widespread

in cen-

so-called Moller Manuscript (compiled

by

Bach's older brother Johann Christoph between 1703 and 1708) contains examples: a prelude in

Bruhns, one in

E

A

major by Buxtehude and two by

minor and one

in

G

major.

The same volume

contains preludes by the young Johann Sebastian; he himself, as

it

Bruhns's

is

measuring

were, against his models.

Organ Prelude

ion, namely, in

in

E Minor begins

in toccata-like fash-

The composer

an exploration of the tonic.

first

sketches out an initial figure, unruly and theatrical, containing eleven

of the twelve tones of the chromatic into

on the

harmonically and stays there. This music

it

manneristic: for

its

time,

Bruhns follows the fiigue

scale

on

it

tonic; is

both concise and

was the very best kind of composing.

toccata-like introduction with a veritable

a chromatic, strikingly active

main

and

a playfiil

comes

a second

subject

countersubject. After another toccata-like interval fiigue

then he bores

with a bizarre subject and a very idiosyncratic exposition.

mere seven free-form measures form the

Over

final

segment.

a clear structure (toccata beginning, fijgue

middle, fiigue

2,

toccata ending) and

in a very

A

compact

i,

toccata-like

space,

Bruhns

has assembled a whole arsenal of forms and compositional modes appropriate to the fantastic style: intonation, pedal point, arioso, pastorale, siciliano, recitative, sinfonia, ch.2iCOVintyfiigapathettca;

on top of

an original arpeggio figure borrowed from violin

practice.^

all

474

this

is

The

Instrumental

Works

Bach cannot yet compete with ity,

elegance,

and

fantasy,

this

mixture of comprehensibil-

even though there are hints of his

the opening of his Prelude in

G

BWV

Minor,

ability in

composed

535a,

1705-08 and added (in autograph form) to the Moller Manuscript:

(Ped.)

This piece, one of the oldest surviving preludes of Bach, already

shows a typical

characteristic:

within the fantastic as a

style.

The

an emphasis on consistency, even

figured opening

sequence than in Bruhns; the tonal space

is is

shaped more clearly explored more

com-

pletely; the

tone clusters between the two pedal points are more sys-

tematically

expanded from one part to four

parts, in the

harmony of

the diminished seventh chord.

Moreover, Bach gives the beginning toccata section only twentyone measures; then comes the fugue.

German canzone and which

is

It is

modeled on

closely resembles a

a type

of north

theme of Adam Reinken,

preserved in the Moller Manuscript

as the

model

for a fugue

The Art of the Toccata

475

by Peter Heidorn. The scope and consistency of this

work go

far

beyond what one usually

fugue's motivic

from north German organ

sees

masters.

Bach makes impressive use of the pedal

when

Before,

his preludes

were in the central German

was only incidental use of the

there

pressed, during his visit to Liibeck,

now

in presenting the theme.

He

pedal.

tradition,

was probably im-

by Buxtehude s pedal

use.

From

on, he will arrange the themes of his organ fugues with great

make

in order to

skill,

striking pedal entrances possible, without

being hampered by any of the limitations that thematic invention

normally imposes.

The young Bach

keeps revisiting previously drafted work.

early as 1710-11 (at least in the opinion of Jean

Werner

As

Claude Zehnders and

Breig) he started a complete rewrite of this composition,

probably in the course of his teaching.^ In this rewrite, the prelude loses

multicolored fantasia quality, but

its

tains the

This middle section

section. tastic,

is

length grows. Bach re-

episodic changes such as those in Bruhns s prelude but by a

which sequentially descends

twelve steps of the chromatic scale and goes even a bit further.

Hermann

Keller writes that

Bach here

is

rations in the labyrinth of chromaticism

not completely sure

two

how

Bach needed

row

write

to

for the

up

this

The

still

tones:

— — before he could convinc-

an intermediate version

preserv'^ed

long sequence of broken diminished seventh chords.

Aesthetically speaking, this sort of chord sequence usual; to

"his first explo-

and enharmonicism,"

same

others by his pupil Peter Kellner

ingly set

making

to write in this style. ^ For instance, he uses

different notations in a

among

476

new middle

characterized not by the rapid, fan-

stereotypical thirty- second- note figure, all

its

beginning and ending but inserts an impressive

modern

ears

Instrumental

it

is

nothing un-

sounds even obsolete. But the compositional

Works

process reflects Bach's effort to find his

arrangement of tones, such

way from an

arbitrary

as existed in the traditional toccata, to

coherent harmonic systems.

To be

sure, the

such does not define a structure; but since

chromatic descent as

it is

loosely organized

about an implied dominant pedal point at the center of the move-

ment,

provides the prelude with a large-scale form. In the intro-

it

duction, the composer arrives at the dominant; in the middle section,

under the cover of the dominant he penetrates the depth of the har-

monic

need hardly

space, returning to the tonic in the final part. It

be mentioned that this

reminiscent of sonata structure.

is

Speaking in general terms, one could say that a musical composition

seen no longer as a chain of linked ideas but as the

is

ment and

architecturing of time.

syntactic one.

A

becomes a

When looked at in this way, a movement or section is

like the audible expression

of a hierarchic system.

this idea already existed in the older

insofar as these are based

modern

paratactic structure

fiilfidl-

The rudiments of

forms of dance, song, and

on functional-harmonic

aria,

principles; the

Italian-style concerto in particular set the direction for Bach.'^

Still it is

noteworthy that the young composer picked precisely the

genre that seemed most appropriate to a simple array of fantastic ideas

— the

toccata

—

to overlay with ideas of this kind.

For Bach to write music covering a larger harmonic

must have not merely

a fijnctional

harmonic system but

territory,

also a

he

mod-

ern harmonic system of equal temperament, one that allows unlimited

modulation through the use of enharmonic tonal ambiguity. In

Arnfried Edler's view. Bach had worked out the use of fijnctional har-

monics on harpsichords, which tended to be tuned with equal temperament. Also, he had the opportunity on his Liibeck visit of 1705 to get to

know

the organ of the Marienkirche there, which was possibly

tuned to an approximate version of equal temperament.^ possibilities

is

absolutely versatile

artist like

range of

established early on: coherent large forms independent

of a set text or cantus firmus can be created only rial is

The

— which does not

if

the musical mate-

necessarily

Bach would always make use of these

mean

that an

possibilities.

The Art of the Toccata

477

no wonder that Bach undertakes

It is

BWV 535a

rework the

to

fugue as well; but he changes neither the theme nor the basic pattern

of entrances.

By being

with the rules of composition

a bit stricter

and cutting back on the fantasy character of the countervoices, he does reduce some of its overly abundant inventiveness and playfulness in favor of logical and linear voice leading. tuosity required

by the pedal part

is

The

increased vir-

not an extrinsic change but an

indication of his wish that in a well-balanced setting

all

the voices

play an equal role.

We

can generalize a bit from a comparison of the two versions

of the Prelude and Fugue in G-Minor. In Bach's organ and keyboard works, there ity

is

a tendency to

of the toccata, wherever

damp down

it

the essential fantasia qual-

works against

larger structural forms,

forms that Bach advanced through his lifelong occupation with the binary prelude and fugue. It

is

no accident that he was the

music history to elevate the prelude-fugue form to canonic significant that his first efforts in this

is less

same

level as

the north

saw

it

toccata to

its

new

mission to bring

He

this

its

end.

Bach

least to

impose a new standard

form that he was ad-

binary form.

was the

form and make

to cultivate this

first

Before, the free and

bound

styles

combinations in the fantasia

though

on the

order into the landscape

fantasia style, for the sake of the larger

—

status. It

are not

highest point, and to

of organ and keyboard music, and not

vocating

in

Buxtehude and Bruhns, who brought the old form of

German

as his historic

on the

new form

first

it

a specialty.

were informally united in varying

style,

but with him they become polar

closely interrelated: they allow the

emergence of the kind of

tension required for the creation of any large-scale form. For us today the combination of prelude and fugue

achievement, and

it is

is

a given, but

it is

linked in an almost mysterious

largely his

way with

his

work. Without the will or the way to yoke these two unequal brothers together in the service

of an ideal

bond and break away from each portant musical form

478

The

Instrumental

is

third, they will

other.

What

linked with a single

Works

shake off their

other historically im-

name? Bach alone was

him

impassioned in his pursuit of that ideal

third.

Beethoven, not by accident, in his opus

harnessed overture and

fugue together in the

133

After

only-

of Bach. The Well-Tempered Clavier did

spirit

not come as a bolt from the blue.

But

it

would be

young Bach

a distortion to see the

as

on the

path toward large-form structure only. That there are compositions

under the category of prelude and fugue where he cata element does not tastic

mean

revels in the toc-

that he did not also enjoy both the fan-

style. A good example the pairing of the D Major, BWV 532, composed at about the Prelude and Fugue in G minor, BWV 535. Spitta

and the virtuoso

is

Prelude and Fugue in

same time called the

works"

as the

D

Major "one of the

— probably because of

which prompted one copyist to

its

most

master's

brilliant

organ

supremely virtuosic pedal part,^

to remark, "In this fugue, the feet have

do some serious pedaling" ("Bey dieser Fuge mufi

man

die Fiii^e

recht strampfeln lassen").7

While

the middle section of the prelude

which lends

quietly flowing alia breve,

is

written as a long and

stability to the

are quite individual characteristics in the outer

form, there

movements. Bach

begins with an ascending scale in the pedal part: the performer

meant both

to explore the tonality not with ten fingers, as usual, but with

feet.

The

initial

motif (given to the right hand in the roughly

contemporaneous toccata brio.

is

BWV 912a)

is

set in the pedal,

and with

Later these octave passages are also played in the manual, in

the final section of the prelude where the double pedal lends further

excitement to the rhapsodic Abgesangy which has a bracingly disso-

nant accompaniment. In contrast, the fugue follows with a theme that recalls Buxtehude's affable canzone introductions

— but only

just recalls

it:

Bux-

tehude did not write themes this fantastic.^ Given the seemingly

unending sequence of sixteenth notes, musical

style.

And

in fact the typical

it is

ill-suited for

opening motif of the counter-

subject appears not simultaneously with the val that splits the

theme

in

two

— not

an imitative

just

theme but

in the inter-

once but several times.

The Art of the Toccata

479

nv r^ *

*.

This example

is

taken from the revised version

BWV 532: Bach

has meanwhile modulated into more distant keys like C-sharp minor

E

and

major.

playfulness:

The

distinguishing characteristic of the fugue

countersubject, with the pedal gamely accompanying.

measures

fit

the fugue s capricious

the upper voices,

falls

mood:

is

is

in that form.

Italianate

lin part

the

first

by

theme and countersub-

like the

punch

line

of a joke.

indeed part of the nature of the fugue. Bach wants to

show not simply do

final

back on the beginning and gives the opportu-

then suddenly the movement ends,

Wit

The

a pedal solo, broken into

nity for an uninhibited reintroduction of the ject;

its

is

he writes an almost concertante dialogue of theme and

and

that he can write a fugue but

The theme

violinistic at the

from Marco

Uccelini's

the things he can like Pachelbel,

same time. Edler points out

La gran battaglia that is

half bar of the fugue in

By setting

Buxtehude and

like

is

all

but

a vio-

identical with

BWV 532.

the subject in such various keys even in the pedal part,

Bach demonstrates the modernity of his technique, which here would seem

to require the use

young composer

is

of both heel and toe of the

wielding

original performance piece

That

all

—

the

means

left foot.^

The

at his disposal to create

truly a fantasy

an

on the theme of fugue.

there exists an earlier version of the

BWV 532 fugue with-

out a prelude suggests Bach's desire to join prelude and fugue as basically paired

480

The

movements and yet

Instrumental

Works

still

look on the fugue

as a

completely

independent form. In the early

Weimar

period, these ideas are just

work

taking shape. For that reason the keyboard

minor found in the Andreas Bach Book the

work underneath

With

is

all

D Major, BW\^ 532, even in his arrived at a level of sustained

the other genres he employed.

in

Weimar

tively

as well as

this

by the number of

While

there are rela-

few manuscript copies of Bach's vocal music that

are not auto-

and fugues

his preludes

abundance. His keyboard works are generally

At

demonstrated by the

this is

copies of his organ works that are circulating.

graphed or authorized, copies of

C

entitled "toccata," although

is

an unrivaled organ virtuoso:

number of students he has

911 in

both a prelude and fugue.

Bach has already

phase,

mastery, before he did in

point he

is

the Prelude and Fugue in

Weimar

early

heading

this

BWV

known and

exist in

same

at the

time are models of the form.

The word "model"

is

appropriate, since

than two dozen great toccatas. Given the

works took in coming down to

us,

it is

Bach composed no more

many

different paths these

unlikely that

many were

lost.

In contrast to the realm of the religious cantatas, he composed his preludes and fugues not serially for everyday repertoire use but as

meant more

singular showpieces, services. It

was not wrongheaded

1812 to collect the six preludes

edition, nor

was

it

for concert use than for

and fugues

wrongheaded

BWV 543-48

does not contain

all

this edition.

same time

Bach's pupils into

series, like

may

On

Granted,

to gather

it

works, and

never have occurred to

works of the same type

the Brandenburg Concertos.

of the great musical challenges of the day

certo style. crucial

points to an idea that

and contemporaries:

two or three

One

it

first

the significant ones; but as a con-

centrate of the essential characteristics of the toccata, at the

into a

forty years later for Franz Liszt to

produce his famous transcriptions based on this collection

Sunday

Viennese publishing house in

for a

the one hand. Bach

is

is

the Italian con-

attracted to this style:

it

offers

beginning points for the creation of a musical architecture,

to use the previously

mentioned terminology,

that are not an array of small units of

syntax throughout.

On

it

creates

meaning but have

or,

movements a coherent

the other hand, with his predilection for

The Art of the Toccata

481

complexity, he does not have confidence in the boldness and simplicity

of a concerto movement by Albinoni or Vivaldi.

lifelong project to bring the possibilities of the

form into

line

own

with his

ambitions, in a

and unique solution of formal problems

The Toccata

in

F

BWV

Major,

work

later.

way

that

on an

large musical

becomes a new

of his works.

540, represents a remarkable

—

the fugue was probably

For Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy,

for himself

becomes Bach's

modern

in each

achievement of the middle Weimar period written

It

ill-tuned organ

who

tried out the

one cold and rainy day in a

Swiss village, the modulation at the conclusion sounded "like

little

would make the church

The ending

it

collapse."^°

indeed remarkable: after a pedal point of thirty

is

measures on the dominant. Bach does not go into the tonic but brings in a false cadence that had been avoided earlier (in bar 270); then, after a major second chord, he indulges via C-flat major in a

"Neapolitan" chord in G-flat, finally landing so abrupdy in that one

F major

reluctant to take this as the definitive reconfirmation of

is

the tonic. This

is all

the

more

surprising, as the toccata begins with

the tranquillity of a pastorale: a pedal point in F, fifty-four bars long, is

held underneath the gaily festive canon in the two upper voices.

Then comes an extended pedal solo of twenty-eight bars, whereupon the long

first

section

is

repeated from the beginning, this time in the

dominant and with the upper voices switched with an extended pedal point and pedal solo

in the canon, again

after.

This twofold ex-

position ultimately encompasses 170 bars and ends in the dominant,

but the piece cannot end there: surpassing the old. Indeed,

ginning was only a

movement

a sonata

ft

482

,

n

The

foil for a

I

I

I

I

needs something new, something

soon becomes clear that the naive be-

development that would be the equal of

in every way.

^^n—Ftttt^

Instrumental

it

it

Works

I

^

f

{f

?•

»F f F f - m \

~ i

J

JIJ

—

adamant dwelling on an ostinato F or

Bach's is

matched by

his systematic

C in the exposition

approach in conquering harmonic

space, handling dissonance and chordal progression with great boldness.

The

which he

fanfare theme,

contrasts with the opening

played on almost every step of the chromatic

theme,

is

service

of a large-scale modulation plan.

cata

like a ritorneUo,

the

part of the toc-

The catchy fanfare now acts

out on the concerto principle.

laid

is

The second

scale, in

even though constantly modulating. But the scat-

tered citations of the introductory theme, heard as episodes, are

bound really

key signatures. So the form Bach has chosen does not

to fixed

correspond to a Vivaldi-type concerto movement.

sible to say

is

It is

impos-

"toying with the conventions of the concerto

or following a variation of the type, as did Giuseppe ToreUi,

grosso"^^

among

whether he

others, in his opus

8.^^

Fanfarenthema

176

The

self-confidence with

which Bach

the Italian concerto to organ music

have the advantage of its large form, he concerto s transparent structure with

and

The word

phrases, the agitated,

resists

its

While eager

to

the imposition of the

regular alternation of tutti

of its clear distinction between ritornello and episode, and

solos,

so on.

applies the principles of

impressive.

is

toccata

is

whole flows

and

apt here: for

like a

finally, after a

of Bach's longest organ

broad

river:

long journey

movement

—

the brevity of

all

it

calm

— we

at first,

its

melodic

then wildly

are speaking, barwise,

empties, with great sudden-

ness, into the ocean.

Bach

brilliantly

sodic forward

of parts

—

combines the

toccata's

motion with the concerto's

that

is, its

tendency toward rhap-

architectural organization

Hnear and structural elements, not in the sense

of a clean and unified work, in which elements of different size are

reduced to their lowest

common

denominator, but more

kind of constructed wildness. In cases such as

this,

as a

musicologists are

The Art of the Toccata

483

proud of detecting, through analysis and description, the

justifiably

combination of toccata and concerto sights are, a

composer

when he remarked,

like

in his reflections

more though

still

in his twenties, dealt

in

F

A statement like that does

with which

hude, Bruhns, and Reinken and

less sophisticated

on the end of the Toccata

major, "That was one fearsome cantor." justice to the elemental force

such in-

styles. Significant as

Mendelssohn was no

this organist, a

youth no

with the tradition of Buxte-

at the

same time with the

chal-

\

lenges of Corelli, Torelli, Albinoni, and Vivaldi.

On the basis

of his experience

an organist and orchestra con-

as

Reinhold Birk has compared

ducter,

Bach

Eroica:

this force

shares Beethoven's predilection for long developments

tempi and for heroic-dramatic

at brisk

with that of the

action.^^

One

should not

overlook Bach's penchant for the large and symphonic simply because

appears here "only" in a toccata: in the

it

time, there were great organs but no great

With advancing

age, even Bach's

more proportioned

(alas,

Major from the

Clavier-Ubung over the Toccata in

up

symphony

that

orchestras.

organ writing became clearer and

one almost could add). But

take the late Prelude in E-flat

give

Germany of

who would

third part of the

F Major? We would

not want to

either.

A work of the size and expressive power of the F-major toccata calls for

speculation

der links

it

on how

it

came

into being. Jean-Claude

with the Hunt Cantata of

1712 or 1713

Bach composed both the vocal work and the

Zehn-

and suggests that

toccata for the court

and the hunting gentry of Weifienfels.^'^ Indeed, the episodic theme played in the pedal at

first

makes one think of some courdy

mony, perhaps even a hunting burg

at Weiftenfels,

to f ',

was

with

its

signal.

The organ

in the

unusually large pedal, going

perfectly suited to the

cere-

Augustusall

the

way

demands of this work.

Peter Schleuning interprets the toccata as a "sublime pastorale"

and

a

symbol of the annunciation of Christ's

shows the

peacefiil

shepherds in the

tated second part their fright

484

The

Instrumental

Works

field

birth: the first part

making music, the

agi-

on hearing the heavenly message. ^5 In-

when

terpretations like this are useful

word of the

presented not as the final

experts but as a spur to further thought.

Zehnder and Schleuning

complementary:

are

if

we

The

views of

accept the idea

that such works were performed not just routinely at church services

but also for special ceremonial occasions, then

we

should examine

their semantics.

There

good reason

is

sitional subtleties.

204f the

shift

to take a fresh look at formal

For instance, in the

false

A major to D minor

is

from

bars of deft modulation. It a well-thought-out plan, fifteen bars has less as

is

drawn out through

more

of musical

at

bar

fifteen

style yet

with

so considering that each of the

thematic relevance as well.

rules

cadence episode

paragon of the fantastic

the

all

an obstruction than

By the

a

and compo-

The

episode

is

perceived

rock around which a stream flows.

as a

logic, in

bar 270 this false cadence should

be repeated along with the entire preceding section. But something else

happens: Bach squares the "deception" {Betrugerey), as his con-

temporaries called

from

its

it,

by

shifting the false cadence in the repetition

expected place to bar

318,

shordy before the end, thus

achieving the tremendous effect that Mendelssohn described.

In such cases an analyst might question whether a particular

anomaly was quite sure: tions

in fact intended

Bach

playing with elements of form and their func-

is

— and he does

whether the Toccata is

weU

this so

in

F Major

experimental, or whether

The

by the composer, but here he can be

that the question again arises as to in fact dates

from

belongs to the later

it

1712-13,

and thus

Weimar

period.

sources do not allow a definitive answer. If the toccata

BWV

540

contemporaneous Toccata

panorama of organistic

in

like

is

C

an endless stream, the nearly

Major,

possibilities

— we

toccata head motif alone but keeping

mind: toccata, adagio, and riod,

it is

in the

fiigue.

one of Bach's attempts

BWV

its

564,

is

more Uke

a

are not just looking at the

three-movement form

in

Written during the Weimar pe-

at three-part

form, such as are found

sonata and concerto, and documents his concerns with

mod-

ern Italian music in large form.

The Art of the Toccata

485

The

first

movement opens with

a long

manual

passages typically toccata-like, but at the same time

The

the fantastic violin style of the Italians.

solo, its it

running

borrows from

following pedal solo,

even longer in number of measures, does not come off as elegantly

make

the introductory manual part: to

teenth notes, sixteenth in this

low

more of

give an effect

may

triplets,

German

pedal parts like

understood

new

section of the toccatas

tween manual and pedal. The section combines two ideas of form: Bach characteristic themes,

formed on two selects the

work was

generally

as a test piece for organ.^^

The second

tween two

organs with traditionally

since the entire

been the continuation of such an organ

it

The young Bach

the pleasure of listeners and

this, to

—

the horror of organ builders

at all

of powerfiil reed stops, which

gravity than of brilliance.

have tested the capabilities of

north

the rapid succession of six-

and thirty-second notes audible

register requires the use

as

first

test,

is

movement could have

to

check the balance be-

interesting musically in that

is first

writing a dialogue be-

which perhaps were

to

be per-

different manuals; but to present this dialogue, he

framework of the

Italian concerto

with

its

elements of ri-

torneUo and episode.

Lothar Hoffmann- Erbrecht

Major

works

like the

Toccata in

C

as "prestudies" for Bach's stand-alone instrumental concertos.

supported by the second movement of the toccata,

This view

is

which had

earlier

chord

sees

made

Spitta think of "a solo adagio with harpsi-

accompaniment. "^7

Slow concerto or sonata movements of

Corelli, Torelli, or Vivaldi are the obvious godparents here;

himself incorporated this type as the second Concerto.

But analogies and

the organ repertory: after

and Bach

movement of his Italian

associations should not stray too far

all,

the north

German

from

masters of the sev-

enteenth and early eighteenth centuries cultivated the genre of expressive, highly colored

organ chorales, to which Bach contributed

masterpieces such as the adaptation of Siinde grof^,"

BWV 622, from the

The ending

fligue exhibits

vided into clear sections and 486

The

Instrumental

Works

is

"O Mensch, bewein

dein

Orgelbuchlein.

no concerto-Hke

traits

but

is still

di-

broadly narrative. While the pauses

embedded

that are

in the north

German theme would

matters for Buxtehude or his contemporaries, in

Mahnkopf has

them. Claus-Steffen

of rhetorical self-referentiality, gesture,

its

love of virtuosity

in Bach's early

its

Bach

be routine

positively revels

BWV564's

seen in

"elements

tendency toward overwrought

and boldness" the signs of mannerism

Sturm und Drang works.^^ But mannerism

the signal of an approaching end: with fugues like this

ing farewell to the north licking fugues of

German organ

style.

The Well-Tempered Clavier

is

always

Bach

is

say-

Even the most

rol-

will

be

more

set in a

focused way.

Likely composed a few years

D

"Doric" Toccata in

is

the incorrectly captioned

BWV 538,

Minor,

pletely different picture. It

later,

com-

presents us with a

probably the

last

of the older, four-

phased type of Bach organ fugue that reveals the theme more through additive than structural form in various tonal is

steps. ^9 Still,

it

not without structural devices: interludes on a single motif are

transposed into various keys as in a concerto, taking on the rank of thematically linked episodes. This results in a structure that

thing but transparent and concerto-like: the theme in strict

worthy of a is

woven

ricercar,

is

style,

aided by two obbHgato voices in counterpoint,

into a dense

noted, there

any-

is

and complicated

fabric.

As Hermann

Keller

not a break in the tension anywhere in the 222-bar

movement; indeed, the four

The compositional

stretto passages only intensify it.^°

rigor

of the

BWV 538

fugue s

strict style is

matched by the consistent form of the preceding toccata movement.

While the Toccata

in

ward momentum, was

F

Major,

still

BWV 540, despite aU

its

urgent for-

divided into various sections, here

we

find

one continuous sixteenth-note motion from beginning to end on the thematic material introduced at the outset:

The Art of the Toccata

487

There

is

no playing around with manual or pedal

solos;

nor

there any of the fantastic sectional structure of the old toccata.

is

The

great variety of changes evident throughout the piece are in the service of the concerto principle, which, while treated unconventionally,^^

amounts

still

to a

breakthough in Bach's organ works.

ritornello does not appear in ritornello

and episode

The

one and the same form, yet the stages of

are set unambiguously,

and the changing forms

taken by the ritornello, which can be heard as derivations from a single underlying motive,^^ allow the listener to hear the

theme, elaboration, and cadence,

The word "unambiguous" Werner Breig) the in

is

as the

scheme of

above example clearly shows.

inaccurate, if we accept (along with

existence of an earlier, lost version of the toccata,^^

which the function of the episodes was not yet completely

In Weimar, Bach ting

is

way

a

work in

its

is

wrestling with the concerto form: yet no one set-

station

own

clear.

on the path

right.

His

to perfection of this form; each

difficulties

is

a

with form do not detract from

the worth of his works; on the contrary, they liberate the creative

power is

to find ever

fascinating

is

new

solutions. In the Toccata in

the tension between two

D Minor, what

modes of time: time rush-

ing by and time hierarchically captured.

One

cannot speak of Bach's toccata

toccatas for clavier, of which the tasy

and Fugue

in

D

Minor,

Weimar, but perhaps not

art

without mentioning the

most important, the Chromatic Fan-

BWV 903, was

until

on the death of Maria Barbara

probably composed in

Cothen, possibly in 1720 Bach.^"^ It

as a

tombeau

was preceded by other ex-

BWV 913 could have come from Arnstadt under Buxtehude's influence; an earlier version of BWV 912, preserved in the Moller Manuscript, could date from this time. Toccatas BWV 914 amples of the form:

488

The

Instrumental

Works

—

and

915 already

show

and end with

signs of the Italian sonata style,

virtuoso fligal passages with violinistic style themes. Toccatas

and

910, 911,

the

Weimar

916, all

from the Andreas Bach Book, have been dated

That Bach often employed

his early toccatas for teaching,

and more

even

heterogeneity and

him they were models of their

type.

But dur-

after his death, the Chromatic Fantasy

was con-

occasional excesses, for life,

to

period.^5

in later years, indicates that despite their stylistic

ing his

BWV

sidered the unrivaled pinnacle of the form.

Only once

in the history

of music, in Arnfried Edler's opinion, "were such different structural

and expressive elements

and instrumental

arpeggios,

All the sources

because of the section

like figuration, free-floating improvisational

call this

word

combined. "^^

recitative so compellingly

work

a fantasy, never a toccata, primarily

recitativo written over the final

movement. This

maze with

presented as a cleverly arranged harmonic

is

wealth of dissonances,

false cadences,

The harmonic scheme was knovm

and enharmonic ambiguities.

as the Devil's Mill^7 in the

theory of the day. Bach attempts in a very small space

motion, as

it

were

matic

scale, as

scale.

As

— the

—

music

in time-lapse

systematic traversal of the keys of the chro-

he does in The Well-Tempered Clavier on a much larger

early a critic as Forkel linked the

admiration

a

— probably based on

two works by noting wdth

the reminiscences of Bach's sons

how Bach had effortlessly "fantasized" through "all twenty- four keys":

He linked the remotest keys together as easily and naturally as the nearest; it

was almost as

of a single

key.

ifhe were modulating in the inner circle

Harshness was

totally alien to his

modulation;

even in transitional passages his chromaticism was as gentle

flowing as if he had remained

in the related diatonic keys only.

His so-called chromaticfantasy, now

am

in print, can prove

what I

saying here. ^^

But the chordal progressions, strict if

and

superficially

random

yet obeying a

hidden organizing principle, are merely the background for

the voice of lamentation that soars above them.

The

recitativo stro-

mamento, an expression of deepest agitation and despair, was part of

The Art of the Toccata

489

opera even in the seventeenth century; but

duced the

it

first

to instrumental music.

instrumental

emotional

state

—

594,^9

but

this

— from

grief

is

at

most

line

harmonically open

—

is

3,

intro-

probably

the portrayal of an

a first-person perspective. Vivaldi's

has a recitative section that

a hint

of what

is

similar

is

for organ as

BWV

to come.

of the section tided "Recitativo" cannot be cate-

gorized as in the recitative

is

Chromatic Fantasy

and Bach himself set a version of it

The melodic

clearly there

was Bach who

work consciously to attempt

concerto Grosso Mogul, opus in this regard,

The

it

it is

style, for it is

not singable, metrically

on many levels

a calculated

a subject here, speaking wordlessly.

free,

or

work of art.^° But

One

is

reminded of

Dorothea Ertmann, a Bach interpreter and a student of Beethoven

who recalled her teacher s visit after the painfiil loss of her

in Vienna,

son: "Instead of expressing his

down

at the piano,

sympathy with words, he

without a word, and extemporized

Connecting these two ideas might seem forced,

know that Beethoven knew the was widely

if

sat right

at length."^!

we

did not

Chromatic Fantasy, which since 1802

available in V^ienna in print as well as in manuscript; in-

deed, he copied parts of

it

himself in

1810.^^

Beethoven

also

com-

posed the Hammerklavier Sonata, opus 106, and the Piano Sonata in A-flat Major, opus no, as a kind of lively conversation with the

Chromatic Fantasy^^ particular,

The

Klagender Gesang ("Song of Lament"), in

from the adagio of opus no, finds

a

model

there:

Klagender Gesang arioso dolente

Beethoven found in the Chromatic Fantasy an intense linkage of subjective emotional expression with formal

work as

in the

baroque tradition

does Rolf

Dammann, and

a high point

as the "presentation

We

can see the

of pathos per

se,"

celebrate the recitative in particular as

of baroque rhetoric in the world of instrumental

music.^5 Or, like Peter Schleuning, anticipate

rigor.^"^

we might

point to features that

Sturm und Drang.^^ Bach has created

a paragon, classic

and unique, on the theme of restraint and freedom, pointing the way 490 The Instrumental Works

to

what was

later called absolute

thentic subjective expression It is

music

and

—

in

its

struggle for both au-

objectifiable form.

not coincidence but necessity that links Bach's model piece

with the expression of suffering and despair: the essential structure of absolute music

is

that of melancholy.

background,

we can

With Theodor W. Adorno's

music theory

as

suffering;

authenticity inheres in this alone, but the subject re-

its

say: the subject is articulated as

mains powerless against the systems that have created

When

art succeeds, its imaginative

power

of

in ridiculing Brahms's

tence,"^^

As

made

inability

we must

subjective

it

might be

melancholy of impo-

of historical

to trace patterns

fugue follows fantasy. Thus the fijgue

must not overpower. Granted,

this fiigue

the subject has not disappeared.

tasy, as

its

influ-

movement

Friedrich

is

an obit:

the

not moderate

matches well the tone of the phan-

the bombastic octave doublings at the end

working out

is

tempering the passion of the fantasy preceding

in character: the fuga pathetica

—

as "the

not define Bach the composer through his reception

With Bach,

jectifying act,

music

this point all too clearly.

productive as

history.

tasie

makes the

an occasion for Utopian thinking. Nietzsche, that "philosopher

life,"

ence,

suffering.^7

dispels the individual

sense of impotence that knowledge triggers; art to act

its

The

make

liberties that

are analogous to those

Wilhelm Marpurg noted

it

clear that

Bach

takes in

he took in the fan-

in his

two-volume Ab-

handlung von der Fuge (1753-54).^^ His having the countersubject enter

on the seventh seemed so oudandish

century

later,

that he corrected

to

Hans von

Biilow, a

it.'^^

Johann Nikolaus Forkel received the Chromatic Fantasy

in the

second decade after Bach's death through Wilhelm Friedemann. Included in his package were these lines of a mutual friend,

who

"liked

to write doggerel":

Anbey kommt an Etwas Music von Sebastian, Sonst genannt: Fantasia chromatica; Bleibt schon in alle Saecula.^^

The Art of the Toccata

491

In this package you can see

Some of Sebastians

pages,

Called Chromatic Fantasy, 'Twill

be lovely through

all

ages.

If a classic, perfectly balanced style exists anywhere in Bach's work, it is

found in the Prelude and Fugue in

to be

work, coming 1727^31,

down

may have been written in the

composing organ works no longer at

Weimar) but

a specific idea.

Tempered so great

With

all

copy from the years

when Bach was

Leipzig period,

for his

immediate needs

to produce masterpieces, each

Clavier, the

is

B Minor, BWV 544. The

to us as an autograph in fair

work a

(as

he had

deliberation

on

due respect to the preludes of The Well-

B -minor

organ prelude leaves one astonished,

Bach's art in bringing together a small ensemble of ideas

into an integral, self-generating

But no gain

is

form that avoids every stereotype.

made without some

now been abandoned. With

its

loss:

the toccata principle has

dramatic nature, oriented about the

player as subject, and featuring a rhapsodic flow of ideas, the toccata is

not the best vehicle to present a work of all-encompassing orga-

nization and self-contained structure.

form exclusively

— although no longer

fashion he favored in

His approach

The

is

Bach now

Weimar and

uses the concerto

in the comparatively naive

integrated into the toccata form.

highly reflective and subtle.

organist as interpreter

is

the

first

to sense this: if he tries to

distinguish between tutti and solos as in a regular organ concerto

movement, switching from one manual covers that such change

is

to another, he quickly dis-

not possible, for the solo episode does not

lead immediately back to the ritornello. Furthermore, the episodes are dovetailed with the subsequent ritornellos in a

way

out the work's idea of unity rather than contrast. arranged on this pattern:

Ritornello with cadence

on the tonic

(16 bars)

Episode with motif i plus ritornello with cadence on the

dominant 492

The

(26 bars)

Instrumental

Works

that brings

The

piece

is

i

Episode with motif i plus ritomello with cadence on the tonic parallel (13 bars)

Episode with motif 2 plus ritomello with cadence on the

subdominant

(13

bars)

Episode with motifs 2 and

i

plus ritomello with cadence

on the

tonic (16 bars)

The most meaningflil element of the

traditional concerto

movement: while

the ritomello, loses significance in the course of this at the first

and second appearance

it is

by the third and fourth appearances respectively.

bow,

Even

at the

as it were: it is

This ritomello

it is

its full

reduced to

rest, headless, in just six

head motif, development, epilogue sophisticated structure of

The

bars,

for a final

measures.

is

recognizable

melody and counterpoint

which the pedal

is

—

that

is,

a highly

in four to five

thematically interwoven with great

what

a compositional

gem we

us:

first

episode

the solo part unfolds. thickens.

and eight

— Bach has composed

ease. Just a glance at the score reveals

have before

six

not a ritomello in the usual sense of the word:

though the pattern of Vivaldi- type themes

voices, into

glory for sixteen bars,

end the ritomello does not return

put to is

in

movement,

is

easily identifiable: while the pedal

But

in the

is

silent,

second half of the section, the plot

Segments of episodes combine with shortened segments of The Art of the Toccata

493

the ritornello; there

But

it is

is

more development,

and complexity.

intensity,

not sufficient merely to note that here he

is

composing more

procedurally in the sense of Viennese classicism than in the con-

He

certed style of the age of the continuo.

is

establishing an almost mathematical balance

visibly

concerned with

among the

nine parts of

the prelude. Ulrich Siegele has proposed the theory, and proved

many cases,

that in his later years

Bach

it

in

forms according

laid out his

to mathematical ratios."^^

The prelude exacdy in

half.

is

divided at bar 43, by the cadence to the dominant,

Assuming the form has

five parts,

Christian Martin

Schmidt has found further symmetries: the two framing sections of 16 bars each

embrace a second part of 26

part of 13 bars each

—

that

bars,

and a third and fourth

again 26 bars together. ^3

is,

Another proportionality is that of the golden

named

culated using the Fibonacci sequence,

i, i, 2,

3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34,

more

the sequence one goes, the

This

is

cal-

after the thirteenth-

century mathematician, in which each term

preceding two:

section.

is

sum of

the

the

and so on. The further along

closely the ratio of the

two preced-

ing sections approximates the ratio one would get by dividing the entire

span by the golden section. Even the

close to this ratio; but 8:13 relates to the

and fourth

is

second (16:26)

(16: 13

+

13) in

the same as 16:26.

as the fifth

was unconscious.

certo

of

first

part

portions together are 32 bars, the

It

arts,

is

in the ratio of 8:13.

would be hard

or whether this use of his eye

to see the proportions of the pre-

five parts as a coincidence: instead

movement

tutti

the

could argue at length whether Bach consciously worked

with proportions from the visual

ludes

Thus

does to the combined third

three middle sections comprise 52: this, too,

One

comes passably

the ratio of the smaller part to the larger in

The two frame

the golden section.

8:13 ratio

and

structure

solos,

and

its

of adopting standard con-

more or

less arbitrary alternations

he created a sequential form with a proportional

scheme expressly designed

for this

unique work.

It

may be

allusion to the golden section will at least prepare the

idea of proportion in Bach's works.

494 The Instrumental Works

that this

ground

for the

The

classic aspect

of the

chitecture; another critical

is

element of the work

not limited to

its

ar-

highly organized

is its

of order and expressiveness. Seldom are these qualities seen

relation

together at such a

power.

B -minor prelude

One

the prelude possesses extraordinary rhetorical

level:

can hardly find another organ movement of Bach with

such extensive vocal structure throughout. While the voices do not quite sing, to an unusual degree they speak, lation.

and with detailed

So many gestures with such varied nuance

articu-

are otherwise

found

only in the vocal-instrumental choral and aria settings.

Hermann

Keller reveals an instinct for such associations in his

B -minor

observation that the

from the B-Minor Mass and the parisons can be pushed too

the St

Matthew

mental gallant

Passion

style.

far,

aria

but

"Erbarme

dich."''^'^

the Kyrie

Such comfrom

this reference to the aria

shows the prelude's

Above

mind

prelude brings to

with the senti-

affinity

a dancelike pedal part that

is

just a bit

ponderous, there are note patterns that might be understood as syncopes in the sense of shifted notes, and

overlay, as regression,

that stylistically

sound remarkably modern. The

all

tied legatos

and

suspensions in the pedal voice precisely match Jacob Adlung's con-

modern organ

cept of

touches, the piece

But despite such contemporary

playing.^5

not in accord with the

still is

naturalness: the contrapuntal setting

work of the

voices

is

B-minor prelude

—

that

is,

level

it

tion

in the Prelude in E-flat Major,

of the gallant

— more

like the

Despite

its

style,

by and

last

strates

BWV 552, which opens the

Though large

this piece also has

it is

a

more

—

after the

—

F-major

toccata,

the overall design

how

it

it.

BWV 540,

is

time, with the help of Italian concerto form.

not just

some

austere concep-

French overture form that inspired

length

Bach's longest organ prelude

One

of classicism that he attained in

harmonized whole. But he probably

third part of the Clavier-Ubung. traces

too complex, the filigree

the union of diverse formal ideas with

expressive means, resulting in a

equaled

of

too intricate.

Bach never surpassed the the

is

Zeitgeist's ideal

it is

never obscure.

Bach demon-

helps regulate simple passages so that they are

The Art of the Toccata

495

how

understood but also

easily

it

helps create structures that are the

equal of those in the future sonata movement.

which

closes the third part of the Clavier-Ubung,

and

parts,

The

earlier

overall design

its

fugues

it

is

fugue in E-flat, divided in three

With

the height of perfection.

is

might have been possible

to separate

Bach's

and remove

this

or that exposition passage without toppling the whole structure; here

He has overlaid so many elements of symme-

it is

no longer

try,

key arrangement, musical procedurality, and rhythmic transfor-

possible.

mation, that removing one stone would bring the whole edifice down. It is

more than mere speculation

both in the

Trinity,

tripartite structure

three themes of the prelude tional ideas

to see references to the

— Bach

from outside the

field

of the fugue

artist s

The

own

likes to appropriate organiza-

— but

two of which

three themes,

—

as

meant

are

to be a legacy of the is

not a bit abstract.

throughout the move-

are paired

ment, run the scale of beauty from sublime to charming. at first

sounds

like a

initial stile antico

are symbolic

dance

theme,

finale,

but toward the end

now with

like this

were the toccatas and

philosophy. Yet this music

artistic

as well as in the

of music. Compositions

are not written primarily for the listener

fugues of the immediate past

Holy

it

The

third

returns to

different rhythmic figures,

I

its

which

of the coincidentia oppositorum, the sign of the divine

essence.

In this chapter, the organ toccatas and preludes were presented in chronological order.

Having

finished our presentation,

apologize for this approach, but qualify give us

little

relative one.

it

we do

not

to this extent: the sources

support for an absolute chronology and clues only for a

Thus caution

tivisticaUy, that

is

advisable.

Bach progressed

We

should not claim, posi-

in a straight line. After

all,

for him,

what was progress?

As mentioned

earlier,

there

he established them, became again

— but were they

a

the ones

different versions of these

may be

musical standards that, once

Rubicon he did not want

we imagine

the Prelude and

Fugue

496 The Instrumental Works

The many

works for keyboard instruments prove that

he kept refining models, not dropping them. is

they were?

to cross

for Clavier in

One

striking

example

A Minor, BWV 894, dating,

1

without dispute, from Weimar. In his

and adapted

it

for the first

certo for Flute, Violin,

and

last

final years,

movements of the

and Harpsichord

in

showing what he could do when he wanted tics

Triple

Con-

A Minor, BWV 1044, to.

Typical characteris-

of the original are seen again in his rewrite but are presented

more coherently and

at greater length.'^^

biography cannot avoid attempts are

he revised the work

at a

Generally speaking, a Bach

chronology; but where there

no fixed points of orientation, the biography can

gestions for a historical approach to his

offer only sug-

art.

The Art of the Toccata

497

THE ORGAN CHORALES More than two hundred chorales arranged for organ have come down to us under the name of Johann Sebastian Bach. Much of the art

of composition he learned through arranging chorales for organ,

and

later

he used the genre for teaching composition to his students.

Although he was

actively a professional organist only until his thirty-

third year, he continued to arrange his

life. It

tret' ich"

may be just

was the

last

hymns

for organ until the

a legend that the chorale " Vbr

end of

deinem Thron

composition he worked on, but the hymns of

the church and their skillful adaptation were as defining for his as a Christian

and composer of sacred music

and

as the Bible

its

life

in-

terpretation were for a Protestant theologian of the time.

There

are serious questions about the transmission

chorales, starting with the authenticity of

many

of Bach's

pieces that exist

only as secondary manuscripts: a 1997 catalogue of organ chorales

of dubious provenance also

needed

plete

lists

198 numbers!^

for partially corrupt versions,

A critical examination

some of which

are a

is

com-

muddle, where Bach's pupils scribbled down their teacher's

chorale transcriptions and continued composing

them

for their

own

purposes.

In this situation,

we must abandon

versions that are authentic. It

is

the idea of reconstructing

better to look at the entire field of

source transmission as evidence of a productive engagement with Bach's organ works.

Some of his

chorale transcriptions

to the nineteenth century via their use in 498

The

Instrumental

Works

church

came down

services,

where

they underwent further "composition." The Well-Tempered Clavier also did not

mained

need to be rediscovered: Bach's cantus firmus music

in continuous use

among

re-

the cognoscenti.

In the organ chorales, the authentic Bach can be found primarily in

the

collections

he created himself: the

Orgelbuchlein,

BWV

BWV 669-89 from the third part Eighteen Chorales, BWV 651-68, from

599-644; the chorale transcriptions

of the Clavier-Ubung; the

on "Vom Himmel hoch," BWV 769; and the organ transpositions, BWV 645-50, known as the Schiibler Chorales. The early chorale adapta-

the Leipzig original manuscript; the Canonic Variations

tions

BWV 1090-1120

from the Neumeister Collection,

the fifty or so chorales in the range all

as well as

BWV 690-765, which are beyond

doubt authentic, cannot be considered here, even though we thus

give short shrift to Bach's early forays in composition, as well as to a

number of important engagements with

central

and north German

models.

But we

will at least

touch on the

hymn accompaniments

of the

Arnstadt period, which earned Bach the criticism mentioned earlier in the biographical section

—

that

is,

that they did

the congregational singing than to keep

ments

to "Allein

Gott

in der

Christmas chorales "Gelobet dulci jubilo,"

BWV

729,

Hoh

sei

seist du,

it

together.

more

to confiise

The accompani-

BWV 715, to the four Christ," BWV 722, "In

Ehr,"

Jesu

"Lobt Gott,

ihr Christen, allzugleich,"

BWV 738, as well as to "Herr Jesu Christ dich zu uns wend," BWV 726, have

BWV 732,

and "Vom Himmel hoch, da

come down

to us in

komm

ich her,"

complete form, though largely through his

Weimar and Leipzig pupils. Meanwhile, ness of these pieces, there

is little

in

view of the mischievous-

reason to deny that he accompa-

nied the Arnstadt congregation in the

manner

Later in his teaching and practice he

may have

that caused complaint.^

seen this style as one

of his early trademarks. Perhaps, winking an eye, he entertained his students with stories of his earlier wranglings with the Arnstadt

church authorities.

A good example of Bach's Arnstadt hauteur can be found in the opening of "Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns wend,"

BWV 726. At the

The Organ Chorales

499

end of the

ond

line

instead of the expected D major there a sixG major in false cadence, which at the start of the sec-

first line,

chord in

five

is

is

C

resolved to

major

— but only

after the

two

The

connected by a tonal garland of thirty-second notes.

lines are

rather as-

tringent harmonizations of the final line probably "confounded" con-

gregations outside Arnstadt as well.

We might see such works as the attempt to secure maximum independence and virtuosity even the accompaniment.

mettle as

The

much

The young Turk wanted

tory, there

of,

derives not only

goes

much

from

art.

his musical

first

large project of

further: for the first time in

The

music his-

structural integrity of a composition

a high degree

idea, in the tradition

of consistent form and coherence.

of Theodor

W.

Adorno,

One example

is

work and

the

first

phony: on the one hand,

it

the material that

movement of is

is

being shaped.

Beethoven's Fifth

comes from

own

intrinsic disciplines;

a dialectical relation

between the

ordering of the tones and the intention of the composer.

500 The Instrumental Works

Sym-

defined by motivic-thematic, har-

monic, and dynamic processes, with their its life, its vitality,

relevant only

is

be perceived between the

aesthetically plausible dialogue can

subject that shapes the

but

show

appears a cycle of works that pursues and reflects the idea

of an integral work of

when an

to

of musical forms,

as possible.

rigorousness of the Orgelbuchlein, the

Bach we know

The

for that simplest

Of course,

everyone, including Bach, has forerunners. In their

cantus firmus masses both Guillaume

aimed

compositions that in modern terminology might be called

at

works of art. In

integral

Dufay and Josquin Desprez

his Gradualia

of 160^ and 1606 William Byrd

expressly tried a similar idea in an even

more comprehensively

cyclic

work.

But much of these gains

seventeenth century wore on. So one

lost as the

in Bach's Orgelbuchlein a ishingly,

in the philosophical

with a

series

new beginning

is

of small pieces that are

way, the Orgelbuchlein

is

justified in seeing

for this philosophy

— aston-

more than accom-

little

paniments to a cantus firmus that could be sung this

dimension were

like a song.

Seen in

a direct continuation of the Arnstadt

organ chorales. Yet the integral quality of the work was achieved by dispensing with a

nomenon

By

fiill

working out of the cantus firmus. This phe-

deserves a brief digression.

Bach's time, instrumental variations or figurations

melody of

a sacred or secular

nated in folk music.

They gave

on the

song had a long tradition that the

origi-

accompaniment of strophic music

more variety, and perhaps provided commentary on

it

as well.

By the

sixteenth century, similar practices gave rise to written variations for

keyboard instruments. For music making in the home, variations on secular songs provided an educational transition

from mere compe-

tence to expertise in playing an instrument. In the church context, chorale arrangements per omnes versus were suitable as music to be

performed in alternatim fashion during Communion: the congregation or choir sang the tita,

hymn verse, the hymn verse,

followed by a second

organist played his a

second

partita,

first

par-

and so on.

Since the verses performed by the organ were not meant stricdy as

accompaniment could assume

to the congregational singing, the chorale

new forms from

Four chorale

partitas, as

melody

verse to verse.

they came to be known, are attributed to

Bach: "Christ, der du bist der heUe Tag,"

BWV

766,

"O

Gott, du

BWV 767, "Sei gegnif^et, Jesu gutig," BWV 768, and ich Sunder machen," BWV 770. They exist only as

frommer Gott," "Ach, was

soil

The Organ Chorales

501

copies and so are difficult to date exactly, but are generally assigned by

Bach relied

scholars to Arnstadt or the early

on

traditional central

Weimar

period.

Bach

largely

and north German models and

ex-

is

pectably less original here than in other forms.

There may be

particular reasons for this traditionality: the se-

quential patterning of the chorale partita does not lend itself to a

writing style aimed at creating a logical structure. During the several

phases of his work on "Sei

of the chorale

partitas,

gegriifiet,

Jesu

giitig,"

Bach may have come

form, finally abandoning

it

considered the

to feel uneasy

last

with the

to give his compositional efforts a differ-

ent focus: a series of chorale movements, each of which could be

considered a model of its type.^

He does not take up hymn or chorale

arrangements ^^r omnes versus again until his

last years

— under other

circumstances and on the highest plane: in the Goldberg Variations,

BWV 988, BWV 769.

and the Canonic Variations on "Vbm Himmel hoch,"

This new concept did not come out of the blue and was not

re-

Bach took some of the chorale arrangements

for

alized

all at

once:

the Orgelbuchlein from an existing collection of them"^ and gradually

added the

others.

He may

chorales for everyday use,

first

have considered writing a book of

and then gradually formed a plan

more

his efforts systematically to a

to turn

clear-cut compositional project.

Klaus-Jiirgen Sachs has looked closely at the subtitle,

which

points out that the Orgelbuchlein offers the "beginning organist" instruction in "developing a chorale in it

many diverse

ways."

He

sees in

Bach's "compositional-didactic intent" to offer "examples of an ad-

vanced school of figuration."^ Actually, the pieces of the Orgelbuchlein

not only pick up the long tradition of the chorale partita and

secular song variation but also

ideas such as those suggested

ond

add

to the tradition

wdth

by Friedrich Erhard Niedt

The

BWV 643:

Instrumental

Works

The

fol-

as a preliminary

version of the five -note figure in Bach's chorale "Alle

miissen sterben,"

figural

in the sec-

part of his Musikalische Handleitung, published in 1706.

lowing three-note figure of Niedt s^ could be taken

502

new

Menschen

Bach

Niedt

While

for

Niedt "figuration" means

filling

out a bass line with figured

note patterns that are rhythmically and melodically congruent, Bach

much

goes

fiirther.

A glance at the pedal part reveals that he too fol-

lowed the normal practice of his

which moves

largely

He

sixteenth-notes figures.

and

ever,

this

is

craft in embellishing the bass line,

quarter-note values, with

in

confines himself to a single figure,

appropriate for this particular melody.

is,

More, Bach consistently works

it

as the material for a

the same time this setting characteristic quality it

for a setting that takes this

om-

which occasionally includes even the hymn tune,

nipresent motif, utilizes

how-

not formulaic but in Heinrich Besseler s terminology

"characteristic, "7 that

and

and

eighth-

is

is

At

dense contrapuntal structure.

more or

less transparent, so

the motif s

not lost in the fabric of the different voices;

brought out with rhetorical emphasis. In the context of the

is

chorale's

message

— human mortality— "God knows

conic commentary: set to the

that

is

it

can even be taken

so"

—

as a la-

these words could be

motif

Because of

its

"picturesque" qualities, Albert Schweitzer called

Orgelbuchlein a veritable "lexicon of Bach's tonal language."

the

Without

it,

Schweitzer thought,

it

would be impossible

to under-

stand what Bach was trying to express in the themes of his cantatas

and passions.^ In

fact,

though. Bach made extensive use of compa-

rable short motifs even in his vocal

works

— and of course

in the

most various semantic contexts.

A link

half century

later,

Heinrich Besseler

set

out to trace a direct

from Bach's "organ songs without words" and

accompaniment" ment:

to

Franz Schubert's Lieder with piano accompani-

"What we have

the romantic song, as later.

'Gretchen

am

their "distinctive

before us it

is

nothing

less

than the prototype of

appeared with Schubert one hundred years

Spinnrad' and 'Erlkonig

move

ent emotional world, but their forms follow the

in a very differ-

same

principle. "9

The Organ Chorales

503

One

can make judgments

of Schweitzer and Besseler

like those

only by emphasizing the work's poetic element over

its

structure.

Robert Schumann would never have thought of doing such a thing: to him, the preludes

and fugues of The Well-Tempered Clavier vf^r^

"character pieces of the highest order"; but he also praised their "pro-

foundly deductive, combinatory nature."^° probably provided to

The

Orgelbuchlein

was

Schumann by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy

a partial manuscript; he

would presumably have described

like "Alle

Menschen miissen

metaphor

for the intertwining of order with expression.

as

work

a

sterben" as an arabesque, a romantic

We can understand the Orgelbuchlein as the product of the music theory of

its era,

or interpret

it

against an aesthetic backdrop that

takes into account the musical experience of the nineteenth cen-

tury

— both

viev^^oints have merit.

But there

is

a third approach:

seeing the settings of the Orgelbuchlein as evidence of a dialectical en-

gagement with

The

and

specific rules

organ must perform a

rules are self-evident: the

manner that

in such a

it

for

an

artfiilly

Some

its last

Bach

with the

device: aside

first

restrictions are not dictated

hymn

by the form but

no

tune and

is

arise

from the

a setting for four voices

melody and accompaniment

themselves but, with the pedal as an equal partner, fuse to

a greater whole, a well- articulated

they are not carrying the cantus firmus. cantus firmus, but the setting has

determined aspect of music to free itself

This

mus was

The

is

small devi-

and thoroughly worked out

contrapuntal structure: the voices remain freely improvised

504

tune

note.

that do not divide the fiinctions of

make

from

note of the

of the composer. Bach's aim here

free will

among

even out loud. There

era,

wrought framing

ations, the setting begins

ends with

hymn

could be silently sung along during the piece

and, given the tempi of the

room

liberties.

is

from

is

its

own

never lose sight of the

intrinsic logic: the socially

obvious throughout, even as

it

seems

it.

an advance over the chorale

clearly

We

when

primary and

Instrumental

Works

its

partitas: there, the cantus fir-

figuration secondary; here, there

is

an exciting tension between the melody and

From

this viewpoint, Besseler s

tic

accompaniment

Lieder ohne Worte;

seems

mental

—

it

as in Gretchen

am

like

and Webern studied

is

no

Spinnrad or Mendelssohn's

an essential part of the structure, not orna-

has an expressive meaning of its

Composers

the characteris-

less apt:

Bach provides the chorale tune

that

it is

characteristic setting.

suggested comparison of the Orgel-

buchlein settings to Schubert's songs

perpetuum mobile,

its

own

as well.

Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms, Schonberg, settings such as these instead

of Schubert's

songs: they are the philosophers of the guild, as opposed to the singers like Monteverdi, Schiitz, Handel, bert,

and Verdi

(if

we may

Telemann, Mozart, Schu-

oversimplify). Bach's art fascinates the

philosophers, because even in a short and formally unproblematic setting (not unlike a formula)

embraces the tensions of order

it still

and expressiveness, of poiesis and mimesis, autonomy and heteron-

omy

— thus

the whole of music itself

This quality Bach;

is

seen not just in the

work of

the mature or late

apparent very early on, vividly in the Orgelbuchlein. In the

it is

organ chorale "Der Tag der

ist

so freudenreich,"

the three figured voices has

its

own

BWV 605, each of

character yet also complements

the others.

iZi-ni i^-Mi

The

^^

^J3

^^.-m i^-J^^^^^

material being used for the figuration has

structural

and

that of "Alle stereotypes,

gestural. In other ways, the setting

Menschen

and the bass

is

two

less

fiinctions:

elegant than

miissen sterben": the middle voices are line

is

formulaic; the line endings are over-

emphasized, to the disadvantage of the flow of the whole.

The work,

possibly one of the older pieces of the Orgelbuchlein^

documents

The Organ Chorales

505

work of

Bach's inclination to pursue the integral

throughout

if

art; it is

present

not perfectly realized in every measure.

A number of settings put traditional counterpoint techniques on display

—

method

for example, the canonic leading of the cantus firmus.

requires particular skill with voice leading in the

niment and

is

a technique at

though he had

set (even

which Bach was not expert

tried

it

in a

Collection), as dissonances inevitably crop

and

633.

tus firmus has the coloration

at the out-

of the north

up between the two

BWV 600,

BWV 614,

In chorales like

accompa-

few chorales of the Neumeister

voices of the canon; examples of this are 624, 629,

This

622,

and

German

arrangement of "Christum wir sollen loben schon,"

608, 618-20, 641, the

can-

tradition, or the

BWV 611, with

the cantus firmus in the alto voice.

The

"picturesque" element that so fascinated Schweitzer plays a

role in almost all the pieces in the Orgelbuchlein.

The beginning of

Adams Fall ist ganz verderbt," BWV 637, shows how much Bach enjoyed "bringing out" this exceedingly simple, even formulaic hymn tune through daring harmonies and bizarre

the setting "Dutch just

motifs.

Not only the Arnstadt

may have

struck

handedness than

Adam's

fall is

many

chorales but settings like these as well

listeners

more

as

examples of

artistic

high-

of the

hymn

texts.

as respectful interpretations

imitated not only in the diminished sevenths of the

pedal but also in the

downward movement of the tenor voice and

labored efforts in the alto to

rise

back up again. Diagonally

the

intersect-

ing voice leadings, hard dissonances, and rapid changes in harmonic direction

We

make

the listener uneasy."

could apply traditional figuration theory to the

monic and compositional 506

The

Instrumental

Works

liberties

many

har-

taken here^^ or see them as expres-

sive dissonance, to use the ory.

But any attempt

language of modern emotive music the-

with

to deal

this

counter an element of radicality that

is

musical material will en-

difficult to reconcile

with the

The

simple concept of accompanying and interpreting a chorale. leading of the quite unsingable pedal voice part, although

perfecdy symmetrical to the final affirmation,

is

twelve-tone compositions of Arnold Schonberg

song "Tot" from opus

compromising as

48. It

style that is

Weimar, and

in a

it

remains

reminiscent of the

—

for instance, the

usually the late Bach's strict and un-

is

vaunted; but the style appeared as early

work with

a tide as harmless as "Little

Organ

Book."

The many other chorale arrangements of the Weimar period no match self

may

for the concentrated

power of the

have taken this view; in his

collecting a

number of them

Orgelbuchlein.

last years,

are

Bach him-

he made a point of

into an anthology. This collecting prob-

ably had a purpose similar to that of the second part of The Well-

Tempered Clavier: in the absence of a printed work, to provide his students and admirers with a manuscript compilation of works typical

The

of the genre.

collection

was supposed

to contain perhaps

twenty-four pieces; however, the so-called Leipzig Originalhandschrift

Mus. MS Bach P271 contains only the Eighteen Chorales,

BWV 651-68,

of which the

last

—"Vbr deinem Thron

generally conceded to be incomplete. in older versions

view the collection

priate to

Almost

as

—

is

the pieces also exist

period, so

it is

appro-

exemplary of Bach's Weimar organ

chorale writing outside the Orgelbuchlein;

them

all

stemming from the Weimar

tret ich"

at this point, shuttling at will

we

shall therefore discuss

between the Weimar and

later

Leipzig versions.

With

the Eighteen Chorales, the variety of detail that the pieces

of the Orgelbuchlein exhibit in the frame of an unchanging form

is

extended to embrace a multiplicity of different compositional

styles.

To underscore

comes

the collection's ambition, at the very beginning

the great chorale fantasy in the

Weimar

version

manual three-part

"Komm,

Heiliger Geist, Herre Gott," here

BWV 651a.

fiague

on

a

This should be thought of

theme from the

first line

as a

of the chorale;

The Organ Chorales

507

here and there, bits of the cantus firmus are played in the pedal in

long-value notes.

The word fugue does In

stile antico.

its

not imply a dense contrapuntal structure in

fantasy element, the

movement

BWV 540

of a concerted toccata, perhaps the toccata

which was discussed

key,

most evident

in detail earlier.

in the middle of the

reminiscent more

is

The

in the

same

concerted element

movement, where the cantus

is

fir-

mus

pauses for nine and a half measures: Bach takes advantage of

this

opportunity to insert a concertante episode with a sighing motif

that,

with

The

its

later

version, with

many

thirds,

sounds almost

its

truncated cantus firmus.

ened the movement by more than bars were

new composition;

lier version.

is

the

first

this

it is

to

show his

no accident that

respect for this

this invocation

of

piece in the collection.

bition in his approach to the Eighteen Chorales. It too

"Komm,

he length-

BWV 652, also shows the extent of Bach's am-

second piece,

the chorale

Weimar

although only a quarter of the

Without question he wanted

Holy Ghost

The

half,

To remedy

his

the rest derived from the text of the ear-

venerable Lutheran chorale: the

flirtatious.

Bach of Leipzig was no longer happy with

Heiliger Geist, Herre Gott" but

is

devoted to

composed

alio

modoy a sign that Bach was reaching into his musical storehouse to give a demonstration of the art of chorale arranging. This longest of his

all

organ chorales

is

more

traditional than

its

predecessor;

it

may

even be a historical model in the image of Bohm, Buxtehude,

Bruhns, or Reinken. Each

line

an imitative setting in the tenor,

of the

hymn

appears sequentially in

alto, pedal; finally it is

colored in the

soprano. Bach's observance of this principle outdoes that of his predecessors, but consistency does not give this didactic

spark of the

BWV 651:

its

work

quite the

concertante wtrwo, has yielded to a saraband-

like gravity.

"An Wasserflussen Babylon," the north piece is

German

had anything

tradition,

to

BWV 653, the third work,

but

do with

his

it is

Hamburg debut

said to have improvised "almost a half hour"

508

The

Instrumental

Works

is

also in

doubtfiil that this meditative

on

in 1720,

when he

this chorale,

mov-

ing the nearly hundred-year-old ute: "I

thought

you."^^

The

through

had died

Reincken to make the

out, but I see that

next piece, the arrangement of the

BWV 654, has

Mendelssohn Bartholdy loved

from Munich in the

fall

Communion chorale own reception his-

its

and wrote to

it

liebe Seele.

and sounds so moving,

shudder all

over.

and a very

4 foot one which

use

a manual which

is

a gentle

oboe,

a

consists

clairon,

//

is

I start

to play

were made

as if it

(Sfeet) for the

throughout —you know that from there

"

that every time

I use a flute pipe

quiet

his sister

of 1831:

Seb. Bach's ''Schmucke dich, it,

in

charm

its

In fact, Fanny, here I have found the proper registration

for

on

lives

version in the Eighteen Chorales works

"Schmiicke dich, o liebe Seele," tory. Felix

it

trib-

subde ornamentation in the French mode.

its

The

this art

Adam

to play

moving

I

it,

voices,

floats above the chorale

But for

the chorale

wholly of reed stops,

and there I

Berlin.

very soft, 4feet,

and a viola. This im-

bues the whole chorale with a peaceful sound, as though they were

far-offhuman

voices,

singing the choralefrom the bottom oftheir

hearts.^^

Mendelssohn enjoyed performing the work in Leipzig an essay entided

Neue

"Monument

Zeitschrift fiir

Musik

ftir

as well.

In

Beethoven" appearing in his journal

in 1836,

Robert Schumann under the nom

deplume "Jonathan" addressed Mendelssohn with these words:

And

then you, Felix Meritis, a

""schmiicke dich

hung about

andjoy

Seele, "

the cantus firmus,

into

it,

all to you.

Four years erer

meine

of the

St.

and

there

mind and

were gilded garlands

and you poured

that you confessed to

you of every hope and

them

great

played one of the Chorales with variations: the text was

heart,

rob

man of both

such blissfulness

me yourself,

belief, this

''if life

were

to

one chorale would restore

"^5

later, in

the Thomaskirche at Leipzig, the rediscov-

Matthew Passion held an organ

recital that

The Organ

was unusual

Chorales

509

for the time, since

it

was devoted

exclusively to

Johann Sebastian

The

Bach, to benefit his promotion of a Bach memorial. included "Schmiicke dich, o liebe Seele." tic,

Schumann was

concert

enthusias-

saying that the concert provided "the pleasure of double mastery,

with one master interpreting the other," and he characterized the organ chorale

comes from

as "a priceless,

profoundly

felt

work of music, such

as

a true artistic temperament."^^

Philipp Spitta was not far behind: for him, the work's formal peculiarities,

completely understandable in terms of the genre history,

were mere colors to help "present and complete an inner portrait of solemn, subdued heavenly rapture."^7 In his

last years,

Albert

Schweitzer wrote, on the basis of old manuscripts: Truly the portrayal of atmosphere in this y

A strain

one of a kind. it.

Communion piece

of mystical sensuality runs

all

through

The idea of the soul as the loving bride of Christ, which

text borrowsfrom the

and

the

Song ofSongs, andfrom the concept ofthe

banquet, plays into the portrayal of eucharistic

celestial

is

lends this languorous music a

bliss,

movement of shuddering

^'^

ecstasy.

Certainly the eucharistic mysticism attaching to the chorale has

helped give cide

it its

special rank.

But

for us today,

whether the saraband-like setting

is

difficult to

it is

due to the

chorale's

de-

being

an enlarged and elevated rendition of the north German "colored" chorale, or

due to

its

solemn and meditative

mood

—

a

mood

that

can be realized completely only in the context of the Eucharist.

There tings

are

few organ chorales of Bach that combine hymn

and four-part counterpoint so unpretentiously. This

is

set-

one

piece from the Orgelbuchlein that has been raised to the level of the

monumental, but invested with motifs that tive or figured as

thirds

and

flowing and expressive.

sixths can be seen, in

are not so

The

much

lovely passages in

Schumann's phrase,

as gilded gar-

lands entwined about a cantus firmus, which itself has

arabesque or hieroglyph.

510

The

Instrumental

Works

figura-

become an

The wend,"

fifth chorale

BWV 655,

is

arrangement, "Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns

not a

hymn setting but a sonata movement. This

composition, described as a

organ sonata

— but here

trio, anticipates

it is

the trio

movement of an

assigned a particular task: to

dible the material of the cantus firmus.

make

au-

This happens in two ways:

in

a structure of Italianate grandness, the concertante opening section

presents a ritornello that takes

up the

triad fanfares

of the chorale's

beginning; a shorter final section adds to the upper voices, which play on undeterred, a ground bass

composed of nothing

less

than the

entire cantus firmus.

This conception could have originated there

was

and so the court organist may have

certo,

ter to his

in the

image

the organ.

The

if

felt it

would add

local princelings

must have perked up

when one

a

which

hymn

in a spirited this

in der

ending segues into the

experiment with the

Hoh

a

little

lus-

sei

Ehr,"

their ears

and

day, in a festive court service,

Bach introduced the German Gloria with

To

court:

he showed what he could do with these forms on

then nodded approvingly,

Gott

Weimar

of the sonata and con-

lively interest there in the Italian arts

trio,

modern in

trio

movement,

its last

few

Bach added another:

bars.

"Allein

BWV 664fa/b. After an extended opening The Organ Chorales

511

which

section,

gives the first line of the chorale

opportunity to

its

have a word, at length, and in the pedal, the middle section allows strictly concertante

ures

and

tion

is

elements to take the stage, with brilliant triad

to

final

remind the congregation which hymn

This procedure reproach. "^9

in the opinion of

is

is

to be

it is

stiU

sung next.

Werner Breig "not beyond

Indeed, the Leipzig Bach would probably not have

composed anything more along these tion in the

fig-

reminiscence of the opening sec-

although only two lines of the hymn,

relatively short:

enough

The

sequences.

trill

lines.

The primary

numbers of the Clavier-Ubung, part

3,

for

considera-

him was

the

presentation and profound reflection on the cantus firmus. Another trio

on

"Allein

Gott

in der

Hoh

Ehr,"

sei

cluded has a classical balance. Soon piece of

Weimar

As Franz Schubert

certo a century earlier

of his professional conjure with.

modern

He

is

this

it.

supposed to have "paved the way to the

Weimar may have found

by experimenting in

is

this via the chorale

way to

the con-

formed the core

temperamentally incapable of taking over the

Italian concerto it

the

areas that

in his circle

remarkable idea for music history to

activities ... a

simply must adapt

to

also in-

Bach incorporated

symphony" through the chamber music he created

of friends,^° so Bach at

him

after.

is

boldness without great change in the Eighteen

Chorales, showing that he stood by

large

BWV 676, that

form without distance or

to his style in order to

is

make

it

reflection;

his

he

own. Doing

only superficially a detour. In reality

it

allows

enhance the basic ideas of the sonata and the concerto, forms

with an emphasis on melody, with those features that played a cal role in his

own

art: skillfijUy

criti-

worked out motifs and themes and

obbligato, largely contrapuntal settings.

Bach was

at his best as a

firmus arrangements.

By

composer and

interpreter of cantus

transferring the potential of this art form,

already over a century old, to the idea of concerted music, he established the foundation for the absolute music of Viennese classicism,

whose sonata movement, while not

identical

with a formal-harmonic

scheme, contains the above-mentioned elements of motivic and the-

512

The

Instrumental

Works

matic work and a coherent compositional

style.

Not just

the minia-

ture pieces of the Orgelbuchlein but also one-of-a-kind experiments like the chorale trio "Allein

from

dinarily successful

plies to the expressive

Gott

in der

sei

Ehr" were extraor-

a musical history perspective.

The same

ap-

melodic work of the thirty-year-old composer

of cantatas: Weimar's Bach was up to

The

Hoh

it.

variety of forms of the Eighteen Chorales

might even

in-

clude works dating from before the composition of the Orgelbuchlein.

Given

its

loose form and lack of overall structure, "J^sus Christus,

BWV 666a, could be the earliest, followed a bit later by the chorale "Nun danket alle Gott," BWV 657a, an amazing amunser Heiland,"

plification style

of the four-part organ chorale with pre-imitations in the

of Pachelbel.

men,"

BWV 182,

The

1714 cantata

"Himmelskonig,

willkom-

sei

has a final chorale of similar construction, "Jesu,

deine Passion."

In other movements the compositional techniques of the Orgelbuchlein are continued. In

"Komm, Gott

Schopfer, heiliger Geist,"

BWV 667a, the setting of the verse identical with the organ chorale of the same name, BWV 631, from the Orgelbuchlein. Then first

after

is

an interlude. Bach gets his breath back again, to execute the

cantus firmus in the pedal, in long-note values. But there able lack of an overall scheme,

is

a notice-

and the two sections barely

relate to

each other.

The

chorale

"Wenn

wir in hochsten Noten sein,"

gets a treatment going far

beyond the customary

inal version in the Orgelbuchlein

north

German

scholars think,

both

in the

type

(BWV

641).

is

BWV 668a,

revision.

The

a colored organ chorale

orig-

of the

Late in his Leipzig period, most

Bach produced an expanded version

that appeared

posthumous publication of The Art of Fugue and

fragment under the heading "Vor deinen Thron

tret ich" as

as a

the last

of the Eighteen Chorales. In the Leipzig version, the

hymn

be performed on a solo manual,

made more

objective

is

melody, traditionally meant to largely stripped

and "demoted" more or

less to

of ornament,

the prima inter

The Organ Chorales

513

pares voice of a contrapuntal section.

But

by an enhancement: Bach now precedes each a pre-imitation figure longer than the line

The

trend

line

of the

is

balanced

hymn

with

itself.

while the Orgelbuchlein version, despite the

clear:

is

demotion

this

counterpoint accompaniment, had something of the subjective sound

of a "soul" tune from early Pietism, the Leipzig version documents

working out of the cantus firmus

a thorough

Clavier-Ubungy part tifying really

power of the

3,

and shows Bach's

chorale.

our image of the

fit

desire to display the objec-

The use of techniques

late

pre-imitation (where each line

inquiry, ^^

—

and the

the level of the

there are divergences in the

chorale,

structed,

is

BWV

687,

arise

and could be

level.

—

that has provoked recent

is

right in suggesting that

The arrangement of the "Aus

from the Clavier-Ubung,

flineral chorale.

from teaching

similarly con-

and

aesthetic questions regarding Bach's

Did arrangements such

situations?

Did Bach mean

to

as this possibly

document how the

character of an organ chorale can be altered with a few

We

tiefer

decidedly more convincing. So in addition to the bio-

graphical, there are technical

supposed

history,

work between old and new segments with

respect to harmonic development.

Not"

work

Peter Williams

critic

does not

preceded by a shortened and then

is

only for use in work of the highest

It is just that

like this

Bach: by the 1730s the technique of

an inverted form of itself) was almost ancient justified

in the style of the

leave this question

open and turn

little

tricks?

to the third part of the

Clavier-Ubung, a collection in which Bach announced his philoso-

phy of the organ chorale two previous

in authoritative published form. Like the

parts of the Clavier-Ubung, this collection, through use

of model examples, represents a special organ prelude. "As

if it

were a

field

of keyboard music: the

practical, yet theoretical

handbook, the

organist can select individual works according to need, whether for use in the

worship

demonstration of music"^^

—

all

service,

it

be

or for technical instruction and

the various possibilities of liturgical organ

so Christoph

Wolff describes the work's

deliberately dedicated not only to "those

who

function. It

love" this

was

kind of

music, as were the previous two parts of the Clavier-Ubung, but "es514

The

Instrumental

Works

of

pecially to the cognoscenti

knew he was

kind of work." Bach obviously

this

demanding music, both

presenting the listener with

and compositionally

technically

"To build

a

house requires a frame; but

to seek, let alone find, the builder s

it

honor not

would be odd indeed

in the

house but in the

frame!" These words of E. T. A. Hoffmann, quoted by Wolff in

his

search for organizing principles in the original printed editions of Bach's works,^^ could shed light

Ubung:

is its

on the

third part of the Clavier-

order in the frame or in the house itself?

Bach was making changes

in the biographical section.

up

to print right

As we showed

to the last

moment.

First

it

to

what went

was only supposed to

have the great organ chorales; then the small chorales came

by

stage;

then the framing pieces, the Prelude and Fugue in E-flat

Major; and

finally the four duets

idate the idea that

ing

all

in, stage

BWV 802-05. This does not inval-

Bach had some organizing

these preprinting phases, but

it

principle in

mind dur-

seems unlikely that he meant

to construct a musical cathedral.

The word

"cathedral"

is

not used casually here: since 1930, the

organ mass has continually been associated with part 3 of the Claviertjbung}^ But tant

mass in

it

its

does not follow in any layout."^^

Bach

is

way

"the order of the Protes-

setting, as

he says in the

title,

Catechism and other vocal works," and the importance of the should not be underestimated.

make up

the

first

With

in der

but in the

Hoh

part of the edition: the

title

sei

Ehr," in three.

latter

the prelude, the vocal works

German

Vater in Ewigkeit," in two settings and the

Gott

"the

That

is

Gott

Kyrie, "Kyrie,

German

Gloria, "Allein

a respectable short mass,

only the "catechism chorales" that follow are

men-

tioned as such, each one in two settings: "Dies sind die heilgen zehn

Gebot," "Wir glauben reich," "Christ,

ich zu dir,"

all

an einen Gott," "Vater unser im Himmel-

unser Herr

zum Jordan kam,"

"Aus

tiefer

Note

schrei

and "Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, der von uns den

Zorn Gottes wandt." It

must remain an open question why Bach chose or permitted a

tide that imperfectly described the content

should not conclude from the

tide's

of the work, but

we

vagueness that his selection of

The Organ Chorales

515

He

key Lutheran hymns was arbitrary or even subjective.

canon of hymns

a fixed

in

mind, such

likely

had

An-

as those that existed in

dreas Reyher's Schulmethodus for primary school use in the principality

On

of Gotha in 1642.

the subject of his "Catechismus-Gesangs"

(Catechism Songs), Reyher, whose

systerna logicum

was

verifiably

Bach's introduction to logic, gives specific instructions, one of which is

of particular interest here: he

lists

the songs the schoolchildren

were to use for their workday morning singing This six

list is

sessions.

almost identical in content and sequence with Bachs

"Catechismus-Gesaengen." Only the Friday morning hymn, "Er-

barm dich mein o Herre Gott," tiefer

Not

zu

schrei ich

dir."

replaced in his collection by "Aus

is

Perhaps Bach remembered a different

order from his school days, or perhaps he preferred "Aus tiefer Not" for

some other

reason. ^^ If the

German

Kyrie and Gloria are in-

cluded, the third part of the Clavier-Ubung could be described as the organistic portrayal of

Lutheran

religious

beUef In

1739, the

two

hundredth anniversary of the Reformation in Albertine Saxony, there

would have been good reason

for such a musical representation.

But Bach probably did not so much intend sent his

summa of liturgical organ

tion he

had any musical renown

composer and organ choose

part of the Clavier-Ubung

to is

make

at it

all,

then

his profession

foundation

As

the

is

as

of faith.

an organ natural to

The

third

whether seen from

No

one asked Bach to

We

clearly see his conviction that the

worship service and that

its

the Lutheran faith.

HaUe

Bach advised

was

a profession of faith,

a part of the divine

is

as to pre-

chorale arrangement in such a theologically for-

mal, ceremonial fashion. chorale prelude

it

would have been

a theological or compositional point of view.

exhibit his skiU at

do that

playing. If at the time of publica-

virtuoso, so

which

this field in

to

organist

Johann Gotthilf Ziegler reported

in 1746,

hymns offhand but

accord-

his students "not to play the

ing to the sense of the

words. "^7

He

advocated not only a musically

expressive approach to organ playing but also an organist

vout and dedicated.

By

who was de-

giving his collection of cantus firmus-based

compositions the formal framework of the Prelude and Fugue in 516

The

Instrumental

Works

E-flat Major, he structure

and

enhanced the standing of the form. The difference

characteristics,

when compared with

the Orgelbuchlein,

the Leipzig Eighteen Chorales, and the Schiibler Chorales,

These comments have given appropriate attention theological dimension. ological speculation

—

number expresses

tiple

occurrences of the

who

in

noting, for instance, that the three great all:

a prime number,

number 42 might be is

said to have

second generation after Abraham.

Bach indeed thought

proved nor disproved,

more

appear in the

this

it

Bach produced. element

tive

We

is

would mean

Of course

this art

made

it is

is

the art of

Looking

on

at the chorales

here the danger of such

what

easy to forget

great

speculative, but the specula-

see this right at the beginning of the chorale arrangements,

mind by

BWV 669-74, Bach certainly had some-

setting the first of the "little" manualiter arrange-

ments

in 3/4 time, the

three,

symbolic of the Trinity, appears doubled and squared.

second in

6/8,

and the third

in 9/8: the

while these three "great" arrangements of the kyrie are alia

com-

basic observations

largely within the compositions themselves.

in the double kyrie triptych

thing in

which can neither be

Some

we merely mention on counting,

The mul-

a reference to Jesus,^^

that he

himself

an in-

so on.

final chapter, "Bach's Art."

speculation: with a focus art

And

as

been born in the forty-

kabbalistically,

difficult for

of the Clavier-Ubungy

"which

the indivisibility of the Trinity."

Matthew's Gospel

position a bit

to the work's

We could go beyond this, and indulge in theWe

kyrie settings total 163 bars in

If

obvious.

is

on the individual chorale arrangements.

could apply numerology

divisible

in

all

number

Mean-

written in

breve rhythm, and for a thoroughly musical reason. Alia breve

here

is

almost a synonym for

stile

antico

and thus a writing

style in the

vocal polyphonic tradition of Palestrina. In his organ works back in

Weimar, Bach had been able Frescobaldi's Fiori musicali,

to study this style in the kyries

among

others. Later, in Leipzig,

came

intensely involved with the masses of Palestrina, Lotti,

dara.

The organ

is

chorale "Aus tiefer

set in the stile antico,

Not

schrei ich

zu

dir,"

from

he be-

and Cal-

BWV 686,

and Bach adopts the Phrygian modal key from

the given cantus firmus, an indication of his awareness of tradition.

The Organ Chorales

517

The be

at

true organist,

home

Bach means

in the tradition

—

to

announce

reinen Satzes

in the second

("The Art of

was no accident that Jo-

volume of

Kunst

his

among

other things, using the third publica-

its

he had just become a Bach pupil, and Bach would surely have

tion,

trained

him thoroughly

in the use of church tones.

But what do we mean by "use"? In the

handed

in his treatment of the Phrygian

view, his

Bach

kyries.

is

quite high-

mode. In Pierre Boulezs

harmonic language dismantles the modal or church-tone

functions even

more boldly than Schonberg's twelve-tone language

dismantled tonality! ^9 This means that Bach

is

writing anything but stile

an-

counterpoint he inserts another element: the Phrygian cantus

fir-

a sleek Palestrina setting. Rather, into the three- or four-part

mus of the Gregorian

kyrie.

The melodicism of this material in a

very

ments, each with

its

the accompanying setting fashion, to be sure.

artfiil

own

almost in double refraction. stile antico,

ing self

it

into

liturgy,

Still,

They heard an

artfully

The

its

archaic effect

line

knew

it

major

is

ele-

woven, giv-

it

from its

it-

their

modern,

in a new, alien light.

of the cantus firmus in

with the word "kyrie" in E-flat major, and end in

D

is

comes from

dissonance-rich harmonization, which casts

the key of

two

cantus firmus does not in

archaic, since the Leipzig audience

Bach has the opening

these

arranged setting

which the Gregorian cantus firmus

but paradoxically,

derived from

must have heard the composition

an almost archaic character.

seem

is

claim to greatness, stand in strange juxta-

position. Bach's contemporaries

in

des

Musical Composition"), mentions

Strict

the treatment of church tones,

It

part of the Clavier-Ubung as an example: at the time of

tico

must

in that of strict style as well as in that

of the cantus firmus and the church tones.

hann Philipp Kirnberger,

at the outset,

B\W

669

start

D major, although

(cautiously put) not provided for in

G-

Phrygian. Even greater confusion for the listener results when, at the

D-major harmony. Bach

starts the alto voice

the minor second of the Phrygian mode. is

518

in itself purely Phrygian.^°

The

Instrumental

Works

on

a',

as if to repudiate

At the same

time, this entry

"

"lo"

1

(Ky

—

=^fi

rii

n

1

ri

-

-

e

-

^

-t 1

1

1

1

/j

1

,j.

J

j:]

*rrrfCrr>

iTrrinYr

i

Melodic consistency and a flowing Palestrina-like setting lessen the impression of harmonic tension, but tension alia

breve setting that

and counterpoint

—

is

both

Phrygian cantus firmus in long-note values

This does not mean that Bach

is

a deliberately

between

first

is

in

its

harmony

unwieldy

as

interwoven with

composed the

as a it.

breve and

alia

The tension between the two elements

planned structural element.

this structure

unavoidable in an

when something

particularly

then added the cantus firmus.

is

and complicated

flexible

One

sees the difference

and the impressive canonic

of the old

skills

Netherlandish masters and their ability to bind together multiple contrapuntal parts variously derived from one or

Bach does not must its

start

satisfy certain conditions:

it

should be in

material from a set cantus firmus;

it

mony's

all

the while

ability to provide a

antico

stile

must bring out the

archaic cantus firmus as such, contrasting

point work,

more cantus

firmus.

out thinking of the parts but of the whole, which

with

it

artless

skillfiil

making use of modern

and draw

and

counter-

fianctional har-

form.

Similarly complex thinking, with a constant awareness of musical history,

chism

speaks from the great chorale arrangements of the cate-

—"Dies sind

die heilgen

unser im Himmelreich,"

zehen Gebot,"

BWV 682.

BWV 678, and "Vater

In each, Bach sets himself the

task of incorporating the plain cantus firmus, in the

broken canon, into a in

meeting

this

strictly

constructed trio movement. His success

compositional challenge

theory teachers and composers impossible.

What

is

form of an un-

know

astounding

is

is

not in

that the task

itself is

remarkable:

difficult

but not

Bach's sure-footed selection of

completely different solutions. "Dies sind die heilgen zehen Gebot"

The Organ

Chorales

519

up on

picks

traditional compositional

methods of the seventeenth

century and displays the canon on the cantus firmus on a separate

manual. Thus, despite it is

historically part

prodigious demands on player and listener,

its

of the tradition of the form and to some extent

comprehensible to the

listener.

One

can always follow the cantus

firmus.

In comparison, "Vater unser im Himmelreich"

is

bizarre.

Be-

cause the canon voices of the cantus firmus are divided over two separate keyboards, they are not acoustically separated

The

parts.

fabric

of constantly intersecting voices

barely comprehensible, because layer

with

its

Bach has

traditional opposite.

from the other is

nonetheless

overlaid the contrapuntal

The two

voices "accompanying"

the cantus firmus canon are expressive solos taken from the slow

movements of his sonatas and mannerisms and

The

concerti

and tricked out with modern

gallant rhythmic changes.

gallant element

companiment parts

is

transcended in a unique fashion: the ac-

are suffiised

cult, motifs. It is as if

with strange, one might even say oc-

something sacred needs to be protected from

profane eyes.

God is

manner hard

to interpret.

concealed by musical figures that speak but in a

Bach's use of a frankly obtrusive

Lombardian rhythmic

pattern,

unusual for chorale arrangements, within a highly complex and unstable

rhythmic structure, demands so

much

concentration that

it is

almost impossible to appreciate the larger- scale progression of the

work. Whether to go beyond the "sighing" melodic

seems to

suit the text,

and

see

any

variously articulated smaller motifs, 520

The

Instrumental

Works

line,

symbolic significance in the is

the listener's choice.

which

many

Was

it

most

called the

which cannot be

movement

listening sei

is

Our

uttered," as

at the

easier

Father or even as the symbol of "groanings

Romans

here again

but as a modern

v^th the arrangements of "Allein Gott in der

Bach could not

manualiter version: 676, with

is

embedded,

resist offering

Hoh

two

foregrounded. But

is

trios in addition to the

BWV 675 could be called a gallant invention and

Bach, in his daring

movement

cheerful ritornello, a sonata

its

winsome. The formal symmetry of the

Ehr,"

it,^^

same time? This purely instrumental way of

which the cantus firmus

ture, in

8.26 has

BWV 675 and 676: in these works the concerted trio struc-

Ehr,"

BWV

of his chorales to perform,^^ be heard not

difficult

only as a musical

trio

which has been

Bach's intention that this arrangement,

Weimar

makes up

latter

setting of "Allein

Gott

that

in der

is

what

for

Hoh

sei

BWV 664, perhaps felt he owed "the cognoscenti of this kind

of work."

With the

the third part of the Clavier-Ubung he goes so far beyond

two

first

tents can

parts,

no longer be thought of

Leipzig's St. time,"^^

is

as well, that its

as utilitarian.

The

here putting \nsfiori miisicali on view: a

work

—

conjures

for

his life-

demon-

also use for

work

or better yet, concertizing. But most important, the

up once and

for

all

con-

cantor of

Thomas's Church, "already a legend during

and study both, which one of course can

stration

playing

and beyond the Orgelbuchlein

the spirit of the Protestant organ chorale.

In the world of the Enlightenment, the listener no longer wants to

be steeped in a chorale, reflecting devoudy on every

wanted now

are chorale preludes to

genre no longer

fits

masses and

fiagal

is

world in themselves.

any of the dominant

the gallant style of writing, the strict style for

What

preview the congregational

singing, not chorale arrangements that are a

The

line.

compositions. There

was

still

is less

styles:

along with

tolerated, but only

and

less

room

in the

culture for the increasingly luxuriant offshoots of the organ chorale

that flourished for nearly

two

centuries. Still

it

should be noted that

extended, fantasy-like chorale arrangements were once a

north cial

German

organ

specialty

recitals

and probably continued

and evening concerts. With

to

Dutch and

be heard in spe-

his hybrid forms,

The Organ

Chorales

it

521

was Bach himself who marked the end of the genre. His pupils astounded by his

much

pretty

The

art,

attempt tentatively to carry

it

are

on, but do so

alone.

teacher will take one step further: to the Canonic Variations

on the Christmas hymn "Vbm Himmel hoch da

komm

ich her,"

BWV 769, which were in fact expressly composed for the organ but have, even ity

more than the

third part of the Clavier-tjbung, the qual-

of demonstration pieces. Written on the occasion of Bach's join-

ing Lorenz Mizler s Societat der Musicalischen Wissenschaften in 1747,

they are a series of canonic masterpieces.

The high

point of the printed version

is

the fifth variation. It

contains in sequence the song's melody in a mirror canon and the

second part following

The

greatest density

more, the

Above as his

of a

at intervals is

at the end.

first line is set

above

it

sixth, third, second,

As

the fourth line

ultra all four lines

more than

is

hymn

pact of the

a technical

— amazement

reversed.

Bach

presents

of the song, one above the other.

i^ESkJUi

This

heard once

and

in sixteenth notes

the final pedal point of the last three measures.

non plus

is

and ninth.

m

composing coup: the at the events

affective

of the Nativity

concentrated and summarized one more time. In the very the tonal sequence parts).

likely

B-A-C-H

im-

—

is

last bar,

can be heard (though spread over two

This of course did not escape the composer himself, and he regarded

it,

perhaps smiling to himself, as his hidden auto-

graph to the work.

This flexible,

522

The

is

not witchcraft, since the underlying cantus firmus

but

still

is

quite

the result of the most extreme care to develop from

Instrumental

Works

the simplest materials ever

more complex

— the watchword being

structure.

For

"all

this reason the

from one"

work

— an

fascinated

twentieth-century composers. Paul Dessau celebrated the final section in his analysis as "a singular

Pierre Boulez

admired the

triumph of the composer s

"strictness

and

art."^'^

of the

logical consistency"

compositional method, which created "musical architectonics" from within,

which was

itself a "structure generator."^^

Igor Stravinsky

Gerd

arranged the variations for mixed chorus and orchestra in 1956.

Zacher wrote an essay on the variations, in which he contrasted the of their structure with the wealth of musical rhetorical

strictness

statements he found in them.^^ It

might seem

ations as the

end point

estant chorale.

645-50,

logical to

named

this chapter

wdth the Canonic Vari-

to Bach's nearly lifelong

But there after

end

is

work with the Prot-

a postscript: the Schubler Chorales,

Georg

Schubler,

BWV

who published them in 1748-49.

This publication corresponds with that of the Canonic Variations but in a

complementary way: the

plications of the latter are cessible style

esoteric quality

answered by the

and contrapuntal com-

concertante,

of the former: though the four

thoroughly ac-

and two quartets

trios

are

not simple to perform, they are easy to hear, lively and occasionally in the gallant style. This

is

hardly surprising, since five of the

are verifiably transcriptions

of arias and duets from sacred cantatas of

the 1720S or 1730s; indeed, a vocal original sixth piece,

The

"Wo

soil ich fliehen hin,"

selection

est store

is

also lurk

uns wend,"

BWV 655,

BWV 664,

675,

a half dozen.^7

mod-

their originals

and 676

—

trios

—

Compared with

—"Herr Jesu

as well as "Allein

disadvantages. For those

Gott

Ehr,"

sei

BWV 645, alongside

its

and

them, they do not stand up to

for instance, the trio

BWV 140.

Hoh

these arrangements have advantages

who know

the

Christ, dich zu

in der

"Wachet

auf, ruft

original, the tenor aria

Wachter singen" from the cantata "Wachet

Stimme,"

behind the

of suitable pieces. Bach would hardly have been able to

above-mentioned original organ

die

may

BWV 646.

not arbitrary. Given what was probably a

come up with much more than

Stimme,"

six pieces

"Zion hort

auf, ruft

Based on works originally written

uns die

uns die

for a

mixed

The Organ Chorales

523

vocal-instrumental ensemble, these chorales have certain a priori vocal characteristics; and

some of them

da capo form, so they

are in

have an easier time finding the ear of the listener than their

works composed

for instruments only.

Bach was

advised to agree late in life to a publication that

sister

certainly not

ill-

picked up on his rep-

utation as a specialist in the area of organ composition, but at the

same time he preserved

for posterity certain fine single pieces

from

his sacred music.

In 1788, Johann Friedrich Kohler, the author of a manuscript history of the schools of Leipzig, thought that these compositions

would not

age: they

would

modish revolution

"outlive every

in

music," probably echoing a remark generally attributed to Carl

Philipp

A

Emanuel Bach

(source

handwritten copy of the Schiibler Chorales,

hands, shows that late in errors but also

still

improvements to

524

anonymous) .^^

The

life

Bach was not only

working on the

Instrumental

Works

in private

correcting printer's

lifelong job of

his compositions.^^

still

making nuanced

THE COTHEN DEMONSTRATION CYCLES: INVENTIONS AND SINFONIAS, THE WELL-TEMPERED CLAVIER, SIX SOLOS FOR VIOLIN "You find everything in Bach: the development of cyclic forms, the conquest of the realm of tonality the highest

order. "^

whole, but the

first

—

Anton Webern

the attempt at a is

thinking of Bach's

great proof of this idea

stration cycles written at

summation of

is

work

as a

found in the demon-

Cothen. These were not the product of mo-

mentary inspiration but came out of that "meditative" temperament that his son Carl Philipp

Emanuel thought had made Bach

a great

contrapuntalist.^ It

might seem surprising that Bach could find time

for such

meditation, particularly in Cothen, for the musical projects arising

from

it

are not usually part

of the duties of a kapellmeister and cham-

ber music conductor. Nonetheless, completion of the demonstration cycles falls in the sition,

second half of the Cothen years, a period of tran-

when Bach,

faced with the challenges of the next position he

has set his sights on, wants to nail skills

of his

pinnacle,

and

art.

To put

it

down

securely the fundamental

another way: having arrived at an

Bach now, with Tbe Well-Tempered

SinfoniaSy the violin solos,

artistic

Claviery the Inventions

and the Brandenburg Concertos

treated in the next chapter) presents the great,

works that could be understood

as

complementary

(to

be

cyclic

concentrated paradigms of all his

composing.

Only ist,

a

composer equally gifted

as

harmonist and contrapuntal-

with an overall "harmonic-polyphonic concept" in mind,^ would

be equal to such a task. In

fact, his

obituary praises

him

The Cothen Demonstration

for having Cycles

525

"employed the most hidden

of harmony with the most

secrets

Johann Abram Birnbaum, on the other hand,

artistry. "4

"voices [that]

.

.

.

work wonderfully

without the slightest confusion."^ strange [that

is,

When we

in

skilled

praises the

and about one another, but

The two

together "make up his

unique] perfections."^

look in particular

at the Inventions

and Sinfonias and

The Well-Tempered ClavieVy the Cothen demonstration cycles can be seen from three different aspects: as works of pedagogy, as works of art,

and

as contributions to a

The

philosophy of music.

pedagogical nature of the works

spective titles

is

emphasized

in their re-

by Bach himself: the Inventions and Sinfonias wtrt writ-

ten for "those eager to learn" with the intention that they might "learn

how

with two or three obbligato voices; the preludes

to play purely"

and fugues of The Well-Tempered Clavier were composed, not for the "use

and advantage" of "young musicians eager

pedagogical intent

is

context: almost

the Inventions

all

just as clear in the

and

least,

to learn."

This

works themselves and

their

Sinfonias as well as a series of

preludes from The Well-Tempered Clavier are found in early versions in the 1720 Klavierbuchlein for

Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, allowing

us a glimpse into the father s teaching of his eldest son.

Did

the son not only learn from the father but also assist

him

with the composition of the two-part inventions, and even compose the last in

B minor on his own? A 1972

thesis to this effect, while not

very convincing,^ might nonetheless bring us to look at the famous series in a

new

light.

Bach's instruction of his son was probably not fundamentally different

from that which he gave

to other students.

The

lexicogra-

pher Ernst Ludwig Gerber reports on the keyboard lessons his father received in Bach's house in 1724-25:

At thefirst lesson

[Bach]

set his

had studied these through series

of suites, then

Inventions before him.

When

to Bach's satisfaction, there followed

The Well-Tempered

526

The

art,

Instrumental

and my father counted these among

Works

a

Clavier. This latter

work Bach played altogether three times throughfor him with unmatchable

he

his

his happi-

est hourSy

when Bach, under the pretext ofnotfeeling in

to teach, sat

in

minutes}

Inventions, Sinfonias, and preludes are not a "school of dex-

Czemy's, yet have

terit}'" like

The

mood

himselfat one ofhisfine instruments and thus turned

these hours into

The

the

a decided!}' technical

practice of the independent playing of

many

element to them.

both hands

presented

is

Leaning on a remark of Carl Philipp

different ways.

Emanuel concerning Bachs use of the thumb

in playing,^

Henning

Siedentopf makes the further point:

Bach ture

is

thefirst to use the

would like

to

have

hand in his keyboard music the way na-

it

used The whole set of rulesfor the use

of the hand herewith becomes

accessible.

From

this

combining of

various technical principles of play arises the Klavieriibung

("keyboard practice"), a form ofstudy that develops greater dex-

hand, in a manner suited to

terityfor the

contemporary concept of

Bach was thefirst is

to

''signing" as

hand

to let the

develop a rich vocabulary

For Bach, out of physiological

movements

that

make

it.

If we start with the

a language of the fingers.

"come of age,

"

so to speak, that

and suitable syntax.^^ out of the nature of those hand

facts,

ke^'board music possible

comes the nature of

music, which the composer makes \isible through the perfection of his art.

This nature should be understood

multiplicity.

dependent

Each

as concordia discors, unity in

voice of the musical statement

entity, as is stated

on the

is

an obligatory, in-

tide page of the Inventions

and

Sinfonias; at the

same time, each voice combines with the others

perfect harmony.

No matter how bold and independent of each other

the voices all.

may

be, the principle

in

of harmonic coherence rules them

For Bach the thorough bass (continuo), seen as harmony in the

modem

sense,

But while

is

the "most perfect foundation of music.**'^

it is

possible to

Musicalische Handleitung

Niedt, a

work aimed

leam the thorough bass

by Bachs

fi-om the

book

contemporary Friedrich Erhard

at rapid master}'

without the student

s first

hav-

ing to deal with "cruelly long preludia, toccatas, chaconnes, fugues,

Tlie

Cothen Demonstration Cycles

527

and other such strange Creatures,"^^ Bach

sets

up

a

music theory

structure that recognizes the thorough bass as an ideal foundation

but has more in mind than merely a setting of the upper voices, in

which the

right

hand

details

what the

wants instead a fabric of voices that are

left

obligat

hand and

sets for

He

it.

cantabile in equal

measure.

The Inventions and Sinfonias convey positiony' while

sion for

The Well-Tempered Clavier serves

whoever

"is

as a special diver-

artistic

character of the works,

which we

examine in the Inventions and Sinfonias.

These works their systematic

of composition, even though

are original as a type

arrangement ^fro;«?2^5 tonos

is

reminded of the tradition of the bicinium and luted form,

up

Com-

already versed [habil^ in this study." This last

formulation points out the shall first

a "strong foretaste of

was continued

to Bach's time.

One is

not.^^

distantly

tricinium, which, in di-

in the Latin schools of central

Germany

But the terms bicinium and tricinium were always

understood to mean ensemble music for two or three singers or players.

As models of strict yet cantabile composition

Inventions or style.

and Sinfonias

ing

They do not

Bach described the inventions of the

Wilhelm Friedemann tasias."

are unique.

as

arranged by key, the fit

into any genre

Klavierbuchlein for

"Praeambula" and the sinfonias

His new nomenclature shows

his awareness that

he

as

"Fan-

is

break-

new ground.

The

mixture of contrapuntal and figured rhetorical elements

unparalleled. sect in style

The

old and

new

senses of the stylus phantasticus inter-

an unmistakable way. While up until Athanasius Kircher

was understood

is

as "the uttermost concentration

of strict

this

style in

the contrapuntal fantasy," ^"^ three generations later Johann Matthe-

son described

it

as "the freest

most

liberal style

of

setting, singing,

and playing music," which could only "be mastered by clever heads full

of invention, and rich (sometimes even too rich) in figures of

every kind."^^

Mattheson's use of the terms invention and figures should be noted. Invention

comes from

invention a

term of rhetoric. Figure

is

even more concrete allusion to the doctrine of musical-rhetorical 528

The

Instrumental

Works

an

fig-

originating in late-sixteenth-century rhetoric. This context

ures,

makes

and

clear that the Inventions

had

Sinfonias not only

a well-

thought-out structure and a "cantabel" or singable quality to boot but

were meant to be

also ric

and

artistic

—

that

is,

connected to musical rheto-

poetics.

But what do these terms matter compared selves!

voices

works them-

to the

Given the requirement of having two and sometimes three and

a

harmonious, largely imitative

of exercises of highest order.

all

both cycles consist

style,

kinds: they are paragons of composition of the

With

some of the more straightforward

the help of

pieces, twentieth-century

composers and many Bach scholars and

interpreters have ventured to penetrate the mysteries

terpoint and also to describe the aesthetic

of these work

of Bach's coun-

and philosophical context

cycles.

After Ferrucio Busoni published an edition of the two-part Inventions in 1907, with characteristic commentaries, Fritz Jode used

them

barely

two decades

later in

developing his idea of organicism in

music. His aim was to replace the "mechanics" of traditional form

theory with this idea and by proceeding along "the guidelines of psy-

come

chology" and "by analysing individual phenomena" to to

understanding their

In

"unity."^^

1951,

Erwin Ratz,

Schonberg's, devoted a lot of space to the Inventions his

Einfuhrung

sical

a student of

and Sinfonias

Formenlehre ("Introduction to

in die musikalische

Form Theory"), which

closer

in 1968

in

Mu-

he reissued with the subtitle Uber

Formprinzipien in den Inventionen und FugenJ.

S.

Bachs und ihre Be-

deutungfur die Kompositionstechnik Beethovens ("Principles of Form in the Inventions and Fugues of J. S.

Bach and Their Significance

Compositions of Beethoven"). In

his "fiinctional

like

Jode, was interested in

a "closed

why

a musical

work of art

is

perceived as

organism," as an "entirety."^^ Finally, in 1957 ^^^ ^959 J^"

hann Nepomuk David devoted one short book each tions

in the

form theory" Ratz,

to the Inven-

and Sinfonias, analyzing the musical notation of

this

"music

with a purpose," to lay out their astonishing order, their purity of craftsmanship, and their correct use of materials

"beauty of technique.

—

in

sum, their

"^^

The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

529

Hermann

Keller considered the three-part Sinfonia in

BWV 795, one of "the master's crown

jewels. "^9

F Minor,

Bach works with

a

two-bar counterpoint model that contains three themes that appear simultaneously. Since these are in triple counterpoint, he can de-

velop a fugue from this model with three constantly interchanging subjects.

hardly possible to understand the piece purely as a contra-

It is

puntal structure.

The beginning and

more an upper-voice

setting.

the ending, at least, seem to be

The listener's

impression

is less

the per-

ception of ten thematic entries than of a progression distantly re-

sembling a

suite:

the arrival at the tonic parallel in bar

marks a

13

kind of caesura, followed by a circuitous modulation back to the tonic.^° Since the thematic figures

do not change

in

any material

way, the "sighing" motif dependably stays with the listener through-

out despite the addition of interludes, and the short,

it is

monic

movement is

relatively

possible to take in this trinity of contrapuntal density, har-

tension,

and gestural

force with the ear alone.

While often

one needs the score to comprehend the wondrous structure of a Bach fugue, here the immediate impression calls to

mind

is

sufficient: the invention

a highly polished object that can be held in the

and examined from

hand

all sides.

p—

ia^r;

The

rhetorical character of the

of the opening melody voice

mented by

is

movement

exacdy

is

evident.

like a sigh,

The second

rhetorical justification for the

530

movement

harmonic

Instrumental

which

is itself

frictions that arise.

the

Undeni-

has a dramatically effective arc of tension, with

apex at the end of the middle

The

supple-

countersubject introduced

in bar 3 adds detail to the theme's gestural sorrow,

its

it is

shape

a countersubject with a descending chromatic quarter-

note passage, a bass lamento.

ably, the

and

The

Works

third.^^

Bach's pupil

Johann Philipp Kirnberger,

ample

The Art of Strict

in his

on with the composition's

Musical Composition, took issue early

which was unusual even

store of dissonances,

And

for Bach.^^

Philipp Spitta feared that "the distorted impression most listeners

would perhaps get on behind the "daring

first

hearing" might prevent their realizing that

intervals,

changing notes, and harmonic cross-

relations lay not just forced artifice

but a truly imaginative

vision."^^

In his Tonsatzlehre ("Craft of Musical Composition"), Paul Hin-

demith frankly dubbed is

it

a

harmonic "jigsaw puzzle." "The

what he wants

continually being asked

to listen to, independent

The

chords or subordinate notes foreign to the chord this artifice causes

two

goes so far that even in the

voices, the listener does not

know

first

exactly

Siegfried Borris disagreed, assessing the

"typically

measure with only

what

is

F minor

Bachian harmonic progression. "^5 But that

a gloss-over:

is

dominant seventh or second chord takes

sinfonia as "a

something of

effort.

fragment of a

^^

perhaps more sensible to take this harmonically awkward

interval as sia (a

meant."^'^

even just to hear the tritone interval E- flat- A- natural

(the last beat of the first measure) harmonically as the

it

uncertainty

thought-out piece rich in expressive suspensions," with a

carefully

Is

listener

an example of a chromatic cross-relation, that

is,

parrhe-

musical figure nearly obsolete by Bach's time)? There would

have to be a reason for this "freedom of speech," as the term translates into

character.

English, and this

would be the

Hermann KeUer compared

sinfonia's overtly sorrowful

it

to the

F-minor

section

"Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen" from the eponymous Weimar cantata

BWV

12,

and Heinrich Besseler

recalls the

emotional realm

"with which the expressive melody was originally associated: the

contemplation of the suffering and death of Jesus Christ." In his view, the

work thus

requires "a fittingly emotional performance that

brings out the inner coherence of the melody."^7

Giinter

Hartmann

takes the step

terpretation to a symbolic ter F.

Hindermann's

one with

from

a figural or emotional in-

his observation, following

lead,^^ that the sighing figure

produces the tone row

B-A-C-H. This

fact

is

when

Wal-

transposed

significant against the

The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

531

own "Bach

backdrop of

his

contains the

first

two

letters

emblematics": the sequence

When Bach uses the

chiastic relation symbolizing Christ's cross.

B-A-C-H,

quence

terms of his

own

Hartmann's view, he

in

person what he wrote

is

se-

trying to represent in

later in the

Fulde family

BWV 1077, these words in musical code:

album, beneath his canon

"Symbolum. Christus Coronabit Crucigeros," the

B-A-C-H

of the names "Bach" and "Christ" in a

or,

"Christ will crown

cross-bearers. "^9

A few years earlier Ukich Siegele designed a "symbolic proportioning" of the

F-minor

As he

it,

sees

sinfonia based

on the number of entries and

the church doctrine of penitence and faith

is

the piece: ten entries of the theme stand for the law, that

Commandments,

as fulfilled

by

a numeric alphabet,

many known

which he

comes

The thematic upper voice at the beginning,

BACH

we

the

Ten

but which

and only

here,

is

use of

only one

to further conclusions:

the second subject, has

itself signifies contrition.

setting, in its last entry,

is,

Holy Ghost. Making

calls "traditional"

to Bach's time, Siegele

fourteen notes:

fuliilled in

Christ; seven nonthematic sections

stand for the Gospels, for the gifts of the

of

notes.

The thematic

has forty- three tones. If

deduct from these forty-three tones of all three subjects the

fourteen tones of the second subject, that leaves twenty-nine This

tones.

is

Bach's artistic sign:

SDG [Soli Deo gloria]

=JSB.

But theforty-three tones ofall three subjects say: ''CREDO, I believe.''

Bach

is

bearing witness, not abstractly but personally, to

the church's doctrine ofpenitence. '^^

In addition to symbolic proportions, one can find mathematical proportions.

To

take only one example, the piece's mathematical mid-

point comes at bar

17,

where

actually a rather special event occurs

with the reaching of the minor dominant,^^ even

memorable from the comes more or

The torians

less at

on

this

The

The

not the most

dramatic high point

the dividing point of the golden section.

great variety of opinions held

by scholars and reception

one small section gives some idea of the

reducing a piece 532

listener's standpoint.

if it is

like the

Instrumental

Works

F-minor sinfonia

his-

difficulty

to a nutshell.

of

For com-

posers especially,

it is

many- faceted jewel in form;

it is

a miracle; they

like this. It

know how difficult

difficult

is

autonomous work, complete

with

in

its

harmonic daring;

yet derives

itself,

traditional conventions of figurative

a

it is

and

affective

music theory; voices, yet,

detailed articulation of gesture in the melodic line,

epitome of dramatic, almost emotion-driven writing. be proportionalized in various ways and allows interpretations.

Given

all this artistic

richness,

all

it is

the

The work can of symbolic

sorts

who

an

it is

authenticity

its

model of compositional form with three obbligato

its

to cut a

based on modern thorough-bass concepts yet flouts the

orthodox music theory of the day with

from

it is

counterpoint yet succinct

could categori-

Bach himself might have had some

cally exclude the possibility that

symbolic intention in mind?

While

Bach may have thought of the In-

for teaching purposes

ventions andSinfonias as a preparation for The Well-Tempered Clavier,

they are certainly of equal rank to

it,

since they

embody

the element

of concentration versus the infinite variety of the universe expressed in the twenty- four preludes

and fugues

in all the keys.

The

latter are

Bach's most convincing demonstration of the "bipolar principle" of

prelude and fugue as "separate works, but cyclically and reciprocally

connected." This being so, the stylus phantasticusy^^

and

free styles together

it is

which

his

most important contribution

traditionally always

under one roof

brought the

to

strict

— though not with the

sys-

tematic rigor that he requires for this work.

The

principle of organizing keyboard music in ascending key

order has a long tradition. Caspar Ferdinand Fischer, half a generation before Bach,

produced

and fugues dedicated

his

Ariadne Musica, a

series

of preludes

to "magistris atque discipulis" ("teachers

and

pupils") that also takes the bipolar principle seriously. Closer inspec-

tion of course brings to light serious differences tion

and The Well-Tempered Clavier:

for

between

this collec-

one thing, Fischer's twenty

preludes and fugues, oxfughette, are so short that a pair of them usually fit

on one widely spaced page.

What

is

new about The Well-Tempered

Clavier

is

the radicality,

breadth, and multiple perspectives of its artistic concept

—

The Cothen Demonstration

in a

word.

Cycles

533

its

autonomy. There

is

a considerable difference

creating a collection like the Ariadne Musica,

between

who

a

composer

stakes out for his

tonal territory only twenty of the twenty- four keys of the major and

minor chromatic

scale,

and a composer who from the outset claims

the entire range oT tones for his use.

Whoever would

act like a

ern composer and explore the whole realm of music in tions

must

set

up

his

and so on

1:2:3:4:5,

—

own

laws. In place of the simple

all its

numeric

the frequency ratios of the overtones

deal with the irrational

number represented by

twelve; using this number, he

must

moddirecseries

— he must

the square root of

rationally divide the octave into

twelve strictly equal but no longer "natural" semitones.

Andreas Werckmeister,

in

his

work of

Musicalische

1707,

Paradoxal-Discoursey thought this process not necessarily unnatural

but hybrid: just as the square-root fect or

and

pure consonances,^' so

is

series "are the

God

perfect: even, perfection itself."

presume

"in

proper roots of per-

His essence completely pure

But

true Christians should not

to attain this perfection; rather, they

must take

care "not to

conceive of and ascribe to themselves a perfection that properly belongs solely to God."33

With

this,

Werckmeister acknowledges that the lack of practical

know-how

ruled out the possibility of balanced tuning at that time.

But he

condemns the presumptuousness of trying

also

to resolve the series

and the

In practice Bach did not employ perfect tuning but

literally

conflict

between the natural sequence of the overtone

rational ordering of a twelve-tone system.

"well-tempered" tuning. According to the necrologist, "in the tuning

of harpsichords, he achieved so correct and pure a temperament that all

the tonalities sounded pure and agreeable. "^"^ According to tradi-

tional key characteristics,

C

major

may have sounded

purer than

C-

sharp major. But such aesthetic considerations for performance do

not

alter the fact that

perament

The Well-Tempered Clavier brought equal tem-

as a theoretical concept, or philosophical postulate, into

the agenda of music history: the composer

demands the authority to

organize his tonal material according to his

own

will.

This demand

goes hand in hand with the final establishment of fianctional har534

The

Instrumental

Works

monic

tonality, as theoretically set

up by Jean Philippe Rameau

Traite de harmonie in 1722, the year of the completion of the

in his

first

part

of The Well-Tempered Clavier.

Are both these achievements

in line with

Enlightenment philos-

ophy, which gives free rein to humanity's inborn urge to explore but

demands

naturalness too?

Or

more the late-born offspring

are they

of medieval-baroque speculations about musical arcana? Even the sixteenth century produced compositions like

Fortuna motet, which modulated in a

By

F- sharp minor.^^

to

Fantasia durch

calischer Circkel in

Greiters's

of fourths from

circle

F minor

Bach's time musical puzzles such as this

(called Teufelsmuhlen or "devil's mills") like the

Matthaus

alle

had been succeeded by works

Tonos of one Friedrich Suppig, the Musi-

Johann David Heinichen's school of thorough

bass, or the Toccata

per

omnem

circulum of

Andreas Sorge.^^ As

al-

ways, Bach's music eludes such simple categorization.

While the

structural principle of

The Well-Tempered Clavier

quite strict, the characters of the individual pieces

somewhat

loose ensemble.

and fugue is

To be

some

sure, in

are obviously closely connected,^7

fit

together in a

cases the prelude

and certainly there

of keys having definite characteristics. But the

clear evidence

element of variety

is

of order. This

as essential as that

Richard Wagner spoke of a "world-idea" here.^^ This idea in

is

is

is

why

found

both parts of The Well-Tempered Clavier, which despite their dis-

parate origins value.

make up

a unified

whole and

are absolutely

of equal

We thus deliberately choose to look at book 2, and in the fol-

lowing paragraph

Minor,

we examine

the Prelude and Fugue in F-sharp

BWV 883, which exhibits critical features of this two-part

cycle.

The

prelude, a perfectly articulated character piece throughout,

can be looked at as a sinfonia vention, as a sonata

—

that

is,

as a

movement, or even

meticulous three-part in-

as the

andante movement of

an instrumental concerto.^9 Divided into three parts, followed by a

kind of reprise,

it

hardly repeats

itself in

stead with contrapuntal variations are

found

in the

the

literal sense,

on motifs that

playing in-

for the

most part

opening melody. The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

535

Melody, a term that should be used with caution for thematic

forms in the age of the continuo, in section,

which

sets

this case

is fitting:

the tone for the whole work,

vice or ritornello but a

song with a wide

both horizontally and vertically

the opening

not simply a de-

is

tessitura, ornately structured

—"sung from the depths of

the soul,"

Hugo Riemann writes in his Handbuch der Fugen-Komposition^^

as

in contrast to his occasional dry style. Naturally, "song"

metaphorically, not

literally.

The theme

syncopation, with doublets and clavier.

As

stay in the

which

For

the

work goes

triplets,

is

liberally

is

a

and obviously written

melody to

good deal of motivic development,

gallantry, the musical diction

is

not modern in the Italian

or French style but graced with a delicate liveliness reflexively

The

all

Bach's own.

imagines the gestures of a ballerina, not dancing bal-

of course but,

let

for the

serves to disguise the simple periodicity of the piece.'^^

all its

One

meant

endowed with

along, despite a tendency for the

upper voice, there

is

—

all

unnoticed, just dancing for herself

motivic link with the fugue

is

clear: its first

theme answers

the syncopated descending fourth that started the prelude with an

ascending leap of a fourth that

C# -

is

no

less expressive.

F#, to mention just one example.

Prelude and fligue are not polar opposites at as the prelude is

F# - C# becomes

is

all

but siblings. Just

not only "expression" but "structure" too, the fugue

likewise not only "structure" but "expression" too.

server notices

536

The

first,

Instrumental

of course, Works

is

What

the complicated structure.

the ob-

Bach has

written

—

—a

a rarity in itself

fugue for three voices, and in a

triple

double sense: the three themes are treated separately, and then they are

combined. The

one

last

last

time in exquisite timing

to speak "with

one

show how

four bars

—

half-measure intervals

at

fugal skills but skillfully

on Bach's writing

composing

a

somewhat but

style:

he

is

wrought counterpoint and

we admire

the combination of motivic

Each of the

and eloquendy throughout, with no voice

more prominent

notice the

certainly not the artful construc-

density and rhythmic-melodic flow.

terpoint to a

cast a

not showing off his

movement where we do not

tion of a triple fugue. Instead,

clearly

finally

^s^^^u^

notes in small print blur the entries

distinctive light

—

voice":

m/L££/

The

the three subjects enter

one.^^

And

yet

all

three voices speaks just being a

coun-

three are subordi-

nated to the idea of an unstoppable, flowing river of sound.

There passages,

is

little

no distinction between important and unimportant that

is

unthematic, barely a pause or an interlude, and

no important break between individual expositions. The sound flows inexorably but with occasional change perceptibly, the syncopated, almost lingering

subject notes,

becomes merged with the regular

and these

in turn give

way

to the

river

of

in intensity:

im-

movement of the

first

striding pace of eighth

rhythmic dotted eighths of

the second subject. Finally, with the appearance of the third subject in the

middle of the movement, in sixteenth notes, the definitive

pulse of the piece takes over; but

it

does not obscure the previous

rhythms, which continue.

The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

537

Bach

composing with

is

a consciousness of history: a sequence

of different rhythmic forms was de rigueur for seventeenth-century fantasies

and fugues

like those

of Samuel Scheidt's Tabulatura nova.

But where these might be considered an assortment of

Bach ventures

to

arrangement into an is

"the idea of a collective setting."

skillful

intellectual as well as a structural unity."'^^

the realization of Bach's credo "All from one,

phonic

excerpts,

meld heterogenous rhythmic forms "by

all

melody from the merged

in one";

This

it is

also

parts of a poly-

In Carl Dahlhaus's view, this idea fascinated the

nineteenth century and especially Richard Wagner, beyond the classic era

of the

sonata.^''^

summed up introduced new

In The Well-Tempered Clavier, Bach traditions of

keyboard music but also

all

the genre

formal types.

In view of their variety and nuance of expression, Arnfried Edler

reminded of the genre of the French "piece de

caractere."

is

Not forget-

ting that practically every piece deals with a compositional problem

Edler arranged the preludes and fugues of both parts of

sui generis,

The Well-Tempered Clavier by genre and type: "^5 Arnfried Edler's Arrangement of the Preludes and Fugues of The Well-Tempered Clavier

BWV PART

Prelude

FUGU E

Key

Time

Genre Type

Time

Genre Type

hexachord

I

I.

846

C

c

arpeggio

C

2.

847

c

C

figured prelude

C

848

C#

3/8

dance prelude,

C

3.

(4/4)

dance

fiigue

fiigue

fuga incomposta,

theme made of jumps

minuet 4.

849

c#

6/4

aria

C

ricercar fiigue

5.

850

D

C

figured prelude

C

fuga pathetica, French

6.

851

d

C

figured prelude

3/4

fuga

st\'le

cornpostUy

in steps 7.

852

El,

c

figure prelude with

double fiigue

538

The

Instrumental

Works

C

dance fiigue

theme

BWV

Prelude

Fugue

Key

Time

Genre Type

Time

Genre Type

C

ricercar fligue

8.

853

e[,/d#

3/2

aria pathetica

9.

854

E

12/8

dance prelude,

fuga

sciolta

(free fugue)

siciliano 10.

855

C

aria/figured prelude

3/4

Invention

11.

856

12/8

dance prelude

3/8

dance fugue

12.

857

f

C

prdludium ligatum

c

fuga pathetica

13.

858

F#

12/16

dance prelude

c

dance fugue

14.

859

f#

C

sinfonia

6/4

fuga pathetica

15.

860

G

24/16

figured prelude

6/8

dance fugue

16.

861

g

C C

prdludium patheticum

C

fuga pathetica

17.

862

A|,

3/4

concerto

C

fuga pathetica

18.

863

g#

6/8

sinfonia

C

fuga pathetica

19.

864

A

C

sinfonia

9/8

20.

865

a

9/8

concerto

C

dance fugue

fuga

ligata (fugue

without interludes) 21.

866

Bl,

C

figured prelude

3/4

dance fugue

22.

867

bflat

C

prdludium patheticum

C

ricercar fugue

23.

868

B

C

sinfonia

C

fugaplagalis (theme

moves 24.

PART I.

869

b

sonata

C

in scale steps)

fuga pathetica

2

870

C

C

sinfonia

2/^

871

C

C

sonata

C

fuga

872

C#

C

arpeggio, canzonetta

C

fuga composta

873

c#

9/8

sinfonia

12/16

dance fugue

12/8

sonata

canzone

dance fugue, gigue

876

El,

9/8

dance prelude

877

d#

C

sonata

878

3/4

(trio-)sonata

10.

879

3/8

sonata

C C C C C C

11.

880

sinfonia

6/16

874

figured prelude

875

3/2

dance fugue ligata

fiigue

chromatic fugue ricercar fugue

canzone

fligue

ricercar fugue

dance

fiigue,

The Cothen Demonstration

gigue

Cycles

539

BWV

Prelude

Fugue

Key

Time

Genre Type

Time

Genre Type

2/4

canzone

C

dance

12.

881

f

2/4

sonata

13-

882

F#

3/4

concerto,

French 14.

f#

883

c

ricercar fiigue, 3

15-

G

884

dance prelude,

3/4

fiigue, gavotte

style

sinfonia

3/4

fiigue

themes

3/8

dance

canzone fugue

fiigue

saraband 16.

17-

c

prelude, French style

3/4

A^

3/4

praludium pathetkum

c

sonata

6/8

885

g

886

fuga pathetka

18.

887

g#

c

19-

888

A

12/18

dance prelude

c

fuga composta

20.

889

a

c

sonata

c

faga pathetka

21.

890

B^

12/16

dance prelude

3/4

dance fiigue

22.

891

bflat

c

sinfonia

3/2

ricercar fiigue

23.

892

B

c

concerto

c

ricercar fiigue

24.

893

b

c

concerto

3/8

dance fugue

dance fugue,

2

themes

A lowercase letter indicates a minor key.

A

whole world

which

lies

between the

treats a soggetto in the

extremely Hmited range of a diminished

fourth, in the ricercar tradition,

which

translates the

clavier.

and the

modern concertos

first

new

on which Wagner remarked,

style

A-flat-major prelude,

solo-tutti contrasts to the

A movement like the first prelude

stand outside any idea of old or piece,

C-sharp-minor fugue,

first

in E-flat

—

a

at hearing

minor seems

profoundly meditative it

played by Josef Ru-

binstein in the winter of 1878-79, "I play that with even light'

—with me,

the twilight never ends."'^^

reveals that the master of

to

more moon-

Cosima Wagners

diary

Bayreuth did not judge the pieces of The

Well-Tempered Clavier solely on the basis of their atmospherics but

on

their compositional

methods

as well.

She records

his

comment on

the next fugue, one of the most erudite, powerful fugues of the whole

work: "R[ichard] considers the fugue that follows to be most remarkable;

540

it is

The

extremely

Instrumental

skillful,

Works

and yet so emotional; what

strettos,

aug-

mentations, and accents

it

has!'

For him,

it is

the epitome of the

fugue. "^7

The

fugues are not

all

equally erudite. There are concertante and

dance fugues; eleven fugues of part

i

have only three voices, and one

Thus Hugo Riemanns

has only two.

Tempered Clavier

of a "compositional catechism"

as part

problematic.4^ It tempts one to see

The Art of Fugue and too

designation of The Well-

it

too

not un-

much in the context of,

in relation to roughly

little

is

say,

contemporane-

ous compositions in other genres, for example, the Brandenburg Conor the

certos

Clavier

is

^t.

John Passion. Like these works. The Well-Tempered

part of a discourse

on the compositional and semantic

of a type of music that was very important to the so-

characteristics

ciety of the time.

The

students of

Bach who came

Tempered Clavier must

first

in contact

with The Well-

have been awed by the wealth of forms,

types,

and emotions they contained; but they soon came

stand

how

traditional

actively

Bach approached and

to under-

further developed both

and contemporary forms of keyboard

and not

art

just

counterpoint alone.

The preludes They

fugues.

should never be thought of as lesser works than the

are sui generis character pieces, very often developed

and not simply

as preludes to, the fiigue following.

Bach had not yet written sonatas

for the keyboard; but the quantity

independently

of,

of material from his preludes that reappears in the sonata

movements written by

his sons

that included the preludes of part

perspectives that

When

went beyond

and slow

would be shown by any study

2.^9

Surely Bach was looking for

his time.

the Dresden kapellmeister Johann Christoph Schmidt in

1718 required that a fligue

ments of the

who

fast

stile

be constructed

like

speech and adopt ele-

modernoy he was applauded by Johann Mattheson,

gave Schmidt space in his journal Critica musica to express his

ideas.5°

One

can also look through the fugues of The Well-Tempered

Clavier to see whether they are built exordium-narratio-propositioy

on

rhetorical

models

like

and so on. Gerd Zacher examined the

The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

541

E-flat-major fugue, part

not

come from any

from

from

superficial

a fiindamentally

Kunze s

i,

this angle.^^ Bach's

modernity does

resemblance to rhetoric, however, but

new concept of instrumental

music. In Stefan

view. The Well-Tempered Clavier speaks an instrumental lan-

guage that

is

characterized by

its

"deeply involving, contemplative

articulation."

At

this point, the formulaic

older instrumental music

icism that by

very nature

its

impulses, and so

must

approach to playing that dominated

abdicate; in

its

place

comes

melod-

a

nourished by decidedly interpretive

is

has semantic connotations.^^ This does not

it

interpreting a text with musical

means

— an

art perfected

mean

by Hein-

rich Schiitz. Rather, the particular vocal-instrumental language so typical of Bach, the character of which

is

derived from

articula-

its

and nuance, can give music meaning even without the context

tion

of words.

We can observe this phenomenon right in the first fijgue of The Well-Tempered Clavier.

It is

obvious at

become mere

dervalued at

first,

figuration.

the

theme

speaks.

thing.

yet clearly the music

it,

unit,

To be

affect

way in which

is

a

it is

and

six-

note, un-

and now every one of

sure, the

theme can no

than can the fiague derived

means something,

This something need not be

the contemplative

theme

But then the eighth

forms the major value

more be linked with any emotive from

its

are seen as the standard note value; eighth

teenth notes

them has weight:

glance that

from the ascending hexachord.

traditional musical figure derived

The quarter notes

first

specified;

it is

articulated

alludes to

enough

some-

to notice

and to follow

its

in-

terpretative impulse.

One

reason that not only Wagner, but Mozart, Beethoven,

Schubert, Robert and Clara Schumann, the two Mendelssohns,

Chopin, Brahms, Debussy, Busoni, Hindemith, and many other composers were fascinated by The Well-Tempered Clavier 542

The

Instrumental

Works

is its

ex-

The work allows

traordinary combination of strictness and freedom.

the inclusion of various genres and styles, and actually brings out the idiosyncratic nature of each, but binds

kind of thinking.

I

them together

say "thinking," for the unifying plan of a complete

progression through

the keys

all

performance attuned to can realize the work in

is

this idea,

its

and only

a thought-out idea;

and the

listener s awareness

universal context.

of

a

it,

Can we imagine Johann

Caspar Ferdinand Fischer excitedly performing for his students

into a higher

Ariadne Musica

his

from beginning to end? Bach does

just this

with his

Well-Tempered Clavier, to demonstrate the theoretically inexhaustible variety of sensations contained in this "didactic" music.

The Well-Tempered Clavier could be called the

first

self-contained

Bach did not just concatenate works

cycle in

music

typical

of a genre; he fused together various types of works that

would have

history.

a higher

meaning

in context with each other.

that were

Thus, in-

dividual pieces, each one in itself a microcosm, are best understood

when

presented in an ensemble where one element brings the

uniqueness of the other into focus, at the same time helping demonstrate the

higher context of the group.

Cycles of this type, whose elements are neither arranged arbitrarily

nor held together by a musical idea, are historically rarer than one

might think. The middle ground between

strictness

and freedom can

be found only through intense concentration on each single element.

Take Schubert's

Winterreise as an example: in that work, the

of individual songs, each representing an entire world in

ensemble

itself, is still

subordinate to a higher idea imposed by the literary subject.

Although there

are pieces in

The Well-Tempered Clavier that

either erudite or tend to the gallant, the characteristic

the

two then current does not

his clavier suites as gallant

erudite, but the

Universalism

From

ities;

it

Bach

as such.

and The Art of Fugue,

is

dichotomy of

We may classify

also for clavier, as

world of The Well-Tempered Clavier

with such categories.

era.

exist in

are

is

not described

Its characteristics are universal.

the

theme of the

scholarly world in the baroque

the beginning, that world looked for and found general-

"stretched out

its

arms to the entirety of knowledge and The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

543

accomplishment."53 Interrelations were sought everywhere

—

for the

one in the many, for the system that could tame the multitude of in-

phenomena. Karl Joel dubbed the seventeenth century the

dividual

century of the rational

"classic

state,"

the cradle of the idea that

all

personal impulses and particular interests have to be subordinate to the universal reason inherent in the

This idea ticular

comes

is

not foreign to the

across

it

in the titles of works in

scholars of the age attempted to

Universelle

historian in par-

which the

universal

the entirety of music inside the

fit

Johannes Kepler with

V of 1619, Marin

mundi Libri

The music

arts.

entirety of the world: for instance,

monices

state. 54

Mersenne with

his

Har-

his

Harmonie

of 1636-37, and Athanasius Kircher with his Musurgia

Universalis of 1650.

With fiillest

Gottfried

Wilhelm Leibniz

flower. Leibniz

and mathematical

the universalist idea comes to

no longer thinks

categories.

His "best of all possible worlds," pos-

and

sessing "the greatest possible diversity greatest possible order,"55 verse. It allows for

stant change.

Even the

only permanence stant change,

human

is

no longer

is

individuality

single thing

that law

in traditional mechanistic

itself,

and which in each

at the

same time the

identical with Kepler's uni-

and thus

is

in a state of con-

— the monad — which by

its

is

in motion: "its

nature implies con-

discrete substance

is

harmony

in

with the collective law of the universe."^^

The

entire

world

is

expressed in every monad.

The world can be

defined as a system of vibrations, each vibration completely sub-

sumed fect

in the system.

"On

major-key harmony"

—

the highest level, a this is

French

monad produces

structuralist Gilles

per-

Deleuze s

paraphrase of Leibniz's ideas,57 referring to an image Leibniz bor-

rowed from music tried to explain

in a letter to Arnault of 30 April 1687,

why monads would

be in universal harmony, even

while being totally ignorant of each other. choral singers

who perform

their parts

the others, and stiU must sing in poser's plan.5^

544

The

Instrumental

Works

where he

The monads

are like

without knowing the parts of

harmony according

to the

com-

I

Such discourses about universal world order were weU-known Bachs

era.

Those involved

in this discourse did not always

in

know of

each other or have any influence on each other. Bach and Leibniz,

two monads, may each have gone

like

later

his

own

way, and

left it to a

age to take note of their resonances. But note that the Monadol-

ogy was published posthumously in 1720 and The Well-Tempered Clavier ^N2iS completed in 1722:

hard to imagine a

it is

better, if coin-

cidental, timing.

Certainly the separate preludes and fugues of The Well-Tempered Clavier can be seen as "windowless" monads, leading lives uninflu-

enced by their surroundings yet created by

God

they display a marvelously shared order

— the

mony

own unique

of

historical,

tions,

Within

their

and semantic context, they stand

that

"pre-established har-

compositional,

as individual

composi-

but each has a fixed place in a tonal system where the relations

among the is,

substances. "59

all

way

in such a

intervals are all defined

by the universal constant

V12, that

the square root of twelve.

Bach succeeds

brilliantly in creating a cycle that

corresponds to

Leibniz's concept of a universe of individual creations with the rubric "unity,

and

but in unrestricted variety."

fiigues take

The

individual pairs of preludes

no notice of one another and

are not connected as

the separate contrapuntal works of The Art of Fugue. But in

are, say,

their inevitable

and unmistakable positioning

in the

whole they bear

witness to a universal order that can be experienced as a model of the

order of

life

Keplerian

— on

scale.

a

human

scale,

not on a mathematical-planetary

manner The Well-Tempered Clavier

In this

offers a

wonderful glimpse of what Leibniz was struggling to attain in his philosophy. It

does not matter whether

didactic elements in the

Bach

is

we emphasize

the speculative or the

Cothen demonstration

cycles: in the end.

giving us the universal essence of music.

wardly and outwardly

free

He

does this in-

of his office and his duties as kapell-

meister: he can concentrate

on the task

works

Leipzig instrumental cycles: while the

differ

from the

late

at

hand. Nevertheless, these

The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

545

Cothen works accentuate the musical idea, the cycles of the

variety that can

of all musical

it

BWV 1001-06,

would not be as sonatas

emphasize the

single

spiritual unity

creativity.

In what follows, violin,

last years

come out of a

may seem

and

suites.

didactic ambitions

Cothen demonstration

in the

fitting to treat

strange to include the six solos for

them like the

These violin pieces show Bachs

— though

in a

But

cycles.

it

solos for violoncello, solely

speculative

form that hardly seems made

and for

this purpose.

The

violin

demonstration

not Bach's chosen instrument for teaching or

is

cycles,

but the autograph manuscripts of these works

strongly suggest that he felt very

much

at ease

he seems to have wanted to transcribe the directly into notes

on the page.

that are caUigraphically perfect

It is rare that a

and

also

with the instrument:

violinist

s

composer writes notes

communicate the

Melody and harmony

the music at the same time.

bowing motion

in

feeling of

—

one

that

is

the message of the six solos, which constitute as well an encyclopedia of the violin: prelude, fugue, concerto, aria, variation, dance are performable

The violin

on

all

it.

solos

were noticed early on, not so much because they

were unique in Bach's work

They

—

as because they

had

a special quality.

are conspicuous in the surveys of Bach's music that have sur-

vived from the second half of the eighteenth century. princess

Anna Amalia personally obtained

a

The

Prussian

copy of them in

1873 for

her Bach collection. Music lovers of the nineteenth century thought

them

quite the equal of The Well-Tempered Clavier,

and were

ularly

enamored of the chaconne from the D-minor

1004.

Composers such

Schumann added

as Felix

a piano

partic-

partita,

Mendelssohn Bartholdy and Robert

accompaniment

to the violin voice, not as

a sign that they lacked confidence in Bach's linear setting but in

an attempt to open the concert hall to his violin

Brahms should be accorded ing an arrangement of

piano with the

546

The

left

Instrumental

it,

solos.

he played

it

more

Johannes

special recognition, for instead

of mak-

almost note for note on the

hand, commenting, "the chaconne to

Works

BWV

me

is

one

On

of the most wonderful, incomprehensible works of music.

one small instrument,

staff, for

this

man

of profoundest thought and deepest

This chaconne, with

has written a whole world

feelings.

variations, has

its

one

"^°

become the most famous

piece of the cycle. By invoking various kabbalistic ideas, the work has

been read this

as a

tombeau on the death of Maria Barbara Bach,^^ but

The

speculative at best.

is

overall feeling

is

incomparable: Bach

appears in these violin solos as a musician of the highest order for

any hidden messages but because of the

fulness

and profundity, laughter and

Even

less

tears,

fantastic mixture

— not

of play-

joy and melancholy.

than in The Well-Tempered Clavier, cold, clear analysis

cannot explain or even support such expressions of wonder and admiration. It remains one of the mysteries of

he combines and

the solo violin, abstraction versal

and tonal

fullness,

and contemporary

from one and

all

Bach how,

distills spirituality

and musical language that

music for

in

and

sensuality,

is

both uni-

to his age, to illustrate his principle of "all

in one."

It is easier to describe

the generation preceding

without accompaniment

the novelty of the concept. Certainly in

Bach

—

there were compositions for violin

for example, those

of Heinrich Ignaz

Franz Biber, Johann Jakob Walther, and Johann Paul von Westhoff.^^

The

a time

when

last

named was employed

the

young Bach was

he had the chance to

which

Weimar

are

more

court in 1703, at

employed there

know the famous violinist's

from the year 1696. Technically they violin solos,^^

at the

also

are

in the line

briefly,

and so

suites for violin solo

more advanced than Bachs of Biber's expressive violin

style.

The

six solos consist

of three sonatas and three

mer follow the form of the four-movement sonata"), the latter contain

partitas.

The

for-

sonata da chiesa ("church

dance movements in various combinations

The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

547

and sequences. The key sequence of the minor,

six parts

— G minor,

B

A minor, D minor, C major, and E major — has a clever sym-

metry that escapes one

two major

at first:

thirds

(G-B and C-E)

are

connected by a fourth (A-D) whose tones are respectively the mid tones of the two

thirds.^''^

Thus

all six

tones of the hexachord are rep-

resented, but in an order that corresponds to the alternation of

sonatas and suites.

Bach mixes popular and academic ular element

is

his inclusion

larly in the structure

dance that

is

of dance steps in the partitas

virtuosic

and yet easy

to follow.

(first)

is

The academic

the second

particu-

side appears

movement of each sonata.

not possible on a violin, but one can hear entries of

and comes (second),

Bach presents

for example,

and one can hear

inter-

similar ideas in incomparable style in the 354-

bar-long concert fugue from the C-major sonata is

—

followed by a double, allowing the soloist to play in a style

is

A real fiigue ludes.

One pop-

BWV 1002, where each

of the B-minor partita

mosdy in the fiigues, which are dux

in the violin solos.

BWV 1005: here he

something beyond the audible and in the process

able to suggest

give the listener the sense of participating in the performance of a

demanding

The

fiigue.

real significance

of the

six violin solos is

not their virtuosic

many voices, though this does give them access to a great of structural energy. The palpable new dimension of the com-

play with deal

positions just its

is

their coherence.

A

work composed by Bach cannot

be divided up into one-voice and multivoice sections; even in

original, basic form, the entire thing has a

Where a two-,

three-, or four-part

phonic section, the polyphony

polyphonic structure.

harmony transitions

is

still

into a

homo-

there, lending the section a

multivalent richness.

The

tonal space that the quadruple-stopped chords open

the start of the

B-minor

partita

at

BWV 1002 does not disappear when

the music becomes homophonic; structural details.

up

The composer

it

continues to influence the works

Nicolaus A.

Huber has pointed out

comparable writing methods in works of Anton Webern and Pierre

548

The

Instrumental

Works

t

Boulez, expressing the view that the

homophonic

violin solos re-

semble a multilayered organism, where homophony and polyphony,

harmonic

layers

and horizontal rows

one another

relate to

artfully,

even cryptically ^5

The

uninitiated listener does not register these connections con-

sciously but nonetheless reacts to

intensely.

Bach's desire,

whole essence of music with just

coiled like a spring, to present the a single violin

them

and the performer s struggle

to satisfy this desire have

an almost superhuman dimension, and they increase the aesthetic

enjoyment of the work by infusing

it

listener's

with that sense of the

demonic, which, for the ancients, was the echo of the divine. It

may have amused Bach

to revise the thoroughly

(indeed quite playful) prelude of the E-major Partita

be used

danken

as the dir,

it is

Gott, wir danken

should time,

with

and timpani, exhibits

the same.

it

keep

its

dir,"

BWV 29,

in 1731.

The new

strings, oboes, concertizing organ,

a totally different character, but at

He may have

initially

BWV 1006 to

opening sinfonia of the Ratswahl Cantata "Wir

ting, lavishly scored

pets,

undemonic

set-

trum-

bottom

been thinking that every piece of music

riches for

itself;

but then,

later, at

the right

should be allowed to show them off to the outside world.

The Cothen Demonstration

Cycles

549

THE CONCERTOS Among Bach's surviving instrumental concertos, some give off a speothers have a lesser reputation in the public

cial radiance, w^hile

BWV 1046-51, the violin concertos in E major, BWV 1042, and A minor, BWV 1041, the Concerto for Two Violins in D Minor, BWV 1043, ^^^ the Concerto for Two Claviers in C Major, BWV 1061. In the second mind. In the

first

group are the Brandenburg

group are primarily the nally

composed

for

1056, as well as the

clavier

ConcertoSy

arrangements of lost concertos origi-

melody instruments,

BWV 1052, 1053, 1055, and

Concerto for Flute, Violin, and Harpsichord in

A Minor, BWV 1044, ^so based on an older model. Though one might mances

is

just

on the

uation: concentration

regret that the focus of concerto perfor-

original works, there

is

on ten works makes

a it

each of them as unique and independent. This tant, since for generations

sistent

side to that sit-

understand

easier to is all

the

more impor-

of Bach scholarship there has been a per-

tendency to evaluate Bach's orchestra concertos by a single

standard,

form.

good

which might generally be dubbed the Vivaldi concerto

The

partly, or

extent to

not at

all

—

which Bach followed is

surely

—

wholly,

He

cannot

this standard

worthy of renewed

study.

intervene in the debate, but he would probably want to set the record straight.

As a young man, he was

fascinated by the possibilities of the

instrumental concerto style of Albinoni and Vivaldi earlier

550

—

as a

new

century

Heinrich Schiitz had been fascinated by the then-current

The

Instrumental

Works

—

And just

concerted vocal style of Monteverdi.

as

one could not

ever judge the religious vocal concertos of the great Sagittarius Schiitz, since Schiitze

means

"archer")

the Italian concerted style, neither

on how much they retained of

would Bach want

together forever with Italian models.

to be

lumped

We must look elsewhere to find

that great "musical perfection" that Meister

with in

for(i.e.,

Birnbaum

credited

him

1738.

Having no intention

to

measure Bachs concertos on an imagi-

we begin

nary model and recognizing their particular uniqueness,

with the Brandenburg Concertos. In gathering six concertos into a col-

Bach

lection.

is

following a convention but at the same time con-

sciously privileging heterogeneity over formal unity.

of his era are pleased

when

but Bach

is

publishers

they can print music that was

neous in both orchestration and salable,

The

looking for

style,

homogemore

thus easier to learn and

variety.

He

wants to explore, in the

words of Nikolaus Forkel, what "can be done with many parts and

few parts"

of ensemble music.

in the realm

for this demonstration

is

The

intended audience

not his kapellmeister colleague at Branden-

burg or even the dedicatee, the Margrave of Brandenburg himself:

Bach

is

writing for the

artistic

Compared with what was time was small, so

it is

world in general. to

come, the

artistic

not surprising that there

is

world of Bach's

no evidence of

performances of the Brandenburg Concertos outside his immediate sphere.

He

olin cycles

could broaden the reach of his exceptional clavier and vi-

through

orchestral music.

his students,

Thus

but that possibility did not exist for

the Brandenburg Concertos remained, until

long after his death, at most a topic for discussion ated

—

discussion

among

the initi-

on the master s view of what an ensemble concerto

should be.

At come or tos

first

into

is it

glance

it

looks as if Bachs ensemble concertos did not

bloom one by one but

all

together as a mixed bouquet

pure coincidence that they and not the instrumental concer-

form

a closed, coherent collection?

The

instrumental ensembles

of the concertos each have an individual quality to them: only

one takes a collective look

at all six

does

it

become

when

clear that

The Concertos

Bach 551

has taken the sound of each instrument into consideration: recorder, flute,

oboe, bassoon, trumpet, horn, violino piccolo, violin, viola, vi-

oloncello, violone, viola da

most but not

gamba, harpsichord. This

the instruments

all

known

trombones, for instance. Viewing the

six

to his age

—

includes

list

there are

no

concertos as a whole, he

wields his instrumentarium as if it were multiply combined registra-

whose spectrum of sound

tions of an organ, all its facets. It is

way

the

which the sounds

in

meaning

is

visible in

are arranged, that gives value

written for

homogenous

methodicism in

a rigid

for a variety of tonal experience.

The

third

and

string ensembles with

The

contrast, have a

the

colorfiil orchestration:

courtly ritual, and the second

lies

sixth concerto are

an expectably unified

first

two concertos,

first is

pipers."^

The

it

"tonal fantasy

orchestration of the

between the tonal

variety; in overall feeling,

in

reminiscent of

makes one think of the

and concert form of the town fourth and fifth concertos

but aims more

this

and the

tonal color in various levels and nuances.

and

made

to the timbres of the individual instruments.

Bach does not apply

ity

to be

the harmonious combination of the ensemble, and

ideals

of homogene-

approaches the courtly or gallant

idea of a concerto.

Three of the middle movements show the

close proximity of the

Brandenburg Concertos to chamber music and the sonata. In the sec-

ond

concerto, recorders, oboe, and violins join the continuo; in the

fifth,

there are flutes, violins, and a concertizing harpsichord; and in

the sixth, there are two violas and a cello line,

whose

livelier figura-

tion contrasts with the continuo.

There nations,

is

and

no lack of unusual instruments, difficult parts.

The

first

exquisite tonal

concerto requires the violino

piccolo to play a kind of dancing-master violin

part.

In the second

concerto, the combination of recorder and trumpet

is

cording to Johann Mattheson, a "practiced master"

needed

''2i

flute douce or other gentle Instrument

the trumpet."^

The trumpet

Leipzig, where

552

The

Bach had

Instrumental

Works

part

is

combi-

is

unusual: acto

keep

from being drowned out by

of the greatest

difficulty:

even

at

a splendid trumpeter in the person of Jo-

^

hann Gottfried Reiche

at his disposal,

he never wrote another trum-

pet part of comparable difficulty.

In the fourth concerto, what "Fiauti

is

meant by the mysterious term

d echo," unique in Bach's work and very unusual in the works

of the time?

A recorder, one imagines — but in the second concerto,

and elsewhere

Bach

generally,

calls this

instrument "flauto." In the

second movement of the fourth concerto, the

"fiauti

d'echo" are

asked to provide a constant alternation between forte and piano. Per-

haps this

way of writing

explains the

name of the

been suggested that he was thinking of two

also

ments^ or even of double for switching

In the

from loud

flutes,

when

this concerto

whose two pipes would be

two more instruments get been introduced

may

first

—

da gamba in the sixth concerto are not

solo parts.

violas,

This arrangement

that Prince

is

their chance: the

music world in

to the

a novelty as well.

The

violas

as lucky: their challenge

is

to

an instrument not usually favored with aU the more astonishing, considering

is

Leopold of Cothen himself played the

Michael Marissen

suitable

have been written, and the harp-

sichord as a concertizing instrument

be background to the

sopranino instru-

to soft playing.^

fifth concerto,

transverse flute, having just 1717,

F

instrument. It has

viola

da gamba.

of the opinion that Bach, in the context of an

imagined conversation with his princely superior, was consciously, cleverly playing with these social roles.

In contrast, Peter Schleuning wishes to see the movements of the Sixth Brandenburg Concerto as a "sequence of pastoral scenes,"

and

in this special context to interpret the violas as "symbols

cial inferiority,"

that

both these theories

is

is,

as peasants' music. ^

An

of so-

argument against

the fact that in Protestant church music before

Bach's time, orchestrations like those of the Sixth Brandenburg

Concerto were not unusual.7

There have been attempts denburg Concertos

to interpret the

allegorically.

whole

series

o^ Bran-

In 1991 Philip Pickett offered the

view that with these concertos Bach was paying homage to the margrave as a "classical hero" and saw the series as a "musical triumphal

The Concertos

553

procession ... in

structure

its

and

its

content comparable to those

legorical marches, parades, acrobatics

and

festivals

which used

al-

to be

staged on important state occasions." In this interpretation, the concertos are given headings:

"The Triumph of Caesar," "Fame, Homer,

Virgil,

and Dante on Parnassus," "The Nine Muses and the Har-

mony

of the Spheres," "The Musical Contest of Apollo and

Marsyas," "The Choice of Hercules," and "The Meeting of the

Three Living

w^ith the

Three Dead."^

Picking up on Reinhard GoebeFs idea, Karl

Bohmer

introduced

an idea that he thought more persuasive: that the concertos constitute an

"allegorical illustration" derived

from the "decorative program of

baroque Residences." Without trying to take up a direct "reconstruction of Bach's compositional idea" or to explain "every detail in the

course of the piece," he attempts to demonstrate "w^hy Bach selected precisely these six concertos in praise of a baroque prince,

where

this prince

Bohmer

titles

"The Prince

and

his

courdy society are represented in the music."

the six concertos, respectively, as

and how^ and

"The Prince

as

Hunter,"

Hero," "The Prince of the Muses," "The Prince as

Shepherd," "The Prince as Lover," and "The Prince as Scholar."^

The

guild of musicologists and the smaller guild of Bach schol-

ars collectively pull a

when

long face

asked to consider such (in their

view) unserious excursions into the realm of fantasy. First, there

is

no

evidence for any of it; second, readings like these shift the discussion

of Bach's music from the

fields

of "pure" analysis into that of cultural

and reception history and even everyday at

music from a reception point of view

history.

But whoever looks

will not find

courtly society perceived this ceremonial music,

honor, very

much

as

it

viewed the Gobelins and

in the concert hall, or the marble

it

odd

that a

composed

in

portraits that

its

hung

and sandstone sculptures that or-

namented the palace garden. There does

exist evidence

of specific ways of performing sonatas

or suites in series. In the front of a deluxe edition of violin sonatas

from the

last third

of the seventeenth century, by Heinrich Ignaz

Biber, are copper engravings that offer a

mysteries in the 554

The

life

Instrumental

commentary on the

of the Virgin Mary.

Works

The

set

of ballet

fifteen suites

under the the

title

Florilegium

names of the

by Georg Muffat, published

in 1695, ^^^^

virtues personified, such as Eusebia, Sperantis

Gaudia, Gratitudo. MufFat

s

instrumental concertos from 1701 carry

headings such as "Cor Vigilans," "Dulce Somnium," "Deliciae

Regum," "Delirium Amoris," and

now

posed a

cycle,

qualities

of the planets.

lost,

Those among the played

it

themselves

so on. Dietrich

of seven clavier

suites

Buxtehude com-

on the nature and

nobility vv^ho not only loved music but also

may occasionally have

taken an interest in their

kapellmeister's writing style

and discussed,

for example, to

gree he was conforming to

more modern

Italian or

As

a rule, however, if they discussed music at

what de-

French

tastes.

those at court

all,

were probably more concerned with questions of instrumentation or interpretation.

At this

point we have probably showoi enough tolerance for the-

ories that seek to place the

context. For

Brandenburg Concertos in an emblematic

one thing, each concerto has

its

own

history, so that

such a theory can have traction only to the extent that

addresses

it

the arrangement of the whole series. For another, the series has

ovm autonomous is

conception: as in his other important cycles. Bach

primarily concerned with

a historically

mediates tional

method;

meant

it is

The Konzert function in this

his

so.

The word

—

to address the

moment and in even the name

way

as

way

and composi-

that music appears at a

a specific social setting.

has a double meaning

— could

an "imprint," and the ensemble concerto

On the topic of ensemble concertos. Bach wants to say with

Brandenburg Concertos what in his view needs to be

reveals himself as a

fronts the present, atically

to

"imprint" here

categories such as genre, style, form,

particular historical

more

making an unmistakable contribution

developed musical imprint.

among

its

exploring

composer who

and all

who

at the

is

conscious of history,

same time

is

ent creative periods. It

is

who

He

con-

interested in system-

the compositional possibilities. It

virtue than a necessity that the cycle

said.

is

more

combines concertos from

a

differ-

both a work in progress and a depiction of

personal development.

The Concertos

555

Bach succeeded

in creating a series unique in music history,

which not even Telemann's Musique de one hand, ate

and that

cism

a comprehensible

it is

to this

— concertos third,

first,

tional

day can be considered a model of baroque

for amateurs

and

of the

sixth concertos

German ensemble

tasticuSy

On

the

music that the senses can appreci-

music for the cognoscenti, for Bach the

can approach.

table

art. is

On

classi-

the other hand, this

summing

is

up. Particularly in

he conjures up the

spirit

musicianship influenced by the

of tradi-

stylus phan-

which allowed the "transformation of conventional musical

forms into unconventional variants. "^°

He knows well how to use the

modern,

known simply

style; it

clear Italian concerto form,

became

a matter of pride

as the Vivaldi

with him never to repeat a form in

the concertos but always to introduce a

new one

for

group perfor-

mance. In the process he invented thematic figures and forms of mo-

development that anticipate most of aU the

tivic

of

"classical style"

Austro- German provenance."

What these two different ages of music making have in common is

the definition of the categories "composition" and "work." In the

aesthetic ural,

view of Viennese classicism, music should be flowing, nat-

and based

in song, dance, or

form, and so take the same time possibilities

—

Goethe put

it,

tion

its

its

a

shape from the

intrinsic

that

is,

it

Haydn

between four

some other

human

entertainment

concept of grace. But

worth should develop from

its

at

inherent

should represent a higher meaning.

As

string quartet could be seen as a conversa-

intelligent people,^^ or a

Beethoven symphony,

a contemporary review, as a "Pindaric ode."^^

and Beethoven's symphonies can be seen cal structure

social

in

But Haydn's quartets

as attempts to build

musi-

through the use of motivic-thematic development and

variations; thus they allow the self- referential nature

of the system to

operate on an elevated, reflective plane.

To what

extent the Brandenburg Concertos point the

compositional styles of Viennese classicism

is

the

way for the music

ries

of works for keyboard instruments or solo

not the

way

issue;

to the

they laid

discourse of the classic- Romantic era. Bach's seviolin,

and the sonatas,

have an indirect connection here as well. But the all-important or556

The

Instrumental

Works

chestral understanding

of music and composition crucial to further

development was advanced most of all by the Brandenburg although naturally also

Concertos,

by the great opening movements of Bach's

passions and cantatas.

With

all

due respect for the concertante

second, fourth, and fifth concertos,

it is

of the

final fiigue sections

opening movements of

in the

the Brandenburg Concertos that the motivic-thematic v^ork achieves a density, a critical

mass from v^hich proceeded Viennese classicisms

sonata-form

movement

first

meaning of the term. They

in the true

become

the crystallization point for w^orking out motifs, thematic

process,

and dynamic development and thus

individual

The

and

social undertakings

motivic material giving

firom the

are paradigmatic

rise to all this is

opening ritomello of the

of the

of idealism in general.

fifth concerto,

unassuming. Apart

which picks up the

dramatic gesture of the Italian concerto form, and the thematically sophisticated exposition of the fourth concerto.

reverting to simple material that

is

Bach

is

essentially

transparently derived from

seventeenth-century musical figures. Commonalities in the concertos' motivic materials are continually being construed by

cendy by Michael Talbot, but these

critics,

are easily explained^

most

by the

that instrumental music of the seventeenth century repeatedly

with the same simple figurations: with runs, broken

on a main was

less

The

note,

and so on. In

this

fact

worked

triads, variations

kind of music, an original inventio

important than a clever and variation-filled multiple ensembles of the opening

concerto find a precedent in the

re-

German

elaboratio.

movement of the

third

tradition of the seventeenth

and early eighteenth centuries: a sonata of David Pohle for eight strings survives,

composed perhaps

as early as 1660; sonatas

with

two and three separate instrumental ensembles by Johann Philipp Krieger, are tal

Johann Pachelbel, and Johann Michael Bach, among

documented but have not

survived.^^

A glance at the instrumen-

chorale transcription "Gelobet seist du, Jesu Christ" from

Scheldt's Tabulatura

Nova of 1624

of the third concerto has

its

others,

reveals that

Samuel

even the motivic work

roots in the figurative practices of the

seventeenth century: the compositional influence of Scheldt's

The Concertos

work 557

extended beyond the Orgelbuchlein\ Examples closer in time to Bach's

ensemble music can be found da gamba, the

viola

'^

and

of which came out in 1696.

first set

r'rUf n^j-j V

^

in Buxtehude's sonatas for violins

^{j

•