Bach Books
Bach's Musical Universe: The Composer and His Work
Discussions - Part 2

Continue from Part 1

Chorale Cantata Cycle: Part 1

William L. Hoffman wrote (June 3, 2020):
While Bach composed and assembled various collections of instrumental music, printing several, he apparently did not intentionally and systematically do the same with vocal music, although as cantor in Leipzig he ahieved his calling of a "well-regulated church music to the glory of God," found in manuscript in his office. Three areas of sustained vocal effort of major sacred works involved the following: a unique cycle of chorale cantatas as "The Most Ambitious of All Projects" (Chapter 4), "A Grand Liturgical Messiah Cycle" of oratorios for the Passion on Good Friday and feast days (Chapter 6), and Latin Mass settings of four Missae: Kyrie-Gloria, BWV 233-36 (Chapter 7), and the B-Minor Mass (Chapter 8), says Christoph Wolff in his new musical biography, Bach's Musical Universe. The publication of his ClavierÜbung (keyboard exercises) between 1725 and 1731 and organ-keyboard published works in the 1740s are testimony to Bach's commitment to teach and perform this music in Leipzig, reflecting his status as a supreme organ and keyboard performer. These works also convey Bach's abiding interest in and mastery of old (stile antico) polyphonic music. During the half century following Bach's death in 1750, the other major interest in Bach's music centered on his four-part harmonizations of Lutheran chorales, as compiled and published by son Emanuel, 1784-87, also a vital ingredient of his reverence for Martin Luther's vernacular congregational hymns of the Reformation.²

At the same time, Bach co-mingled vocal and instrumental music as, for example, in his ClavierÜbung III publication of 1739 of Catechism chorales associated with the Reformation and a pillar of Lutheran orthodoxy. Like Emanuel's collection of 370 of his father's chorale settings, without texts, the organ study was in part another of Bach's profound explorations of the hymn melodies and their application to various important venues and interests. The year 1739 was the Reformation Jubilee Bicentennial of the area's acceptance of Lutheran doctrine and the first publication in Leipzig of a comprehensive Lutheran hymnal. Relatively few music publications in Bach's time, notably with the leading Leipzig publishing industry, involved vocal music with spiritual associations found in the texts. This activity became more pronounced during the Enlightenment and afterwards. Also, Bach displayed little of the dualistic (either-or) thinking emerging at that time, preferring to embrace the both-and concept such as the realms of sacred and profane music — all is God's creation and dominion.

Chorale Cantata Cycle Models.

Bach's efforts at systematic production of sacred music began when he presented his cantatas for the church year in Leipzig, 1723-24. These involved a heterogenous cycle of 60 works for all the Sundays and feast days, followed immediately by the homogeneous chorale cantata cycle, 1724-25. At the same time, Bach began to present original Passion music for the Good Friday vesper services. During this period of active presentations of his works, Bach also produced within the cantata cycles so-called "min-cycles" that involved different cantata formats, special texts of different poets, and the use of special music. The model for the chorale cantata cycle was two-fold: the cyclic organizing principle of colleague Georg Philipp Telemann and the chorale concerto cycle of predecessor Johann Schelle (1648-1701). Telemann produced the first of 20 cycles beginning with the lyrics of Erdmann Neumeister, which Bach also selectively used (https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Telemann-Georg-Philipp.htm). These began with Neumeister's third cycle using biblical words and chorales, Geistliches Singen und Spielen (Spiritual Singing and Playing, 1711), followed by Geistliche Poesien (Spiritual Poetry, 1714), Französischer Jahrgang (French Cycle, 1715), Concertenjahrgang (solo Concertante Cycle, 1717; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantata_Cycle_1716–1717_(Telemann), Google browser paste), and Sicilianischer Jahrgang (Italian pastoral idiom, 1720), Wolff shows (Ibid.: 119). In 1725, Telemann wrote the text for his chamber cycle, Harmonischer Gottesdienst (Harmonious Worship, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmonischer_Gottes-Dienst), and in 1731-32 published two oratorio cycles with texts by Albrecht Jacob Zell and Tobias Heinrich Schubart (see http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Oratorio-Pentecost.htm: "Hamburg: Keiser, Mattheson, Telemann"). Bach contemporaries Christoph Graupner, Telemann, and Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel also composed settings of chorales in their cantatas, says Mark A. Peters,³ with Stölzel creating two-part chorale cantatas based on pietist hymns with new texts which Bach performed in Leipzig in the mid 1730s (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Articles/Stolzel-Bach-Glockner-Eng.pdf, http://bach-cantatas.com/Other/Graupner%20cantata%20cycles.htm).

In 1689/90 cantor Johann Schelle (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Schelle) collaborated on a cycle of chorale concertos with Leipzig theologian and St. Thomas pastor Benedict Carpzov.⁴ These settings match the service sermons, based on Lutheran chorales. Six are published (https://www.areditions.com/arfiles/product_images/B060-61_samples.pdf: " Ach, mein herzliebes Jesulein" (Christmas 1), "Christus, der ist mein Leben" (Mary's Purification), "Heut' triumphieret Gottes Sohn" (Easter 1), "In dich hab' ich gehoffet, Herr" (Trinity 17) "Nun danket alle Gott" (Trinity 26), "Vom Himmel kam der Engel Schar" Christmas 2). To avoid the monotony of sermons to the same prescribed text, in the church-year cycle of sermons "the 'emblematic' [thematic] sermon blossomed, in which exegesis was associated with a symbol that arose from the text," says Alfred Dürr in his cantata study.⁵ "Another method of achieving diversity was the chorale sermon," he says.

Chorale Cantata Tradition, Genesis

The tradition of elaborate chorale settings began during the time of cantor Johann Hermann Schein in the 1620s and continued with various Baroque composers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorale_cantata). Bach followed in his 1707 Mühlhausen probe with his first chorale-text Cantata 4, Christ lag in Todesbanden (Christ lies in death's bondage), resembling a cantata with the same hymn text by Johann Pachelbel (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZca4uLTFck), teacher of Bach's older brother,Johann Christoph of Ohrdruf. "Bach's fascination — and indeed love — for devising multiple ways of dealing repeatedly with a single hymn tune, exploring its polyphonic potentiality and harmonic implications in many and varied organ works, relates directly to the general context of the chorale cantata project," says Wolff (Ibid.: 121f). "No composer before or after him possessed a closer relationship to the chorale," says Dürr in his chorale cantata study.⁶ Besides the chorale cantatas and the organ chorale preludes, Bach went on to publish three other studies of chorale-based music: the Orgelbüchlein III, German Organ Mass, in 1739 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clavier-Übung_III); the six Schübler Chorales in 1747, organ transcription of trio arias (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schübler_Chorales); and the Canonic Variations on "Vom Himmel hoch" in 1747 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonic_Variations_on_%22Vom_Himmel_hoch_da_komm%27_ich_her%22). Bach also was the music editor of the Schemelli Gesangbuch collection of 954 sacred songs from Luther to pietist Freylinghausen in 1736 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Christian_Schemelli), observes Robin A. Leaver in his study of Bach chorales.⁷ The 1736 publication promised that a second edition would contain about 200 engraved harmonized melodies in 302 settings to chorale incipits whose key is listed in the first edition next to the incipit and number, Leaver observes in his Bach research companion,⁸ but were never published probably due to the lack of sales of the first edition.^9. The actual genesis of Bach's unique chorale cantata cycle began during his first Leipzig cycle when he explored the groundwork for a new, distinctive chorale cantata form. The basic cantata form most often began with chorus and ended with a plain chorale, plus internal, alternating poetic recitatives and arias. Bach instituted work in chorale choruses and troped recitative in his two Leipzig probe pieces, two-part Cantatas BWV 22 and 23 in February 1723 for Estomihi Sunday (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Ref/BWV22&23-Ref.htm). The "idea of an entire cantata cycle with a focus on chorales appears to have emerged in conjunction with a group of five works performed between late August and early October 1723," during the first cycle, Wolff observes (Ibid.: 122). Bach produced a mini series of five cantatas for the 13th to the 19th Sundays after Trinity, BWV 77, 25, 138, 95, and 48, which included opening chorale chorus or biblically-text chorus with instrumental chorale, often with the same final chorale. These five cantatas "indicate his predilection for the kinds of emblematic references that would become so prominent in the 1724/25 cycle," he says (Ibid.: 123).

As with much of the first cantata cycle newly-composed cantatas, the librettists of the five proto-chorale cantatas are unknown, as are the librettists of the second cycle of 42 chorale cantatas. "Since Leipzig had no shortage of poetically active literati, Bach may have benefitted from the rich pool of academic poets," says Wolff (Ibid.: 123). Among possible librettists was one for the entire cycle, pastor Andreas Stübel (1653-1725), who has been rejected (see Thomas Braatz BCW article, "The Rise and Fall of the Stübel Theory," http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Articles/Stubel-Theory.htm). The changes in the paraphrasing sections of the chorale cantata libretti, beginning in 1724, led Bach scholar Harald Streck in his 1971 dissertation study of Bach’s cantata texts, “Die Verskunst in den poetischen Texten zu den Kantaten J. S. Bachs" (University of Hamburg), to attempt to classify four different librettists’ groups of the chorale cantata texts: Group 4, earliest, possibly by various authors and of inferior poetic quality (BWV 20 to 127); and subsequently interspersed are Group 2, BWV 101 to 180; Group 1, BWV 78 to 124; and Group 3, BWV 33 to 125.¹⁰ Other authors suggested include Christian Weiß (1671-1736), Bach's Pastor at St. Thomas Church, and Superintendent Salomon Deyling at St. Nicholaus Church, who alternated with Weiß, preaching the main service sermons during Bach's cantatas. In a footnote, Dürr (Ibid.: 33, footnote 28) says: "It might be significant that Christian Weiß the Elder began to preach again regularly at Easter 1724 so that a cycle of sermons came to an end at Easter 1725. Bach's motivation for composing a chorale cantata cycle may be based on the fact that the year 1724/25 was the second centenary of the publication of the first Lutheran hymnals, suggests Rathey (Ibid.: 79f).¹¹ Bach's motivation for ending the chorale cantata cycle on Easter Sunday 1725 may have been a combination of internal and external factors: fatigue at composing only this cantata type for nine months, loss of librettist' services, and decline in quality of choir. The first needs further exploration, such as the lack of chorale cantatas available for the Easter Season, the pressures during the end of the St. Thomas School year on Trinity Sunday, and the limitations and choices of chorale texts.^12.

Chorale Cantata Types

In Bach's chorale cantatas, the opening used the first stanza and the last the final stanza, in between were the varying the stanzas, from two or three stanzas to a dozen or more, paraphrased as typical madrigalian poetry which "could contain direct quotations from the hymns — with or without its related melody — or even a full-scale solo chorale elaboration of a single strophe," he says (Ibid.: 120), usually with "references to the liturgically prescribed gospel lessons for the day." To ameliorate the monotony of the internal arias in da capo repeat form, Bach used the modified da capo or ritornello type as well as various instrumental obbligati in trio aria settings and the use of inserted chorale tropes. Here is a summary of the two types of chorale cantatas (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Cycle-2.htm): <<The most used category of chorale cantatas is the standard model: opening chorus (Stanza 1), alternating recitatives and arias (stanzas paraphrased), and closing plain chorale (final stanza). In all, 27 cantatas follow this pattern and are primarily found in the de tempore first-half of the church year of seasons in the life of Jesus Christ. They are: 1, 2, 7, 8, 10, 14, 20, 26, 33, 41, 62, 78, 96, 99, 111, 114, 115, 116, 121, 123, 124, 127, 130, 133, 135, 138, 139. Within this model form Bach composed BWV 127 with three chorales, BWV 135 with a closing chorale chorus, and BWV 138 with three chorale choruses: one opening fantasia, one closing chorale chorus, and a troped chorale chorus within a recitative. Cantata BWV 114 has a chorale aria, set to one stanza and first found in Cantata BWV 4. <<The next category were chorale cantatas with interpolated chorale and poetic recitative materials in the chorale paraphrased inner movements, treated in various ways and usually found during the omnes tempore Trinity Time having lesser-known chorales. The most common insertions are the chorale trope in the recitative found in seven cantatas: BWV 3, 38, 91, 94 (2 tropes), 122, 125, and 126. In eight cantatas Bach used multiple insertions, with as many as two troped recitatives and a separate chorale aria in BWV 92, 93, 101, 113, 122, 125, 126, and 178. Cantata 180 has a troped recitative and chorale aria.>>
<<The last category was the traditional pure-hymn (per omnes versus) cantata dating to the time of cantor Johann Hermann Schein in the 1620s. In the chorale cantata cycle, Bach set only one unaltered hymn cantata, BWV 107, for the Seventh Sunday after Trinity in 1724. Between 1725 and 1739, Bach filled some of the gaps in his cycle with eight cantatas of this type: BWV 177 (Tr.+4), BWV 9 (Tr.+6), BWV 137 (Tr.+12), BWV 80 (Reformation), BWV 140 (Tr. 27, last Sunday after Trinity), BWV 14 (Eph.+4), BWV 112 (Easter +2), and BWV 129 (Trinity Fest). Bach also composed four pure-hymn cantatas between 1728-34 which are without liturgical designation: BWV 117, 192, 100, and 97, all being appropriate for bridal Masses. At least one, BWV 97, probably was presented at the 25 July 1734 wedding of Johann Adolph II von Sachsen-Weißenfels (https://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV97.htm), according to Marc-Roderich Pfau.¹³ Cantata 97 evolved in stages and may have been performed on Exaudi Sunday 1731 (https://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV97-D3.htm: Cantata 97").

Chorale Cantata Ingredients

In the late spring of 1724 during the Easter Season, Bach began working on the chorale cycle, soliciting the first batch of five works, from the First Sunday after Trinity (June 11) to the Feast of the Visitation (July 2), for the church libretto book. Aiding him were several cantatas he had previously composed in Cöthen (parodied) and Weimar (repeats). The initial chorale cantata group of librettists,"possibly by various authors and of inferior poetic quality," says Hirsch (Ibid.: 19), enabled Bach to begin in the choruses with distinct contrapuntal techniques using "different stylistic models and orchestral scorings," says Wolff (Ibid.: 134): BWV 20, French overture (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FU_COgaxiCU); BWV 2, chorale motet (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9wMoPPVX3Q); BWV 7, instrumental concerto (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gl5IbBv0BNM); BWV 135, chorale fantasia (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8JWwEIl8gc); and BWV 10, chorale in two registers (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lcc5D8J0FxA). Bach in the arias used a broad array of instruments in the wind category, he says (Ibid.: 136): trumpet, slide trumpet, horn, cornetto, trombone, recorder, piccolo recorder, oboe, oboe d'amore, oboe da caccia and bassoon; in the string group, he used the piccolo violin (BWV 96, 140), and the violoncello piccolo (BWV 41, 115, and 180). At the same time, Bach extensively used the transverse flute in 13 chorale cantatas between mid-July and late November 1724. In the structural diversity of the opening choruses cited above, the most impressive are Cantata 78 in the form of a chaconne (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIWJOKmsgLs), and pre-Lenten Estomihi Cantata 127 with three chorales (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQghy8Ih3ZA), including the German Agnus Dei, "Christe du Lamm Gottes," which seven weeks later closed the second, chorale-laden version of the St. John Passion, BWV 245.2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tyYdyTYkHM). Free declamatory internal recitatives using measured chorale text is possible when integrated into the movement as troping of individual lines, "longer tune segments or making melodic illusions to them in measured time," says Wolff (Ibid.: 140). For the closing four-part plain chorales, Bach uses ritornello-like instrumental inserts (BWV 107/7, 130/6) or a short interlude (BWV 41/6) with motivic correspondences, he observes (Ibid.: 142).

Chorale Cantata Movement Remnants

For the Easter-Pentecost Season of 1725, Bach belatedly composed only two chorale cantatas, both pure-hymn settings, for the Easter-Pentecost season, BWV 112 for Misericordias Domini (Second Sunday after Easter), and BWV 129 for the Trinity Festival). Previously, remnants of movements exist and offer a good view into the composer's compositional process. Schübler organ chorale trio aria, "Wo soll ich fliehen hin" (Where shall I flee hence), BWV 646 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--Fq5d20wqo), is "a lost chorale aria, if not the lost score of an entire chorale cantata, says Wolff (Ibid.: 138), the hymn also found as BWV 5 for the 19th Sunday after Trinity. Bach appears to have begun composing pure-hymn movements for chorale cantatas before the Easter season, with three chorale arias and four opening chorale fantasia movements extant. In their place he completed Cantatas 6, 42, and 85, left over from the first cycle, Wolff points out (Ibid.: 146). For Easter Monday (the second day of the three-day festival), Cantata 6, "Bleib bei uns, denn es will Abend werden" (Stay with us, for evening is coming, Luke 24:29), has a chorale trio soprano aria, No. 3, "Ach bleib bei uns, Herr Jesu Christ" (Ah, stay with us, Lord Jesus Christ, trans. Francis Browne; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hv0uURc9C6E&list=RDUSL3C49ba0Q&index=23), an Easter Monday hymn related to the Day's Gospel, Jesus on the Walk to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-29, https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+24%3A13-29&version=NKJV). Bach also composed a closing plain chorale setting, BWV 253 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SyCA3I8gcA). For the First Sunday after Easter (Quasimodogeniti), Bach apparently began an opening orchestral ritornello sketch, "Chorale + fragment BWV deest," https://www.bach-digital.de/rsc/viewer/BachDigitalSource_derivate_00002156/db_bachp0122_page010v.jpg) on the last page of the score for Cantata 103 for Jubilate Sunday (Third Sunday after Easter). Instead, Bach turned to another draft and completed Cantata 42, "Am Abend aber desselbigen Sabatts"(On the evening of the same sabbath, John 20:19), for this Sunday (ref. NBA KB I/11: 56f), including chorale quartet aria for soprano and tenor, No. 4, "Verzage nicht, o Häuflein klein" (Do not lose heart, oh my dear little flock; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPTh6YiGjaw), an Easter-Pentecost season hymn of protection. For the Second Sunday after Easter (Misericordias Domini), Bach composed a soprano chorale aria, "Der Herr ist meine Getreuer Hirt" (The Lord is my faithful shepherd, Psalm 23 paraphrase; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8zOnjH5RZY: 8:03) found as No. 3 in Cantata 85, "Ich bin ein guter Hirt" (I am a good shepherd, John 10:11). Later, for the same Sunday in 1731, Bach composed pure-hymn Cantata 112 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyz3vtqxsmw), set to the same chorale. It is quite possible that Bach composed the opening chorale fantasia in 1725 and set the fair copy aside, instead completing Cantata 85. From the Third Sunday after Easter (Jubilate) to the end of the Easter-Pentecost season, Bach set nine consecutive texts of Christiane Mariane vin Ziegler (https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Ziegler.htm), which in 1750 were distributed as part of the third cantata cycle. For the Feast of Ascension, Bach composed a chorale fantasia opening chorus, "Auf Christi Himmelfahrt allein" (On Christ's ascension journey to heaven [ascension] alone," from a three-stanza hymn for Ascension. For Pentecost Monday (Second Day of Pentecost), Bach composed for Cantata 68 a chorale fantasia opening chorus, "Also hat Gott die Welt geliebt" (God so loved the world, John 3:16; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GRpDH0Cduc), a justification hymn for the Pentecost festival.
Bach in the 1730s filled gaps in the incomplete cycle chorale cantata cycle and may have repeated it in the 1732-33 season, as well as presenting individual cantatas through the end of his life. These activities are revealed in Bach's review and amendment of performing parts that "document more frequent performances of these works in the 1730s and 1740s than for any other body of cantatas," says Wolff (Ibid.: 148). Bach apparently did revive cantata segments from Cycles1 and 3 for the Easter season of 1731, following the premiere of the St. Mark Passion; in 1735 following the premiere of the Christmas Oratorio; and in 1739 when the St. John Passion fourth version was planned but cancelled. In 1750 at the estate division, for the chorale cantata cycle, Friedemann received the scores, and Anna Magdalena the parts, "likely accordingly to specific instructions left by the compohimself," he suggests (Ibid.: 151). These she donated to the St. Thomas School, possibly "the transaction had been planned for some time, and might have been arranged by Bach himself, Wolff indicates (Ibid: 355, Footnote 17).

SELECTED BILIOGRAPHY

¹ Christoph Wolff, Bach's Musical Universe: The Composer and His Work (New York: W. W. Norton, 2020), Amazon.com; Chapter 4, "The Most Ambitious of All Projects: Chorale Cantatas throughout the Year," text Google Books.
² See Thomas Braatz's "The History of the Breitkopf Collection of J. S. Bach’s Four-Part Chorales," Bach Cantatas Website, https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Articles/Breitkopf-History.htm.
³ Mark A. Peters, "J. S. Bach's "Meine Seel 'erhebt den Herren" (BWV 10) as Chorale Cantata and Magnificat Paraphrase," in BACH ( Berea OH: Journal of the Riemenschneider Bach Institute, Vol. 43, No. 1 (2012): 29); text, https://www.jstor.org/stable/41640620?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents).
⁴ See Markus Rathey, "The Chorale Cantata in Leipzig: The Collaboration between Schelle and Carpzov in 1689-1690 and Bach's Chorale Cantata Cycle," in BACH ( Berea OH: Journal of the Riemenschneider Bach Institute, Vol. 43, No. 2 [2012]: 46-92; text, https://www.jstor.org/stable/43489866?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents).
⁵ Alfred Dürr, "Development of the Bach Cantata: Leipzig cycle II (1724-5)," in The Cantatas of J. S. Bach, rev. and trans. Richard D. P. Jones (Oxford University Press, 2005: 29f); text, Google Books).
⁶ Alfred Dürr, "Bach's Chorale Cantatas," in Bach, essays ed. Yo Tomita (https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781315096704) (London: Routledge, 2017: Chapter 11); https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781315096704/chapters/10.4324/9781315096704-11.
⁷ Robin A. Leaver, "chorale," in Oxford Composer Companions: J. S. Bach, ed. Malcolm Boyd (Oxford University Press, 1999: 92-94.
⁸ Robin A. Leaver, Chapter 14, "Chorales," The Routledge Research Companion to J. S. Bach, ed. Leaver (London & New York: Routledge, 2017: 370); https://www.routledgehandbooks.com/doi/10.4324/9781315452814.ch14).
⁹ For further information on Bach's chorales, see "Chorale-Song Collections, BWV 439-524, Student Work," at Bach Cantatas Website discussion http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Chorale-Collections.htm; also see "List of chorale harmonizations by Johann Sebastian Bach," https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_chorale_harmonisations_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach.
¹⁰ These four librettists groups are outlined in Arthur Hirsch’s "Johann Sebastian Bach’s Cantatas in Chronological Order" in BACH ( Berea OH: Journal of the Riemenschneider Bach Institute, Vol. 4, No. 3, July 1973: 19, 25); text Scribd.
¹¹ For further information on the hymnal bicentennial, see section, "Development of the second cantata cycle and the chorale cantata cycle," in Chorale cantata cycle, Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorale_cantata_cycle.
¹² See William L. Hoffman, "Bach's Chorale Cantata Cycle: Genesis, Provenance, Gaps, Poets," unpublished manuscript (1994).
¹³ Marc-Roderich Pfau, "Entstanden Bachs vier späte Choralkantaten 'per omnes versus' für Gottesdienste des Weißenfelser Hofes" (Bach's four late choral cantatas were created "per omnes versus" for church services at the Weißenfelser Court), in Bach-Jahrbuch (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, Vol. 101 (2015): 341-349), Bach-Bibliografie.

—————

To Come: The saga of the early reception history of the chorale cantata cycle: Friedemann's selection, distribution, and losses; St. Thomas School prefect Christian Friedrich Penzel's cycle revival and subsequent performances; the influences of Bach's chorales from Haydn to Brahms in secular contexts into the 19th century; and various chorale collections from manuscripts to publications.

Bach's Chorale Cantata Cycle, Part 2: Early Reception History

William L. Hoffman wrote (June 8, 2020):
Of all Bach's vocal music, the chorale cantatas probably were the most performed during his lifetime and afterwards while his four-part settings engendered extant studies of various students and initial publication following Bach's death in 1750. Much has been researched, chronicled and continues today. The saga of the early reception history of the chorale cantata cycle and Bach's plain-chorale settings involves various important factors: oldest son Friedemann's chorale cantata selection, distribution, and losses; St. Thomas School prefect Christian Friedrich Penzel's cantata cycle revival and subsequent performances; various chorale collections from manuscripts to publications; and the influences of Bach's chorales from Haydn to Brahms in secular contexts into the 19th century. Those who came after Bach — his sons, students, musicians, members of Bach circles in Leipzig, Berlin, Hamburg, Vienna, London, and elsewhere — nurtured his teachings and spread his legacy.

The first response immediately following Bach's death on 28 July 1750 was his oldest sons Friedemann and Emanuel doing a summary accounting of his compositions found in his office at the St. Thomas School for his Obituary and the subsequent division among family members of his musical estate. At its heart was his chorale cantata cycle, cherished by his family and performed by his students and community musicians, with the parts sets housed at the school. Bach's transformation of Lutheran chorales into choruses, arias, recitatives, and congregational hymns, as well as his organ chorale preludes, would be crucial to forging his legacy and transforming his music into treasured ambition. The chorale cantata collection was a unique achievement, found nowhere else, which was begun in the summer of Bach's second year at Leipzig, 1724, wholly original while uplifting tradition, yielding a totally new work almost weekly. To assist in this exemplary production, Bach turned to family members to copy from his manuscript score the vocal and instrumental performing parts. The two inheritors of the chorale cantata cycle, were his first family participants in such an endeavor: son Friedemann with the Michaelmas festival Cantata 130 on September 29, and wife Anna Magdalena two months later joining with Cantata 26 for the 24th Sunday after Trinity on November 19. Meanwhile, Bach relied on numerous students to be principal copyists as welas assisting in the production of cantata parts from Bach's scores.¹

Friedemann Chorale Cantata Dispersal

Within weeks after his father's death, Friedemann returned from Halle where he was music director (achieved with the support of Sebastian) to begin the task of culling through the manuscripts, the priority being the second but unfinished cycle. The sacred cantatas were stored in divider shelves showing the church year main services, from Advent to the last Sunday after Trinity,² the score and parts bundled and tied so that the incipit labeled the actual service, composition title, and scoring. Each cantata, beginning with the first chorale stanza easily recognized, involved the score which became the property of Friedemann, while the parts set in wrappers went to Anna Magdalena. Posterity reveals that there are actually three versions of the chorale cantata "cycle" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorale_cantata_cycle): the chronological cycle of 42 church year cantatas composed/presented chronologically from the First Sunday after Trinity (BWV 20) 1724 to Annunciation/Palm Sunday 1725 (BWV 1); the "actual" cycle of 50 cantatas, with eight church year additions (BWV 58, 14, 177, 9, 137, 140, 129, 80) to fill gaps composed between 1725 and 1739; and the full cycle of 54 cantatas with the addition of four undesignated (no service specified), pure-hymn works (BWV 117, 192, 100, and 97). Anna Magdalena received and gave to the St. Thomas School 44 chorale cantata parts sets chosen by Friedemann, which now reside at the Bach- Archiv Leipzig. Friedemann had 52 "chorale cantatas," including six with chorales incipits but are not technically chorale cantatas (BWV 58, 156, 27, 68, 128). No original score or parts survive for Cantata 80, "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott," Friedemann apparently having kept the score and parts for himself. In the succeeding years, Friedemann apparently performed only a portion of Cantata 80, the first and fifth movements with trumpets and drums, with a new Latin text in 1763 in celebration of the end of the Seven Years' War (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ein_feste_Burg_ist_unser_Gott,_BWV_80, https://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV80-D7.htm). The last version of Cantata 80 was presented on 31 October 1739, says Wolff (Ibid.: 125).

The saga of the chorale cantata cycle and the remainder of Friedemann's inheritance of the vocal music begins with his resignation at Halle in 1764 and his move to Brunswick (Braunschweig) in 1771 and finally Berlin in 1774.³ During this time, he held no post and became impoverished, sold his father's estate, and managed only selected students. One was Johann Nicholaus Forkel (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Nikolaus_Forkel), Bach's first biographer. In the 1770s, Friedemann offered Forkel the entire chorale cantata collection for 20 Louis d'or but Forkel was only able to afford to copy two works, BWV 178 and BWV 9 (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00000890) for 2 Louis d'or.⁴ (Other score copies had been done in 1755 by Thomas School students Christian Friedrich Penzel and Carl Friedrich Barth from the parts set at the school). The entire cycle was sold, says Forkel (BD III, No. 831: 327). Friedemann acknowledged the sale "of the annual sets of cantatas and other church music" in a letter of 4 July 1778 to Brunswick professor Johann Joachim Eschenberg, responsible for their sale. "My departure from Brunswick was so hasty that I was unable to compile a list of the music and books I left behind," Friedemann says (BD III Ibid: No. 831: 326f). Eventually some 16 of Friedemann 52 cantata scores were sold and subsequently lost (BWV 7, 93, 107, 178, 101, 137, 78, 8, 38, ?80b, 139, 140, 125, 126, 1, 129). Evidence also has been found that suggests that Friedemann sold about one-fourth (13) to Johann Georg Nacke, Oelsnitz cantor and previously Bach copyist in the 1740s, which presumably was acquired eventually by collector Franz Hauser in 1833. In 1827 an auction of Friedemann's holdings was held in Berlin and eleven J. S. Bach manuscripts were acquired by Carl Pistor, grandfather of Ernst Rudorff,⁵ involving Bach keyboard works and nine chorale cantatas for Trinity Time (BWV 20, 2, 10, 9, 113, 114, 5, 130, 116). In 1833 Hauser (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Hauser), most noted 19th century collector of Bach manuscripts, acquired portions of the chorale cantata cycle for the seasons of Advent, Christmas Epiphany, and pre-Lent (BWV 62, 91, 121, 133, 122, 41, 123, 124, 3, 111, 14, 92, 127). Hauser in 1833 also acquired much of the Bach manuscript copy collection of chorale cantatas compiled and performed by Christian Friedrich Penzel, inherited by nephew Johann Gottlob Schuster in 1801 (https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Penzel-Christian-Friedrich.htm). Penzel's teacher and mentor was Johan Georg Nacke.⁶

Bach Copyist Christian Friedrich Penzel

The next important story in the saga of the early provenance of the chorale cantata cycle centers on Christian Friedrich Penzel, a noted Bach copyist after 1750, starting at the Thomas School. Two weeks after Gottfried Harrer (Bach's cantor successor) died and the search for a successor began, on 23 July 1755, Penzel in the summer interim devoted much time to producing 34 scores for apparent performances from the parts copies at the Thomas School. In a few days, according to end dating on the scores, Penzel prepared Cantatas BWV 178, BWV 94, BWV 101, BWV 113, and BWV 137 for performances on the eighth through the twelfth Sundays after Trinity respectively. At that time, Penzel also found and copied the now-lost score of one of Bach's earliest extant vocal works, Cantata BWV 150, an undesignated sacred piece and his copy is the only surviving source. In later August and September, Penzel added cantatas for five more Trinity Sundays (BWV 33, 78, 99, 114, 177) while taking up Christmas Cantata BWV 142 (spurious and not part of Bach's annual cycles), the Trinity Sunday Cantata BWV 129, the last Trinity Cantata, BWV 140, and Cantata 126 for the Michaelmas Festival on 29 September (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00001995).

During the interim of 1755-56, while Penzel served as prefect,⁷ Karl Friedrich Barth served as interim Thomas cantor and led performances at St. Thomas and St. Nikolai until January 1756 when Johan Friedrich Doles was appointed Thomaskantor (https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Barth-Karl-Friedrich.htm). Barth copied chorale Cantatas 129, 177, 178, 94, 113, 78, 114, 140, and 137) and all of BWV 8 (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00001952). On November 10, 1756, Penzel left the Thomas School, matriculating with honors but remained in Leipzig to finish his legal and theology studies. Before completing his studies in 1761, Penzel copied from various sources Cantatas BWV 126, BWV 149, BWV 97, and BWV 106 and Mass BWV 236. He returned home to Oelsnitz and collaborated with his teacher, cantor J. G. Nache, who copied parts, to begin presenting a partial cycle of Bach's chorale cantatas, commencing on Advent Sunday, November 28, with chorale Cantata BWV 62, through Purification, Feb. 2, 1762. Since Bach left no chorale cantatas for the Easter season, Penzel in Merseberg presented two works in this season in 1770, Cantatas BWV 158 and BWV 112, as well as Cantatas BWV 157 for Purification and BWV 159 for Quinquageisma in 1767. Cantata BWV 41 for New Year's, copied Dec. 24 and 26, 1755, Penzel presented twice, in 1756 in Leipzig and 1762 in Odelsnitz.⁸ It is also documented that Penzel copied early versions of four Brandenburg Concerti from Leipzig sources, and some of Bach's Schmelli song settings: NBA III.3 2002:⁹ Nachträge/Werke zweifelhafter Echtheit: 30 Choral- und Liedsaetze aus der Sammlung von Christian Friedrich Penzel, some of which have BWV numbers: 443, 445, 449, 464, 471,479, 480, 487, 488, 498, 500, 503 (see "Devotional/Pietist Songs," http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Chorale-Collections.htm). Also there are several works with no BWV or Anh numbers (David O. Berger, BCW, 2002).¹⁰

Bach Chorales: Collections, Publications

Bach compiled more than 400 harmonized chorales (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_chorale_harmonisations_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach) which were essential in both his vocal works and the teaching of his students who in turn copied them and compiled collections. The comprehensive collections and publication of these chorale was the work of second son Emanuel, "in four volumes, published by Breitkopf from 1784 to 1787," says Wikipedia, begun in 1764.¹¹ These are found throughout the vocal works of cantatas, Passions and feast-day oratorios, and motets, as well as the free-standing settings, BWV 253-438 (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Vocal/BWV250-438-Gen4.htm). As part of their learning and assisting Bach in the production of musical parts, his students also compiled chorale and sacred song collections, BWV 439-524 (http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Chorale-Collections.htm).

In early 1735, Bach's student and main copyist Johann Ludwig Dietel (1713-1773, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Dietel-Johann.htm, https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00003441) compiled a collection of 149 plain-chorale settings without texts as he completed his studies as a cantor. This collection first surfaced in the Leipzig Breitkopf publisher's 1761 Fall Catalogue under the category "Hymnen, Lieder, Gesänge" of "150 chorales in four-parts" on loan from Dietel for copying at a fee (see http://libguides.d.umn.edu/c.php?g=300712&p=2007709: "149 Choralsätze der Sammlung Dietel").¹² A listing shows chorales from cantatas, oratorios, motets, and 45 free-standing settings (from BWV 257-436) as well as four previously unknown Bach settings now catalogued c.2000 as BWV 1122-1125, added to the Bach Work's Catalogue (BWV 1950; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QC-t4AJCY4), as part of 20 chorales that do not appear in Breitfkopf (1784-87) or Riemenschneider (1941).¹³

In the 50 years following Bach's death in 1750, Bach's students spawned a cottage industry of chorale copies and arrangements. One of Bach's last cantor students and an important copyist, Friedrich Christian Penzel (1737-1801, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Penzel-Christian-Friedrich.htm, https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00004033), beginning about 1780 as cantor at Merseberg to compile a collection of 226, of which 30 sacred songs were published in the NBA III/3¹⁴ and are the final Nos. 195 to 226 in the Penzel collection. This group includes 18 from Bach student sources which have not been authenticated by Bach scholars and bear the designation BWV deest, while of the other 12, eight were copied from Schemelli, five from the NLGB as Leipzig sources, and three from other sources.¹⁵

Other collections of presumed Bach chorales have been studied in recent years. These include the "Sebastian Bach's Choral Book" (https://muse.jhu.edu/chapter/1773043/pdf) of 238 melodies with figured bass, possibly dating to the 1740s connections to Dresden and Bach students that appears to be "a workbook for learning how to create four-part settings" from two-part arrangements, says Leaver in another publication.¹⁶ In the Breitkopf New Year catalogue of 1764 to the Dietel collection was added the listing, "Complete Choral Book with notes set with Figured Bass comprising 240 melodies in use in Leipzig" (Leaver trans. 24; BDOK III, 165-66 [No. 711]), lost and unknown source. Leaver suggests (Ibid.: 24) that this source is the Sibley Choralbuch based on four common features: it is a comprehensive anthology for congregational use in the church year; the melodies with figured bass are in two-parts; the Choralbuch comprises 240 melodies while booksellers' catalogues of the 1730s contains 238, a close proximity; and Breitkopf's entry links "the repertory with Leipzig use." Another two-part source is from a contemporary of Penzel and Bach student, Johann Christian Kittel (1732-1809), whose Choralbuch collection of 189 chorale melodies with figured bass may have originated when the chorale basses and figures were created, possibly as early as 1756, when he became organist at the Barfußerkirche in Erfurt, says Leaver (Ibid.: 368; also see https://www.bachnetwork.org/ub8/UB8_McCormick.pdf). Recently discovered is the 1762 collection of 167 Bach chorales in the hand of Carl Friedrich Fasch (1736-1800, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Friedrich_Christian_Fasch), deputy at the Prussian Court to harpsichordist Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach. Its "significance lies in the fact that it not only predates other collections of Bach chorales such as the Birnstiel and Breitkopf editions, but it appears to have possibly been used as a source for such subsequent collections," says Luke Dahn (http://www.bach-chorales.com/Resources.htm).¹⁷

Bach also was involved in the omnibus Schemelli Gesangbuch with Breitkopf in 1736 of Georg Christian Schemelli (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Christian_Schemelli and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach#BWV_Chapter_6, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Schemelli-Georg-Christian.htm), including a group of 69 engraved two-padevotional songs set to newer melodies with a personal, pietist perspective, BWV 439-507 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_songs_and_arias_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach), as well as the completion of the family album, Anna Magdalena Notenbüchlein, BWV 508-518 begun in 1725 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notebook_for_Anna_Magdalena_Bach). The category of "Songs, Arias and Quodlibet," BWV 439-524 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach#BWV_Chapter_6), involved mostly devotional or special songs from the Schemellis Songbook, BWV 439-507; the second Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach, BWV 508-518; the Five hymns from a manuscript by Johann Ludwig Krebs (BWV 519–523), and the wedding Quodlibet, BWV 524 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_songs_and_arias_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach).

The reception history through publication of the chorales traces the 18th century activity of Emanuel and others (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/18th-century_prints_of_Bach%27s_four-part_chorales, https://imslp.org/wiki/Chorale_Harmonisations%2C_BWV_1-438_(Bach%2C_Johann_Sebastian)), including the 19th century publications of Breitkopf und Härtel and others (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_chorale_harmonisations_by_Johann_Sebastian_Bach), as well as well as the 20th century work of Charles Sanford Terry (https://oll.libertyfund.org/people/charles-sanford-terry), Albert Riemenschneider (Amazon.com), and the Neue Bach Ausgabe (https://www.baerenreiter.com/en/shop/product/details/BA5075_41/, https://www.baerenreiter.com/en/shop/product/details/BA5076_41/, https://www.baerenreiter.com/en/shop/product/details/BA5098_41/.

Chorales from Haydn to Brahms.

"Chorale as a genre originated in sixteenth-century Lutheran worship music, but chorales and chorale style did not really enter the vocabulary of secular concert music as a musical topic until the eighteenth century, as a semiotic code for ideas and feelings associated with chorales," says Eileen M. Watabe in her doctoral dissertartion abstract.¹⁸ "Although the frequency of use as well as the range of contexts and implied meanings of chorale topic increased from the eighteenth to the nineteenth centuries, the scholarship of topical analysis concerning chorales has been vague and incomplete. Chorales by definition are congregational, identifying and expressing the sentiments of a group, and their most common associations are of purity, archaism, and of course spirituality." "Nineteenth-century composers – Beethoven, Schubert, Meyerbeer, Mendelssohn, Chopin, Schumann, and Brahms among others¹⁹ – provide examples of chorale topic of every expressive type and in many genres, including art song, oratorio, piano sonata, duo sonata, string quartet, symphony, opera, and piano nocturne."

The process of incorporating chorales into other musical forms can be traced to the late 18th century in the setting of the Two Armed Men in Mozart's The Magic Flute, using the chorale “Ach Gott, vom Himmel sieh darein” (Ah God, look down from heaven), says Watanabe (Ibid.: 15), set in the style of a Bach chorale prelude, showing the late classical origins from the sacred to the secular, also found in the operas of Lully, Gluck, and Piccinni. While this period of the Age in Enlightenment generally kept a growing distance from religion, the public increasingly embraced religious overtones in concerts as, for example, in Haydn's setting of The Seven Last Words of Christ from the Cross. The "Enlightenment era saw the beginning of a trend (which would only intensify in the nineteenth century) in which the chorale was considered old and otherworldly, the rarified epitome and very essence of all spirituality, regardless of denomination, or sometimes, even religion (as in Mozart’s quasi- Egyptian/Masonic chorale and many other far-flung examples in the nineteenth century)," says Watnabe (Ibid.: 23). "In this notion, the simpler and the slower, the better."

Further, the generic sense of music that is hymn-like began to proliferate in the 19th century as, for example, national hymns and anthems in depictive and occasional music such as battle, funeral, and pastoral pieces, she describes (Ibid.: 27-40). "So what is of interest here is not how Haydn’s melodies later became hymns or chorales, but rather, the instances in which he created chorale-like material—in melody, harmony, and texture—in his secular music, with the apparent aim of evoking a particular affect or topical meaning.," she says in her discussion of "Haydn's Hymnic Style" (Ibid.: 40-62), citing slow movements in Symphonies Nos. 61, 64, 66, 75, 87, and 98; 83, 86, 88, 99, and 102, as well as certain string quartets, Opus 76, Nos. 1, 3, 4, and 6. "The significance of Bach may have been more in conveying a sense of greatness of the chorale heritage, rather than the sound per se of his settings, since the notion that simpler was equivalent to more authentic still persisted into the nineteenth century," she says in the section "Connotations and Associations of Chorale and Chorales" (Ibid.: 70). Also very influential in the 19th century was the English writer Catherine Winkworth (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Winkworth), who translated Bach chorales into English while publishing five hymn books. A list of some of her best-known translations is found at http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bio/197.html.

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

¹ A comprehensive study of Bach Pupils has just been compiled by Aryeh Oron, Bach Cantata Website founder and webmaster and Bach Mailing List moderator, https://groups.io/g/Bach/topic/74635023, which includes a List of Bach's Copyists (https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Other/Copy-List.htm, with the assistance of researchers at the Bach-Archiv Leipzig.
² See Friedrich Smend, Bach in Köthen, trans. John Page, ed. & rev. with annotations Stephen Daw (St. Louis MO: Concordia, 1985: 136f).
³ Found in William L. Hoffman, "Bach's Chorale Cantata Cycle: Genesis, Provenance, Gaps, Poets," unpublished manuscript (1994: 5).
⁴ See Cantata No. 178, Alfred Dörffel, commentary, Bach Gesellschaft Ausgabe Vol. 35 (Leipzig: Breitkopf, 1788: 29).
⁵ See Nancy B. Reich, "The Rudorff Collection," in Notes, Vol. 33, No. 2 (Dec. 1974; Middleton WI: Music Library Assn.: 249f, 259); https://www.jstor.org/stable/897122?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents).
⁶ See Don Smithers, Trumpets, Horns, and Bach Abschriften at the time of Christian Friedrich Penzel: Probing the Pedigree of BWV 143 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2015: Footnote 2, 11f); https://www.amazon.com/Trumpets-«Abschriften»-Christian-Friedrich-Penzel/dp/3631663226: copy browser paste).
⁷ See Hans-Joachim Schulze, Studien zur Bach-Uberlieserung im 18. Jahrhundert (Leipzig, 1984: 92f, et passim.; a new study in Michael Maul's Bach's Famous Choir: The Saint Thomas School in Leipzig, 1212-1804, trans. Richard Howe (Woodbridge GB: Boydell Press, 2018); https://www.amazon.com/Bachs-Famous-Choir-Leipzig-1212-1804/dp/1783271698.
⁸ Christian Friedrich Penzel sources: Bach Digital.
⁹Various Bach scholars have done extensive research on topics related to Penzel: B.F. Richter, "The Destiny of the Cantatas of JSB Belonging to the Thomas School in Leipzig," Bach Jahrbuch 1906; Gerhard Herz, JSB in the Age of Rationalism and Early (1935 diss.), Essays on J. S. Bach (Ann Arbor: 1985); Yoshitake Kokyashi, Franz Hauser and his Bach Manuscript Collection (Ph.D. diss, 1973; and Alfred Dürr, "Penzel," MGG:1021f. Often called reception history, particularly involving the provenance of materials, these writers have unearthed significant information on Penzel copies of Bach cantatas and other works (source: "Christian Friedrich Penzel: Short biography," http://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV41-D4.htm).
¹⁰ Found in William L. Hoffman, Penzel notes, "Early Bach Reception History: Music Transmission before 1800" (manuscript draft, 1994: addendum).
¹¹ See Thomas Braatz's "The History of the Breitkopf Collection of J. S. Bach’s Four-Part Chorales," Bach Cantatas Website, https://www.bach-cantatas.com/Articles/Breitkopf-History.htm.
¹² See also, Hans-Joachim Schulze, "150 Stück von den Bachischen Erben": zur Überlieferung der vierstimmigen Choräle Johann Sebastian Bachs, Bach Jahrbuch, vol. 69 (1983: 81ff).
¹³ Also see, bach-chorales.com, J. S. BACH CHORALES, ed. Luke Dahn (Salt Lake City: LuxSitPress, 2017: Indices I, Cross Indices, 14, Dietel-to Riemenschneider / Riemenschneider to Dietel: 209).
¹⁴ Bach, Choräle und Geistliche Lieder, NBA KB 3.1 (Frieder Rempp 1991; https://www.baerenreiter.com/en/shop/product/details/BA5075_41/, details http://libguides.d.umn.edu/c.php?g=300712&p=2007709; 149 Choralsätze der Sammlung Dietel (https://www.bach-digital.de/receive/BachDigitalSource_source_00003441) about 1735; Dreißsig Choral- und Liedsätze aus der Sammlung von Christian Friedrich Penzel (http://www.monarchieliga.de/index.php?title=Sammlung_Christian_Friedrich_Penzel#Die_bisher_unbekannten_S.C3.A4tze, translation: Google Translate).
¹⁵ See Wolfgang Wiemer, "Ein Bach-Doppelfund: verschollene Gerber-Abschrift (BWV 914 und 996) und unbekannte Choralsammlung Christian Friedrich Penzels, Bach-Jahrbuch 73 (Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, 1987: 72f.
¹⁶ Robin A. Leaver, "Bach’s Choral-Buch? The Significance of a Manuscript in the Sibley Library," in Bach Perspectives 12, Bach and the Organ, ed. Matthew Dirst (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2016: 16-38), series publication of the American Bach Society; publication, https://www.wayneleupold.com/index.php/realizing-thoroughbass-chorales-vol2.html.
¹⁷ See also, Luke Dahn, "Timeline of Events Related to the Transmission of Bach Chorales," http://www.bach-chorales.com/ChoralesTimeline.htm; "QUICK KEY TO THE EARLY CHORALE COLLECTIONS," http://www.bach-chorales.com/EarlyCollectionsKey.htm; "Resources & Databases," http://www.bach-chorales.com/Resources.htm; "Articles & Research," including "Chorale Scholarship Bibliography," http://www.bach-chorales.com/Articles.htm.
¹⁸ Ellen M. Watanabe, Chorale Topic from Haydn to Brahms: Chorale in Secular Contexts of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (University of Northern Colorado, 2015); https://digscholarship.unco.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1058&context=dissertations.
¹⁹ A new publication: Russell Stinson's Bach Legacy: The Music as Heard by Late Masters (Oxford University Press, 2020); Amazon.com: "Look Inside"; musicians Mendelssohn, Schumann, Wager, and Elgar.

—————

To Come: Christoph Wolff: Bach's Musical Universe: The Composer and his Work, Chapter 5, "Proclaiming the State of Art in Keyboard Music: The Clavier-Übung Series.

Continue on Part 3

Christoph Wolff: Short Biography
Piano Transcriptions: Works | Recordings
Books: The Bach Reader / The New Bach Reader | The World of the Bach Cantatas | Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician | Bach's Musical Universe: The Composer and His Work: Details & Discussions Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5