Johann Sebastian Bach (52 page)

Following the third cycle came a fourth that must, with the exception of a few remnants, be considered lost (Table 8.11). Conceptually resembling the second, this fourth
Jahrgang
returns to the plan of a uniform series of librettos. Their fertile and versatile author, Picander—
nom de poésie
of Christian Friedrich Henrici—would become over the years Bach's most important Leipzig producer of texts. The collaboration between Bach and Picander, who held the public office of post commissioner in Leipzig and later served as country and city tax commissioner, seems to have begun in early 1725 with a congratulatory secular cantata for the court of Weissenfels, BWV 249a, that was subsequently transformed into an Easter cantata (see Table 8.8) and later became the
Easter Oratorio
, BWV 249. A year after the first performance of the
St. Matthew Passion
, Picander's finest piece of sacred poetry, he published a complete cycle of
Cantaten auf die Sonnund Fest-Tage durch das gantze Jahr
. In the preface, dated June 24, 1728, Picander writes, “Actuated by the requests of many good friends, and by much devotion on my own part, I resolved to compose the present cantatas. I undertook the design the more readily, because I flatter myself that the lack of poetic charm may be compensated for by the loveliness of the music of our incomparable Capellmeister Bach, and that these songs may be sung in the main churches of our pious Leipzig.”
⁷⁵

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8.11. Fourth Annual Cantata Cycle (“Picander
Jahrgang
”)

Even if this statement was only wishful thinking on the author's part, Bach definitely completed nine cantatas on Picander's texts (Table 8.11) and may have composed others whose sources have not survived. Indeed, traces of lost materials may be found in the two printed editions of Bach's four-part chorales published in 1765/69 and 1783–87.
⁷⁶
Among the chief features of the Picander cantatas is the interpolation of chorale and free poetry in arias and choruses, giving the composer opportunities for various sorts of combinatorial techniques (as in BWV 156/2, 159/2, and nos. 1 and 19 of the
St. Matthew Passion
).

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8.12. Cantatas and Related Works Outside the Annual Cycles

As for the Obituary's reference to a total of five complete annual cantata cycles, the fifth is hardly recognizable among the extant sources, let alone re-constructible (Table 8.12). This
Jahrgang
would not, in all likelihood, have had the kind of consistency displayed by the second and Picander cycles. And if the first
Jahrgang
(1723–24) had indeed been planned and largely completed as a double cycle, the fifth could be found there, that is, in the “other half” of the first. But while there are some modest signs of Bach's continuing though reduced production of church cantatas and related works, among them the two oratorios for Christmas and Ascension Day, BWV 248 and 11, as well as the cantata fragments BWV 200, 248a, and 1045, the list of extant works provides little evidence for postulating a late—post-1730—cantata cycle. As far as we can see, the cantatas written after 1729 contribute nothing essentially new to Bach's output in this genre. However, we can note his increased receptiveness toward new stylistic trends, especially in arias of the later cantatas (BWV 200, 248a, and 30); particularly noteworthy are revisions of existing works for re-performances, as Bach drew on the rich repertoire that he had created in his productive cantata years of the 1720s.

Complementing the extensive body of the
Jahrgang
cantatas are occasional works and cantatas for certain regular functions (Table 8.13), but even though some were written for special events such as an organ dedication or the 1730 jubilee of the Augsburg Confession, they do not in principle differ from the cantatas for the Sundays and feast days of the ecclesiastical year. The town council election pieces constitute a particularly important group, however, because they fall into the category of official state music for which the cantor and music director at St. Thomas's bore the responsibility. They were performed at the service that took place annually on the Monday after St. Bartholomaeus's Day (August 24) at St. Nicholas's, after the formal election of the new city council and the rotation of the burgomaster seats. Like the sermon, the cantata was separately commissioned, with both the preacher and the cantor receiving extra fees. “Have ordered from Mr. Superintendent, D. Deyling, the sermon for the inauguration of the new Council, on this coming Monday, likewise the doorkeeper ordered the music from Herr Cantor,” notes the town scribe on August 22, 1729.
⁷⁷
The commissioned piece was due within exactly one week, but because the performance of the council piece always fell on a Monday, Bach had to prepare two different cantatas for the subsequent Sunday and Monday. And as the city council election service was a major communal-political event, Bach would have taken special care with a performance that invariably required a large ensemble and festive scoring with trumpets and timpani.

The autograph score of BWV 119 specifies a continuo group of “Violoncelli, Bassoni e Violoni all' unisono col Organo,” such plural listing indicating the size of the orchestra and underscoring the ceremonial nature of the music to be performed, which always included a processional march to accompany the exit of the town council from the church at the end of the service. Bach's score of BWV 120 makes reference to such an “Intrada con Trombe e Tamburi,” which has not come down to us. What has survived, however, are reports in the Leipzig papers of the so-called council sermon on August 31, 1739, on which occasion “the Royal and Electoral Court Composer and Capellmeister, Mr. Joh. Seb. Bach, performed a music that was as artful as it was pleasant; its text was:
CHORUS
. Wir dancken dir, Gott, wir dancken dir.”
⁷⁸
This performance of cantata BWV 29 began with an elaborate concerto movement for organ solo and orchestra, a sophisticated arrangement of the first movement of the Partita in E major for unaccompanied violin, BWV 1006, that most likely featured the composer as soloist. The terms “artful” and “pleasant,” however banal they may strike us today, are highly favorable judgments that far exceed what newspapers of the time generally wrote about a musical performance.

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8.13. Cantatas for Special Occasions

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