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Cantata BWV 97
In allen meinen Taten
Provenance |
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William L. Hoffman wrote (May 27, 2015):
Cantata BWV 97 - Provenance
One of Bach’s last original cantatas, pure-hymn BWV 97, "In allen meinen taten" (In all my doings), has a fascinating history involving a 10-year genesis, at least two repeat performances and a detailed provenance.
Cantata 97 is based on Paul Flemming's 1642 nine-verse chorale text set to Paul Gerhardt's 1648 Passion melody, "O Welt, ich muss dich lassen" (O world, I must leave thee). Of particular significance, and still being researched by Bach scholars, is the provenance history of the cantata score manuscript, dated “1734” at the end of the last page, and its odyssey, beginning with the division of Bach’s estate in 1750. Originally, Bach secured the score and parts set of 15 with the doublets in the original wrapper with the title page having an incipit but no designated service. The wrapper probably was removed at the estate division. Details are found in the NBA KB I/34 (various sacred cantatas, Riyuichi Higuchi, 1990, Bärenreiter, Kassel).
While Bach’s specific application of this festive work as a dance-suite cantata with its chorale wedding sources remains uncertain, Cantata 97 is one of his finest. As I said in the Cantata 97 Discussions, Part 2 (BCML http://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV97-D2.htm, edited): “Cantata BWV 97, IMHO, is Bach's swan song as original vocal music, and part of his last hurrah to weekly, well-regulated church service music. Bach had ten years to bring this work into being. He was at the height of his powers. He was assured and focused, summarizing his original compositional technique. And, I think he overcame all the challenges of a questionable text (from later perspectives) with all these straight-jacketed verses. The arias were contemporary in style, mirroring the text in a compelling manner. Bach used original melodies rather than the chorale tune, being at his most creative and imaginative. As for the brief recitatives, Bach kept the original text and supported it with a straightforward, commanding, vocal line as proclamation with its resolute harmony. No wonder he repeated this valedictory statement at least twice.” For the latest study see the recent BCML Discussions Parts 3, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV97-D3.htm.
Cantata 97 is one of the four undesignated pure-hymn cantatas, composed after the initial 1724-25 incomplete chorale church year cantata cycle, with wedding service application (after the wedding) – the others being BWV 100, 117, and 192. The 49 chorale cantata church year musical sermons, as with the church year cantatas of the first and third cycles, were equally distributed, in this case in a division between Anna Magdalena receiving most of the parts sets and Friedemann acquiring the original score and doublets. On the other hand, these general use four sacred works, like the passions, oratorios, and missae movements, were split between Friedemann and Emmanuel. The parts set of Cantata 97 involves 15 parts: canto, alto, tenor, basso, two oboes, two violins I, two violins II, viola, continuo (bassoon and cello), general continuo, and two separate organo parts. The parts copyist copying from the score was Bach student Friedrich Christian Samuel Morheim. Bach wrote out the initial violin I and later organo parts and added tacet markings to the two oboe parts, the initial violin II part, and the initial organo part, transposed a whole tone lower. The doublets with the original score are lost.
The most recent information on the original score and parts set is found in Masaaki Suzuki’s 2012 “Production Notes” accompanying the BIS recording. “The main extant materials for Cantata 97 are the full score in the composer’s own hand in the possession of ms. Bach St 64). The organ part exists in two forms, one transposed down a major second (from B-Flat major) and the other transposed down a minor third. The former part was used at the first performance. As with the other cantatas on this disc (BWV 9, 177), the organ part contains tacet markings in some other movements (the third, fourth and seventh). It is interesting to note that this work may well have been performed again in a city other than Leipzig during the 1740s, on which occasion the part transposed down a minor third seems to have been used. The reason for this transposition is likely to have been that the organ was tuned close to the mean tone, and the part would thus have been played a minor third down in the key of G major, thereby avoiding the key of A flat major.” (Suzuki notes, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Pic-Rec-BIG/Suzuki-C53c[BIS-1991-SACD-booklet].pdf; BCW Recording details, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Performers/Suzuki-Rec3.htm#C53.
The parts of chorale cantatas BWV 97 and the score and (presumably) the parts of BWV 100 were found in Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach's estate catalog (1790). The rest of the manuscript scores (and doublets) of the chorale cantatas probably were originally inherited by Wilhelm Friedemann, although recent scholarship suggests that the original scores of chorale Cantatas 124-127 may have gone to one of J. S. Bach’s daughters, Elisabeth Juliana Friederica Altnickol, née Bach, (1726-1781) who kept them as an inheritance trustee for Gottfried Heinrich Bach until he would achieve legal adulthood.
The fate of the manuscript for chorale Cantatas 97 and 100 is discussed in Cantata 100 BCML Discussions Part 3 (July 21, 2013), http://www.bach-cantatas.com/BWV100-D3.htm. <<Two cantatas (97 and 100) were not considered part of Bach's Chorale Cantata Cycle (2), which were inherited by Friedemann (scores) and Anna Magdalena (parts). In Emmanuel's catalog, the parts materials of Cantatas BWV 97 and BWV 100 were not found in the listings by church year occasions, beginning with Advent (BWV 61 and BWV 36) and ending with the Feast of St. Michael (BWV 19). Cantata BWV 97 appears early in the listing of Sebastian's vocal music, following the oratorios, among the occasional works, both secular and sacred mixed together on catalog pages 70-72, followed by Mass movements, motets and the Church Year.
It is believed that Emmanuel stored - - and catalogued - - the works in the same manner as his father had done and in the same pattern that he had received of this inheritance at his father's death. BWV 100 was found at the end of the vocal music, after the Feast of St. Michael, with two incomplete works, an early version of the St. Matthew Passion (BWV 244) and Cantata BWV 190 for New Year's. Bach's second-oldest son apparently never examined these three works since there is no mention in the catalog listing of the specific materials as being scores, parts, or doublets. Obviously both BWV 97 and BWV 100, listed only by their first vocal line incipit, were considered by Sebastian as not being part of his established church year works, treated instead as occasional pieces.
While both BWV 97 and BWV 100 were based on chorales listed for weddings at St Thomas Church, neither is divided into two parts to be presented before and after the service. Instead, many church uses have been suggested, primarily in the Trinity Season, based on prior usage of the chorale melody in other cantatas.
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So, what happened to the manuscript score of BWV 97, since only the parts were found in the C.P.E. Bach estate? The provenance is uncertain until the ownership of Bach manuscript collector Franz Hauser in the 19th century. Gerhard Herz in Bach Sources in America (Bärenreiter, New York, 1984 71f) attempted to fill in the gap. Former Thomas School perfect C. F. Penzel made a score copy of BWV 97 from Bach's autograph score, as well as a parts set, in 1767 in Merseberg, close to Halle. This was where Wilhelm Friedemann resided, and for a fee had allowed Nicholas Forkel to copy tscores of three chorale cantatas from his cycle of scores (BWV 9, 107, and 178).
While Herz suggests that this "could be construed to speak in favor of Wilhelm Friedemann's ownership" of the autograph score BWV 97, Herz also suggests that this occasional "late cantata may just as well have been one of the few remnants of Bach's estate that had remained" in Leipzig, in the possession of Anna Magdalena, their daughters or the Altnikols, or the publisher Breitkopf. Says Herz: "It is well known that Breitkopf & Härtel eagerly bought these last survivors from Bach's estate. In any event, the [score] ownership by Breitkopf& Härtel is documented." It is also known that Friedemann made available to Breitkopf various cantatas in his possession for copying at a price although there is no record that Breitkopf actually copied and sold any of Sebastian’s vocal works. Meanwhile, the scores of the St. Mark Passion, BWV 247, and the apocryphal St. Luke Passion, BWV 246, were listed in Breitkopf’s first catalogue of 1761, for copying, presumably owned by Friedemann as part of the 1750 estate division when Emmanuel received the St. Matthew and St. John Passions. Eventually, the St. Luke Passion was acquired by Breitkopf while the St. Mark Passion, along with various chorale cantata scores in Friedemann’s ownership, were lost or sold and then lost. Cantata 97 was never listed in any of the Breitkopf catalogs (1761-80).
In 1820, Johann Andreas Stumpff (1769-1846) bought the manuscript from Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig. Frederick Locker Lampson (1821-1895) “had by 1872, if not earlier, become the owner of this manuscript,” says Herz (Ibid.: 72). After 1895, the manuscript came into the possession of Christian Archibald Herter (1865-1910) and Lillie Bliss (1865-1931). Since 1932, the manuscript has been housed in the Herter Collection of the Music Division of the New York Public Library, Astor, Lennox, and Tilden Foundations.
Meanwhile, Penzel in 1767 placed copies of the score and parts set together in one wrapper (cover) and inscribed it with the incipt "In allen meinen Thaten" for the fifth Sunday after Trinity, as recounted in NBA-KB 1/34: 91, the NBA Critical Commentary saying: "If this determination originated with Bach, it can neither be proven nor refuted." Observes Christoph Wolff in the liner notes to the Ton Koopman complete cycle on Erato Vol. 21: “However, the church Lied's general content does not especially refer to the reading of the Fifth Sunday after Trinity and leads one to suspect that Bach conceived it without specific reference to the church calendar, possibly for a wedding, but in any case certainly with a view to using it on multiple occasions.” Wolff notes, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Pic-Rec-BIG/Koopman-C21c[AM-3CD].pdf; BCW Recording details, http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Performers/Koopman-Rec2.htm#C21
In the mid-1750s Penzel had written out scores for performance of some 20 chorale cantatas from the parts sets of the cycle at the Thomas School. These included the cantatas for the Fourth Sunday after Trinity as well as the Eighth through the 17th Sundays after Trinity. Later, in Merseberg between 1767 and 1770, Penzel copied other scores, including chorale cantatas BWV 97 and two others not in C.P.E. Bach's estate, BWV 112 for Misericordias Domini as well as BWV 38 for the 21st Sunday after Trinity. Apparently, Penzel was trying to assemble a cycle of Bach cantatas as well as occasional works such as BWV 150, BWV 106, and BWV 211, copied from Leipzig sources. |
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William L. Hoffman wrote (June 1, 2015):
Cantata BWV 97 - Provenance
One of Bach’s last original cantatas, pure-hymn BWV 97, "In allen meinen taten" (In all my doings), has a fascinating history involving a 10-year genesis, at least two repeat performances and a detailed provenance.
Cantata 97 is based on Paul Flemming's 1642 nine-verse chorale text set to Paul Gerhardt's 1648 Passion melody, "O Welt, ich muss dich lassen" (O world, I must leave thee). Of particular significance, and still being researched by Bach scholars, is the provenance history of the cantata score manuscript, dated “1734” at the end of the last page, and its odyssey, beginning with the division of Bach’s estate in 1750, and finally being sold by Leipzig publisher Breitkopf & Härtel in 1820.
Cantata 97 is one of the four undesignated pure-hymn cantatas, composed after the initial 1724-25 incomplete chorale church year cantata cycle, with wedding service application (after the wedding) – the others being BWV 100, 117, and 192. In the scores and parts sets, none of them lists a church service along with the incipit. Their sacred festive nature suggests compositions initially for weddings as well as other de tempore festivals and also per ogni tempo (for any time), perhaps to fill the void in the Easter season Sundays. The usual division of the some 49 service chorale cantatas shows Friedemann generally receiving the scores and Anna Magdalena usually the parts sets which soon became the property of the Thomas Church. Instead, the division probably was the same pattern as most of the first and third cycles: Friedemann and Emmanual dividing the scores and parts sets, in the case of Cantata 97, Emmanuel got the parts set and Friedemann the score.
In 1820, Johann Andreas Stumpff (1769-1846) bought the Cantata 97 score manuscript from Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig. Cantata 97 had never been listed in any of the Breitkopf catalogs (1761-80). The gap is filled in by Bach scholar Hans-Joachim Schultze in the essay “’O Jesu Christ, meins Lebens Licht,’ On the Transmission of a Bach Source and the Riddle of Its Origin”” in A Bach Tribute: Essays in Honor of William H. Scheide (Kassel and Chapel Hill (NC): Bärenreiter/Hinshaw, 1993: 209-220). Like Cantata 97, Cantata 118 has a chorale incipit but no service designation, although its single movement fugal motet setting strongly suggests a memorial service not a church year service. In 1812, Breitkopf announces in an advertisement that copies of score are available at a price for copy collectors. It appears, says Schultze (Ibid.: 212), that Cantatas “BWV 8, 80, 97, 117, and 118 all belong the the category of ‘chorale cantatas,’ that might have formed an appendix to the series of second-Jahrgang scores owned by Wilhelm Friedemann Bach. In that case, their transmission to Breitkopf would probably date from shortly after 1864, the year in which Wilhelm Friedemann left his position at the Liebfrauenkirche in Halle.”
Friedemann’s situation is described in Karl Geiringer’s The Bach Family: Seven Generations of Creative Genius (New York: Oxford University Press, 1954, available on-line, http://archive.org/stream/bachfamilyseveng00geir/bachfamilyseveng00geir_djvu.txt. “On May 12, 1764, he resigned his position at Halle, stopping work instantly, and not even appearing for the checking of the instruments entrusted to his care. No dispute has been recorded which might have provoked so sudden a decision; moreover Friedemann had no other position in prospect on which to fall back, though he may have hoped for a chance at Fulda. Apparently the resentment and disappointment engendered in Friedemann's mind for 18 years just had to find an outlet, and the artist felt irresistibly drawn to washing his hands of his ungracious and narrow-minded superiors, and to showing them that he did not depend on their favour. The satisfaction he derived from this act of defiance must have been great indeed, but so was the price he and his dependants had to pay for it. [New paragraph]. Through six more years he stayed on in Halle, getting some help from his friend, the publisher Gebauer, and working as a music teacher.” |
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