Born on March 21, 1685, in Eisenach, Thuringia,
Germany, Johann Sebastian Bach had a prestigious
musical lineage and took on various organist positions
during the early 18th century, creating famous
compositions like "Toccata and Fugue in D minor." Some
of his best-known compositions are the "Mass in B
Minor," the "Brandenburg Concertos" and "The
Well-Tempered Clavier." Bach died in Leipzig, Germany,
on July 28, 1750. Today, he is considered one of the
greatest Western composers of all time. ...(+)
Born on March 21, 1685, in Eisenach, Thuringia,
Germany, Johann Sebastian Bach had a prestigious
musical lineage and took on various organist positions
during the early 18th century, creating famous
compositions like "Toccata and Fugue in D minor." Some
of his best-known compositions are the "Mass in B
Minor," the "Brandenburg Concertos" and "The
Well-Tempered Clavier." Bach died in Leipzig, Germany,
on July 28, 1750. Today, he is considered one of the
greatest Western composers of all time.
There can be little doubt that this is the best known
and most admired of Bach's earliest cantatas. It could
be argued that in later years Bach's art became a great
deal more mature, but it hardly grew more profound.
It is one of those art works that stands at the
crossroads of time, seeming to look both forward and
backwards. In the latter instance it is highly
sectional, with little in the way of the extended,
developed movements of the later years, it is lightly
orchestrated, begins with a short introductory sinfonia
and it draws principally upon chorales and biblical
references with the minimum of added text. On the other
hand, it is created from structural elements which
operate across and unite movements, the writing is
highly idiomatic and the musical architecture derives
principally from the essence of the text.
It is a work of such depth and intensity that one can
scarcely avoid speculating that the deceased for whose
internment it was composed, had some personal
connection with the twenty-two year old composer. Or
perhaps it simply struck a chord that reminded him of
the death of his own parents, scarcely more than a
dozen years previously. But whatever the personal
impact the occasion might have had on him, there is no
disputing the depth and profundity which the emerging
composer managed to elicit from the minimal lines of
conventional text.
The segmented nature of this work makes it seem more
complex than it really is. It falls into four basic
movements thus: sinfonia, chorus (with solos), aria
(becoming a duet) and closing chorale.
The longest and most complex of the two hybrid
movements is the second.
The cantata finishes with a chorale, but not in the
plain four-part setting we might have expected. The
recorders return, echoing the earlier movements and
evoking a sense of structural completeness; indeed even
the figurations which dominate their writing remind us
of the opening sinfonia. The first five phrases of the
chorale melody are set in four-part harmony, very much
as we would expect to find closing a Bach cantata,
although not without a few embellishments. The modest
instrumental group provides a six-bar introduction and
separates the phrases which give honour and praise to
each of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit; and
that might well have been that. But Bach takes the
final phrase----through Jesus Christ, amen----and
extends it semi-fugally to create what some might call
a coda. But such terminology is misleading. This
section comprises over thirty of the fifty-one bar
movement; the amen to Christ has become the major focus
of the piece!
Bach did something similar at the end of the second
movement of C 4 (vol 2, chapter 42) where the final
chorale phrase was extended to create the rolling
hallelujahs. Clearly he may well have had C 106 in mind
when he composed it, for the principle is the same. But
in C 106 when the instruments enter they too have their
turn at declaiming and emphasising the chorale phrase,
firstly in crotchets (from bar 35) and later in
augmented minims (from bar 43). The movement ends in a
wash of semi-quavers and flowing counterpoint, the
musical embodiment of honour and praise of the
Lord.
Although originally written for Flutes (2), Viola da
Gambas (2), Chorus (SATB) and Basso Continuo, I created
this arrangement for Woodwinds (Flute, Oboe, Bb
Clarinet & Bassoon) & Strings (2 Violins, Viola &
Cello).
PARTITION