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William L. Hoffman wrote (December 24, 2023)
Beyond the 1176 individual Bach BWV works listed in the new BWV3 Bach Works Catalogue (Breitkopf) are various works appropriate for other sacred observances, pasticcios or collections, newly-assembled gatherings, and transcriptions, adaptations, and realizations. This Bach music reveals basic idiomatic melodic, rhythmic and harmonic features inherent in principles such as unity through diversity, subtlety enriching expression, and vocal/instrumental timbres transformed through various guises. The theme of the 1723 Bachfest Leipzig, "BACH for Future," festival artistic director Michael Maul explains as follows: "Bach's music will be presented in new contexts in the commissioning of contemporary works that strengthen the understanding of his compositions" (Bachfest Leipzig: 2023 Programme Book: 8) It also means that we will not only be reverently looking back over 300 years of Bach’s music in its original venues, but also presenting it in new contexts, with a host of fantastic Bachfest debutants, diverse fresh new formats and many a surprising adaptation and reinterpretation of well-known works. "Well, I think that the 150 or more events over eleven days [at Bachfest 2023] will show us all one thing first and foremost: Bach’s 300-year-old music has truly not aged, the history of its reception is 'in flux'. Where it comes from, what it can tell us today and how it can also shape our future – all these things will be explored at the 2023 Bachfest. Hopefully once again with numerous visitors from near and far. Welcome to the Bach city of Leipzig!," says Maul (Ibid.: 9).
The inaugural Bachfest Leipzig concert on 8 June 1723 began with Cantata 75, "Die Elenden sollen essen" ("The Wretched Shall Eat"), for the 1st Sunday after Trinity. "To complement it, a new work was commissioned for performance in the St. Thomas Church," says the Bachfest 2023 notes (see Bach Festival 2023: Classical music goes cosmic (DW): "Opening concert: A call for peace"). In his "Kantate: War and Hope" for soloists, chorus, organ and orchestra, "contemporary composer Jörg Widmann1 takes the baroque form of the cantata and gives it new spirit," with this premiere of a commissioned work "being the most original and deeply moving," says Bach scholar Yo Tomita in his conference report (American Bach Society: Bach Notes 39: 5). This extended cantata genre has "its unconditional focus on chorale-like lyrical texts," says Tomita (Ibid.) in seven sections with texts of Matthias Claudius, Jean Paul, Berthold Brecht, and the Bible, a large chorale with words from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Von guten Mächten, and a concluding Halellujah, all set to Bach's music as parody or new text underlay. The motto, "BACH for Future," "was explored from various new and exciting angles by setting Bach's works in new contexts, formats, and adaptations," says Tomita (Ibid.).
"BACH for Future": "Et Lux," "Judas" Pasticcio Cantatas, Brandenburg Redux»BACH for Future« "also means that we will not only be reverently looking back over 300 years of Bach’s music in its original venues, but also presenting it in new contexts, with a host of fantastic Bachfest debutants, diverse fresh new formats and many a surprising adaptation and reinterpretation of well-known works,"" says Maul, (Bachfest Leipzig: 2023 Programme Book: 8). "For example, there’ll be a kind of Judas oratorio and a requiem by Bach." Scored for SATB and chamber orchestra and directed by Jakob Lehmann, the Bach Requiem "Et Lux"2 is a pasticcio from Bach cantata movements with new texts by Thomas Kunst, "based on what he imagined Bach might have written as a requiem text in the modern day," says Tomita (Ibid.: 7). "The work may be regarded as a parody [new text underlay] but strictly speaking the approach is fundamentally different; from Bach's own practice, since no changes were made to the music itself." It uses the chorale "Wer nur den Lieben Gott läßt Walten" (Whoever lets only the dear God reign) "as an underlying tune to unify the work," he says (Ibid.). The "Et Lux," 11 June, program notes describe it as follows (Bachfest Leipzig: 2023 Programme Book: 49): "Death is the theme of many sacred works by Johann Sebastian Bach, yet the Thomaskantor never composed a requiem. This gave the soprano Julia Sophie Wagner and conductor Jakob Lehmann the idea of using the parody technique to compile a modern requiem from individual movements from Bach cantatas. For it, the Leipzig-based author Thomas Kunst has written new, contemporary texts that have been set to Bach’s music, which remains unchanged. The result is a highly topical work which, after its premiere at the 2022 Thüringer Bachwochen festival, can now also be heard in Leipzig – in the lecture hall of the anatomical institute where Bach’s bones were examined in 1894. At the start of the concert, today’s director of the institute will analyse the plaster cast of Bach’s head that was prepared then."
Another pasticcio is "Judas,"3 an extended tenor solo cantata using the music of eight pertinent Bach arias and five recitatives by the Continuum ensemble," which traces the psychological ambivalence of this disciple of Jesus. Tenor Benedickt Kristjánsson chose appropriate music and commentary showing Judas moving from despair and self-hate to his own form of redemption. Supporting this investigation are passages from the novel »Judas« by Amos Oz (Teh Guardian: Book Review), "tracing the psychological ambivalence of Judas Iscariot," says Tomita (Ibid.: 9f), "certainly one of the most original and unforgettable [Bachfest] events. Instrumentally, the "Brandenburg Mirror Concert" features "six new works made from 'old' notes: the Munich Bach Orchestra conducted by Hansjörg Albrecht has compiled six 'new Brandenburg Concertos', the instrumentation of which follows that of the original pieces. All the proceeds will go to the Bach Forest," says the Bachfest program (Bachfest Leipzig: 2023 Programme Book: 39).
Original Compositions
The raw materials for new constructions may involve movements from Bach sacred cantatas (instrumental sinfonias, choruses, arias, chorales, recitatives) which also are known as musical sermons, focusing on the service's biblical readings with quotations, appropriate hymn texts, madrigalian poetry, and Lutheran theology. The texts can remain the same where appropriate, or altered through parody (new text underlay). In some of the new original compositions, such as Rudolf Lutz's Bach-Luther-Kantate,4 the musical materials are altered, such as a violin sonata arranged as an instrumental sinfonia, a recitative adapted from a Luther melody and text, an aria using a motive from Bach's Canonic Variations on "Vom Himmel hoch," a chorus with a Bach fugue set to Luther text (No. 16, "Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen" [On the Freedom of a Christian]), and a Bach chorale setting with newly-composed instrumental interludes based on Bach's "Chaconne," BWV 1004/5 (No. 7), with Karl Graft''s text, mixing "original Luther quotations with reformulated Luther words and lines he wrote himself," says Wikipedia (see footnote 4, Lutherkantate wikipedia). "The libretto, framed by a prologue and epilogue [with 20 movements, this extended cantata] links Luther’s exile in Wartburg Castle with Bach’s detention in a Weimar cell, thus sthe stage for the baroque composer to reflect on the Reformer Luther," says the score discussion (Ibid., see footnote 4, discussion). The result is "an imagined Luther cantata written by Bach during his Weimar period [in 1717 for the 200th anniversary of the Reformation] that displays the typical, festive occasional style of the era alongside the emotional depth of Bach’s inner turmoil." It was premiered in Wartburg in 2017 under the auspices of the J. S. Bach Foundation.
Soon afterwards, Lutz with his librettist Graf wrote another cantata "in a style inspired by Johann Sebastian Bach, the Landsgemeinde [Country community] cantata,"5 which premiered in April 2018 in St. Gallen, with the title "Alles Leben strömt aus dir" (All life flows from you). In the style of a nine-movement chorale cantata (see tracklist, footnote 5), it recreates a Swiss community assembly. "It is an hommage to this ancient ritual of direct democracy," says the discussion video, YouTube. The impetus for these extended cantatas began in 2011 when the J. S. Bach Foundation, as part of its 25-year project to record all of Bach' works, directed Arthur Godel and Lutz to compile "a thematic collage of selected [well-known] movements from cantatas and instrumental works," called "Bach Im Fluss"6 — "Bach and the river of time," contemplations on life and eternity, says the description (Bachipedia). The 25 movements (see tracklist, footnote 5) includes arias, recitatives, chorales, and choruses as well as instrumental sinfonias, sonatas, solo, and keyboard movements.
The most ambitious project is "J. S. Bach — The Apocalypse — The opera Bach never wrote,"7 from the Netherlands Bach Society and OPERA2DAY, an original work using quotations from Bach works premiered in 2022 in The Hague. Composer Panos Iliopoulos has added new music in a neo-Romantic style and lyricist Thomas Höft has added a narrator-evangelist in a Brecht play with Münster Anabaptist religious fundamentalist fanaticism of the 16th century where a utopian vision becomes an apocalypse.
Bach Works Projects
The Leipzig Bachfest commissioning follows in the spirit of various previous undertakings, such as the Orgelbüchlein Project to complete Bach's unfinished chorale preludes for the church year (Orgelbüchlein.co.uk). Other speculations about Bach's compositions include Morimur (EMI Records), a code realization of the implied chorales in Bach's Chaconne in the Violin Partita in D Minor, BWV 1004 (YouTube), Joseph James' Requiem After J. S. Bach framed by the Chromatic Fantasy in D Minor (YouTube), and Andre Isoir's Johann Sebastian Bach Te Deum and other chorales (Musicweb International). Another major effort has been the reconstruction of presumed original instrumental concertos, based upon extant manuscripts, most notably Bach's Harpsichord Concertos, BWV 1052-59. Best known among the second- and third-generation reconstructions is Bach's Double Concerto for Oboe and Violin, BWV 1060R (YouTube), based upon the Concerto for Two Harpsichords (YouTube), which still is not accepted in the new BWV 3rd edition (Breitkpof: Google Translatef: XXVIIII) but which will be performed at the Leipzig Bachfest on 10 June 1723. In the vocal works category are the reconstructions of Alexander Grychtolik, the St. Mark Passion, BWV 247; Köthen Funeral Music, BWV 1143=244a; and secular cantatas BWV 36a and 66a, 216a and 210a, and 205a and 249a (BCW). Diethard Hellmann (BCW) published reconstructions of Bach's Ärgre dich, o Seele, nicht, BWV 186a for the 3rd Sunday in Advent, Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied, BWV 190a and the Markus-Passion (BWV 247). Hellmann's reconstruction of Markus-Passion (BWV 247) has been recorded by several conductors (see: BWV 247 Markus Passion - Recordings).
One of the first anthologies of Bach's works was conductor Hans Grischkat's Cantate: Vom Reiche Gottes (From the Kingdom of God), oratorio-style excerpts from 18 cantatas arranged from sorrow to joy (BWV 146 to 137).8 More recent is Richard T. Gore's Advent oratorio arrangement, J. S. Bach: Good Tidings of Great Joy (St. Louis MO: Concordia, 1970), from appropriate, Advent-related cantata movements (Amazon.com): BWV 101/5,7; 147/3/6; 30/1-3,6; 62/1,2; 36/7; 70/10-3,11; 151/1; 104/1; 132/5; 22/5; 63/5, 148/1, 29/8.9 The model for these extended cantatas, also known as oratorios, is Grischkat's 1950 compilation from sorrow to joy, from law to gospel, cited in Gore's Preface to his Advent Oratorio.10
Book of Revelation & Bach (source: BCW)
<<The Book of Revelation emphasizes the interest initially found in the Gospels concerning the so-called “last things,” involving definitive judgement, symbolically related to the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem. This interest is called eschatology, or the study of last things. The concepts of Christology and eschatology are found in the New Testament and Bach and his Lutheran associates understood and applied their theological principles. Bach set various verses from Revelation for church year cantatas celebrating the Feasts of St. Michael, Christmas, 1st Sunday in Advent, and possible special occasions in Weimar. Assuming Bach's authorship, the Michaelmas motet Cantata BWV 50, "Nun ist das Heil" (Now is the Salvation) is one of five Bach cantata movements using passages from the New Testament Book of the Revelation to John. They constitute five different musical forms and could be performed together as a Michaelfest composite pasticccio cantata, opening and closing with chorale fugues using trumpets and drums, the latter using the same text as Handel’s “Messiah” chorus,“Worthy is the lamb” (Rev. 5:12-13). The works and their movements with Revelation texts (Francis Browne English Translation) are:
1. Eight-voice motet fugal chorus, "Nun ist das Heil" (Now is the Salvation), BWV 50, Michaelmas, September 29, ?1723: “Nun ist das Heil und die Kraft und das Reich / und die Macht unsers Gottes / seines Christus worden, weil der verworfen ist, / der sie verklagete Tag und Nacht vor Gott.” (Now is the salvation and the strength and the kingdom and the might of our God / become [those] of his Christ, / since he has been cast out / who complained about them day and night before God. [Rev. 12:10]), YouTube.
2. Recitatve/Arioso (bass, continuo), "Der Freide sei mit dir" (Peace be with you, John 20:21, Easter Tuesday Gospel), Cantata 158, ?pasticcio, origins uncertain, (text ?Salomo Franck): B. “Der Friede sei mit dir, / Der Fürste dieser Welt, / Der deiner Seele nachgestellt, / Isdurch des Lammes Blut bezwungen und gefällt.” (Peace be with you, / the prince of this world / who hunted after your soul, / is conquered and felled through the Lamb's blood.” [cf Rev. 12:11], YouTube.
3. Soul-Jesus (soprano-bass) aria, "Wie soll ich dich, Liebster der Seelen, umfassen?" (How should I embrace you, most beloved of souls?), Cantata 152, "Tritt auf die Glaubensbahn" (Step forward on the way of faith), Sunday after Christmas 1715, Movement 6 (S. Franck text), last line (bass): “Dir schenk ich die Krone nach Trübsal und Schmach.” (I bestow on you the crown after trouble and disgrace, [Rev. 2:10]), YouTube.
4. Arioso (bass, continuo) "Siehe, ich stehe vor der Tür" (See, I stand before the door), Cantata 61, "Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland" (Now come, saviour of the gentiles; Erdmann Neumeister text), First Sunday in Advent 1714, Movement 6: “Siehe, ich stehe vor der Tür und klopfe an. / So jemand meine Stimme hören wird und die Tür auftun, /zu dem werde ich eingehen / und das Abendmahl mit ihm halten und er mit mir.” (See, I stand before the door and knock. / If anyone will hear my voice / and open the door / I shall go in / and have supper with him and he with me [Rev. 3:20]), YouTube.
5. Closing chorus prelude and fugue, "Das Lamm, das erwürget ist" (The lamb that was slain), Cantata 21, "Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis" (I had much affliction; S. Franck text), Movement 11: Das Lamm, das erwürget ist, ist würdig zu nehmen Kraft und Reichtum und Weisheit und Stärke / und Ehre und Preis und Lob. / Lob und Ehre und Preis und Gewalt / sei unserm Gott von Ewigkeit zu Ewigkeit. / Amen, Alleluja!” (The lamb that was slain is worthy to receive / power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and praise and glory. / Glory and honour and praise and power / be to our God for ever and ever. Amen. Alleluia! [Rev. 5:12-13]).>> Appropriate chorale preludes and plain chorales are discussed in the next three sections, (source: BCW).
Postscript
There are other works of Bach still to be uncovered or reconstructed: the "lost" Pentecost Oratorio of 1739 (BCW); a lost St. Michael's feast cantatas,possibly BWV 248a=248VI (Wikipedia); Bach's lost "fifth" Passion, known — variously — as the "Weimar" or "Gotha" Passion ("Weimar-Gotha Passion," Wikipedia, details Google Books); Bach Digital).
ENDNOTES
1 Jörg Widmann, Kantate "War and Hope": commission, Ernst von Siemens Musikstiftung; details found at Shott Music; varied texts of five writers, Wikipedia; score, Schott Music.
2 Bach Requiem "Et Lux": Julia Wagner descriptions, Amazon.com, Julia Sophie Wagner; Bachfest Leipzig notes: Bachfest Leipzig: 2023 Programme Book: 49. Bach Requiem Mass, JSBachFOA: Bach's Requiem Mass:
Trailer recording, YouTube; for another Bach Requiem, see below, "Bach Works Projects," Joseph James' Requiem After J. S. Bach framed by the Chromatic Fantasy in D Minor (YouTube).
3 "Judas — A Pasticcio," Arias and Recitatives by Bach, description: Bachfest Leipzig: 2023 Programme Book: 51;
Novello Classics (recording, playlist, YouTube), Amazon.com: 1. Aria, "Meine Seele wartet auf den Herrn" (My soul waits for the Lord, Ps. 130:6), No. 4, BWV 131 (Psalm 130, Out of the depths I cry to thee); 2. Recitative, "Ach! ich bin ein Kind der Sünden" (Alas, I am a child of sin, Johann Rist chorale), No. 3, BWV 78, "Jesus, thou who this my spirit, trans. Z. Philip Ambrose); 3, Aria, "Falscher Heuchler Ebenbild" (The appearance of false hypocrites), No. 3, BWV 179, "Siehe zu, daß deine Gottesfurcht nicht Heuchelei sei" (Watch with care lest all thy piety hypocrisy be, trans. Ambrose); 4. Recitative, "Ich habe wider Gott gehandelt" (The will of God have I neglected), No. 2, BWV 55, "Ich armer Mensch, ich Sündenknecht (I, wretched man, I, slave to sin, trans. Ambrose); 5. Aria, "Hasse nur, hasse mich recht"" (Hate me now, hate me with glee), No. 10, BWV 76, "Die Himmel erzählen die Ehre Gottes" (The heavens are telling the glory of God, Ps. 19:1); 6, Aria, "Erbarme dich" (Have mercy Lord), No. 3, BWV 55; 7. Recitative, " Es mag mir Leib und Geist verschmachten" (Though I may fall in flesh and spirit), No. 4, BWV 3, "Ach Gott, wie manches Herzeleid [I]" (Ah God, how oft a heartfelt grief, trans. Ambrose); 8. Aria, "Sei getreu, alle Pein" (Hold thy faith: all thy pain), No. 6, BWV 12, "Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen" (Weeping, wailing, grieving, fearing, trans. Ambrose); 9. Recitative, "Trinket alle daraus" (Drink all of you, from this, Mat. 26:27b), No. 11, BWV 244, Matthew Passion; 10. Recitative, "Dies ist die Stimme meines Freundes" (I hear the voice of my beloved), No. 6, BWV 154, "Mein liebster Jesus ist verloren" (My precious Jesus now hath vanished, trans. Ambrose); 11. Aria, "Ich halte meinem Jesum feste" (I firmly hold my Lord Jesus), No. 2, BWV 157, "Ich lasse dich nicht, du segnest mich denn" (I'll not let thee go, thou must bless me first, Gen. 32:27, trans. Ambrose); 12. Aria, "Ich fürchte nicht des Todes Schrecken" (I do not fear the horrors of death"), No. 2, BWV 183, "Sie werden euch in den Bann tun [II]" (Sie werden euch in den Bann tun [II]" (In banishment they will cast you, Jn. 16:2, trans. Ambrose); 13. Aria, "Ich traue seiner Gnaden" (I trust his gracious mercy, Paul Fleming chorale, Verse 4), No. 4, BWV 97, " In allen meinen Taten" (In all my undertakings, trans. Ambrose).
4 Bach-Luther-Kantate, "Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen" (On the Freedom of a Christian), ed. Rudolf Lutz, libretto Karl Graf (St. Gallen: J. S. Bach Stiftung, 2021); liner notes, text (17) Bachtage St. Gallen: 14-20; Lutherkantate wikipedia, Wikipedia; discussion, J.S. Bach Stiftung St. Gallen.
5 Landsgemeindekantate: Lutz and Graf discuss the «Lan» J. S. Bach-Stiftung, YouTube; description, Bachipedia, J.S. Bach Stiftung St. Gallen; recording, YouTube; tracklist, JPC.
6 Bach in Fluss: description, Bachpiedia; program & text notes BCW: D-50; recording with playlist, YouTube, J.S. Bach Stiftung St. Gallen.
7 "J. S. Bach — The Apocalypse — The opera Bach never wrote," OPERA2DAY: introduction, Opera2Day; story, Opera2Day; concert schedule, Opera2Day. Bachfest Leipzig, The Apocalypse, Bachfest Leipzig; concert, 10 June, Bachfest Leipzig; talk, June 11, Bachfest Leipzig; concert, June 11, Bachfest Leipzig; Michael Maul, Choral Total, Bachfest Leipzig; Playbill, Netherlands Bach Society.
8 Hans Grischkat, Vom Reiche Gottes (From the Kingdom of God) (Stuttgart: Hänssler, 1950), Bach Bibliography, Bach-Bibliographie; score, Carus Media; details, recording, KUK Art.
9 Other Bachfest Topical Studies: Beyond the various recent scholarly studies of the cantatas and related works are music cycles and special studies (see BCW: "Special Cantata-Type Studies"), such as Bach's "Messiah" cycle from Christoph Wolf (2020, <<Wolff: Bach Oratorios as "A Grand Liturgical Messiah Cycle:" Passions>> (BCW) and Michael Maul's Bachfest 2021 "Messiah" Cycle (Bachfest Leipzig), also known at Bach's Christological Cycle (see BCW), as well as Maul 2022 "Bach — We are Family" (Bachfest Leipzig: "Talk with the Artistic Director of the Bachfest Prof. Dr. Michael Maul") and the Bachfest 2020 complete chorale cantata cycle (Netherlands Bach Society).
10 Advent Oratorio, "J. S. Bach: Good Tidings of Great Joy," ed. Richard T. Gore" (St. Louis MO: Concordia, 1970), vocal score No. 97-4810, eBay. __________
To Come: Bachian Christmases; All manner of Bachian pasticcios, reconstructions, transcriptions. |
