Johann Sebastian Bach

Church cantata (Bach)

Throughout his life as a musician, Johann Sebastian Bach composed cantatas for both secular and sacred use. He composed his church cantatas for use in the Lutheran church, mainly intended for the

History and context#

Bach’s Nekrolog mentions five cantata cycles: “Fünf Jahrgänge von Kirchenstücken, auf alle Sonn- und Festtage” (Five year-cycles of pieces for the church, for all Sundays and feast days), which would amount to at least 275 cantatas, or over 320 if all cycles would have been ideal cycles. The extant cantatas are around two-thirds of that number, with limited additional information on the ones that went missing or survived as fragments. The listing below contains cycle information as available in scholarship, and may include cantatas that are or were associated with Bach (e.g., listed in the BWV catalogue), but were not actually composed by him.

Before Leipzig#

Bach’s earliest cantatas date from more than 15 years before he became Thomaskantor in Leipzig in 1723. His earliest extant cantatas were composed in Arnstadt and Mühlhausen. In 1708 he moved to Weimar where he wrote most of his church cantatas before the Leipzig era. These pre-Leipzig cantatas are not generally grouped as one of the five cycles mentioned in the Nekrolog. The extant cantatas of the pre-Leipzig era are primarily known by their recasting as a cantata in one of the Leipzig cycles.

Early cantatas#

Bach started composing cantatas around 1707, when he was still an organist in Arnstadt. The first documented performances of his work take place in Mühlhausen, where he was appointed in 1708.

Weimar#

In Weimar, Bach was from 1714 to 1717 commissioned to compose one church cantata a month. In the course of almost four years there he thus covered most occasions of the liturgical year. The expression “Weimar cycle” has been used for the cantatas composed in Weimar from 1714 (which form the bulk of extant cantatas composed before Bach’s Leipzig time).

Köthen#

In Köthen, where Bach worked from 1717 to 1723, he restaged some of his earlier church cantatas. Apart from composing several secular cantatas, Lobet den Herrn, alle seine Heerscharen, BWV Anh. 5, is the only new church cantata he appears to have composed there.

Leipzig#

As , director of music of the main churches of Leipzig, Bach was responsible for the Thomasschule and for the church music at the main churches, where a cantata was required for the service on Sundays and additional church holidays of the liturgical year. When Bach took up his office in 1723, he started to compose new cantatas for most occasions, beginning with Die Elenden sollen essen, BWV 75, first performed in the Nikolaikirche on 30 May 1723, the first Sunday after Trinity. He collected them in annual cycles; five are mentioned in obituaries, three are extant. The church year begins with the first Sunday in Advent, but Bach started his first Leipzig cycles on the first Sunday after Trinity, which “also marked the beginning of the second half of the Lutheran liturgical year: the Trinity season or “Era of the Church” in which core issues of faith and doctrine are explored, in contrast to the first half, known as the “Temporale” which, beginning in Advent and ending on Trinity Sunday, focuses on the life of Christ, His incarnation, death and resurrection”. Leipzig observed tempus clausum, quiet time, in Advent and Lent, when no cantatas were performed. All cantatas for these occasions date from Bach’s earlier time. He reworked some cantatas from this period for different occasions. The high holidays Christmas, Easter and Pentecost were each celebrated on three days. Additionally, feasts were celebrated on fixed dates, the feasts of Purification of Mary (Mariae Reinigung, 2 February), Annunciation (Mariae Verkündigung, 25 March) and Visitation (Mariae Heimsuchung, 2 July), and the Saint’s days of St. John the Baptist (Johannis, 24 June), St. Michael (Michaelis, 29 September), St. Stephen (Stephanus, 26 December, the second day of Christmas) and St. John the Evangelist (Johannes, 27 December, the third day of Christmas). Further feasts on fixed days were New Year’s Day (Neujahr, 1 January), Epiphany (Epiphanias, 6 January) and Reformation Day (Reformationsfest, 31 October). Sacred cantatas were also performed for the inauguration of a new city council (Ratswechsel, in Leipzig in August), consecration of church and organ, weddings, confession, funerals, and functions of the University of Leipzig.

First cycle#

Bach’s first (Leipzig) cantata cycle consists of cantatas or similar liturgical works (e.g. liturgical compositions in Latin) first performed from (first Sunday after Trinity) to (Trinity).

Second cycle#

Bach started a second annual cycle on the first Sunday after Trinity of 1724, planned to contain only chorale cantatas, each based on a single Lutheran hymn. He began with O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort, BWV 20, on the first Sunday after Trinity, composed chorale cantatas to the end of the liturgical year, began the next liturgical year with Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland, BWV 62 for the first Sunday in Advent, and kept the plan up to Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern, BWV 1, performed on Palm Sunday. For the occasions from Easter to Trinity, he composed no chorale cantatas based exclusively on one hymn, but wrote a few of them in later years, such as Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140, for the 28th Sunday after Trinity which had not occurred in 1724. Bach’s second (Leipzig) cantata cycle consists of cantatas first performed from (first Sunday after Trinity) to (Trinity). The first 40 cantatas of this cycle are chorale cantatas, thus this cycle is also known as the chorale cantata cycle (at least the first 40 cantatas of the cycle are known thus). Bach’s chorale cantatas written at a later date and restagings of earlier chorale cantatas are also usually understood as being included in this cycle.

Third cycle#

Bach’s third (Leipzig) cantata cycle is traditionally seen as consisting of cantatas first performed from the first Sunday after Trinity in 1725 to Trinity Sunday in 1726, or otherwise before the Picander cycle. More recent scholarship assigns the qualification “between the third and the fourth cycles” to the few known cantatas written from 1727 to the start of the fourth cycle. In the “third cycle” period Bach also performed many cantatas composed by his second cousin Johann Ludwig Bach a Leipzig premiere. For the period from Purification, to Trinity XIII, there are extant copies by Johann Sebastian Bach and his usual scribes for 16 cantatas (JLB 1–16), covering nearly half of the occasions in that period. Another cantata, JLB 21, was likely also given its Leipzig premiere in this same period (Easter, ), but was for some time misattributed to Johann Sebastian Bach as his cantata BWV 15.

Fourth cycle#

Bach’s fourth (Leipzig) cantata cycle, known as the Picander cycle, consists of cantatas performed for the first time from (St. John’s Day) to (fourth Sunday after Trinity), or later in 1729, to a libretto from the printed cycle of 70 cantata texts for 1728–29 by Picander. Later additions to this cycle and Picander librettos without extant setting from Bach’s time in Leipzig can be seen as belonging to this cycle.

Later/other#

Cantatas not belonging to any of the previous: e.g. first performed after the Picander cycle, uncertainty when it was first performed or for which liturgical occasion it was composed, etc. Generally it is not believed that cantatas composed after the Picander cycle amount to a cycle in its own right, at least there are not enough extant cantatas to unambiguously conclude that a fifth Leipzig cantata cycle ever existed.

Occasions#

The Lutheran church of Bach’s time prescribed the same readings every year, a section from a Gospel and, recited before this, a corresponding section from an Epistle. A connection between the cantata text and the readings (or at least one of the prescribed hymns for the occasion) was desired. Relevant readings and hymns are linked to the church cantata article for each occasion. Roman numerals refer to the position of the given Sunday with respect to a feast day or season. For example, “Advent III” is the third Sunday in Advent and “Trinity V” is the fifth Sunday after Trinity. The number of Sundays after Epiphany and Trinity varies with the position of Easter in the calendar. There can be between 22 and 27 Sundays after Trinity. The maximum number of Sundays after Epiphany did not occur while Bach wrote cantatas.

Advent#

Advent is celebrated on the four Sundays before Christmas. In Leipzig, only on the first Sunday a cantata was performed, because it was a Fastenzeit (season of abstinence).

Advent I#

Composed before the numbered cycles: * Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland, BWV 61 (, Weimar) 1 – First year in Leipzig, : * BWV 61 restaged 2 – Chorale cantata cycle, : * Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland, BWV 62 3 – Between the second and the fourth cycle?: * BWV 36, early version, first presented between 1725 and 1730 4 – Picander cycle, libretto planned for : * Machet die Thore weit (same libretto as planned for Palm Sunday , see below, with no known setting by Bach) 5 – Other and/or later: * Schwingt freudig euch empor, BWV 36 (final version),

Advent II#

Composed before the numbered cycles: * Wachet! betet! betet! wachet! BWV 70a (; in 1723 expanded to BWV 70 for Trinity XXVI) 4 – Picander libretto for : * Erwache doch mein Herze (no known setting by Bach)

Advent III#

Composed before the numbered cycles: * Ärgre dich, o Seele, nicht, BWV 186a (; in 1723 expanded to BWV 186 for Trinity VII) 4 – Picander libretto for : * Alle Plagen, alle Pein (no known setting by Bach) 5 – Other and/or later: * Georg Philipp Telemann’s Das ist je gewißlich wahr, TWV 1:183 (1719 or 1720; misattributed to Bach as BWV 141)

Advent IV#

Composed before the numbered cycles: * Bereitet die Wege, bereitet die Bahn, BWV 132 () * Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben, BWV 147a (; in 1723 expanded to BWV 147 for Visitation) 4 – Picander libretto for : * Vergiß es, doch, mein Herze, nicht (no known setting by Bach)

Composer: Johann Sebastian Bach