Show Notes
Bach married his second cousin, Maria Barbara, on October 17, 1707, in St. Bartholomäi’s Church (pictured in the cover image) in a charming little village called Dornheim. They were both 22. According to Spitta, some eight months later, Bach and Maria returned to that same church to attend the wedding of the man who had officiated their own: Johann Lorenz Stauber. J.S. Bach carried with him the parts to a cantata, and this work was heard for the first time in June, 1708. …or so the legend goes. Modern scholarship calls Spitta’s anecdote into question, but in any case, Der Herr denket an uns BWV 196, is one of Bach’s earliest vocal works. Despite being from the same period as the other cantatas we recently covered, the work might show more outward signs of being similar to Bach’s later cantatas: we get a da capo aria for the first time, and the choruses only figure into the first and last movements. We see no sudden shifts of tempo, and movements are clear cut. The only abrupt change of texture comes in the second movement: ‘The lord blesses us.’ Segnet uns. Bach will set the word ‘bless’ differently in every movement. Notice how the soprano soloist amplifies the Lord’s blessings: Despite these examples, the cantata fails to impress us the same way his other early cantatas do. Instead, we take joy in the fugal writing in the outer movements. The finale of the opening chorus is a fugue where the subject is never absent. A glance at a few pages shows this: The closing movement features a fugue with two subjects on the word, Amen! I called the first theme the ‘stomping theme’ and the second theme the ‘climbing theme’ —whatever helps you understand the distinct shapes. When looking for wedding ideas to back up Spitta’s story (though we must be aware of confirmation bias!) I might see the musical representation of two separate figures, always appearing together, never one without the other: Bach adds a classic ‘early Bach’ touch at the end, ending the entire cantata piano, disappearing with a whisper: Write That Fugue!
We Rely Exclusively on Paid Subscriptions! Help WTF Bach endure:Join at WTFBach.comThis is the only place Evan checks comments regularly.You can also make a one-time donation here:https://www.paypal.me/wtfbachhttps://venmo.com/wtfbachThank you for your help! Concepts Covered: Bach's Cantata BWV 196, Der Herr denket an uns (The Lord Thinks of Us), one of only seven surviving cantatas from Bach’s earliest period. The traditional story behind the piece — Bach wrote it as a wedding gift for the pastor who had officiated his own marriage to Maria Barbara — and examines why modern scholarship casts doubt on that account, since the text itself doesn't clearly point to a wedding occasion. Bach draws his libretto directly from Psalm 115, making this one of the textually simplest cantatas in his early output, how a single rising melodic motif ties together the Sinfonia, arias, and choruses. Bach's word painting on the recurring word "bless" (segnet), walks through the construction of the cantata's central choral fugue, and highlights the soprano aria's use of da capo form — possibly the earliest example of that structure in Bach's output. Vokaleinbau ‘vocal insertion’ might be used here for the first time. The cantata's final movement, a double fugue built on two contrasting ‘Amen’ subjects, other early stylistic features and analysis.
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The music at the end is BWV 600, from a forthcoming ‘electrified’ arrangement of Bach’s Orgelbüchlein. The beautiful passage toward the end of my rant— with the koto accompaniment and bird song— comes from one of my absolute favorite books: R.H. Blythe’s writings about Haiku. Blyth considered the three greatest geniuses of time to be Basho, Bach, and Shakespeare— in that order! Wow! What am I missing with Basho!? More than a podcast. This is WTF Bach.
Volume 6 in ‘J.S. Bach: Complete Keyboard Works’ is on presale today! Here are the relevant links: * J.S. Bach: Complete Keyboard Works, Vol. 6 - Arrangements of Albinoni and Reincken(https://modernclassicalx.lnk.to/JSBachCompleteKeyboardWorksVol6FromArrangementsofAlbinoniandReincken) I might call this volume a ‘headphones album’ or perhaps one to listen to in the car: The sonic space shifts throughout the course of these pieces. I describe this process in depth in the episode, but essentially each track is two recordings of the piece, playing simultaneously: one recording is the original live performance, while another is that very same performance, played back through the Disklavier with the dynamics flatlined— as if the piano keyboard were incapable of dynamics — like a harpsichord. The two recordings were then ‘live panned’ during the mixing according to my feeling for the music. The result, while perhaps less extreme than this all sounds, is certainly a noticeable phenomenon, especially in headphones or seated between two speakers as in a car. But enough about that, let’s get to the music. Fugue it:
We’ve now covered the seven surviving earliest vocal works by Johann Sebastian Bach! This episode is a brief tour through the episodes we dedicated to these pieces, refreshing our memories and attempting to identify unifying stylistic features. All the episodes covering the Arnstadt/Mülhausen cantatas can be found at:https://wtfbach.substack.com/t/early-cantatas Wanna Cantata?
“The consummate expressiveness of {BWV 4] has always been marvelled at. Each verse is as if chiselled in music.” -Albert Schweitzer, Vol. 2 Bach’s early Easter cantata remains one of the most beloved in the entire canon. Barely 22 years old, he is already in full command of his tone-painting. Here are three measures particularly packed with symbolism: Filling the music with rests at the word nothing, ‘one death eating another’ through the closest possible canon, crosses both in shape and every note ‘sharped’ (gekreuzt,) dripping blood on the Passover doors with short 8th notes, leaping a diminished 12th (!) in the bass aria at the word death, this cantata is a dictionary of text painting. …und singen Halleluja!
Sometimes an article from the EB strikes me as so amusing, I simply have to share it with you. See you next week (or the week after, latest) for the conclusion of our early cantata survey, with Christ lag in Todes Banden, BWV 4. Thanks for listening! Well, That’s Fascinating!