Church cantatas of Bach's third to fifth year in Leipzig
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Bach's autograph of the start (sinfonia) of Brich dem Hungrigen dein Brot, BWV39, the cantata for the first Sunday after Trinity in 1726, which is the first cantata of his fourth year in Leipzig, composed halfway through his third cycle
On Trinity Sunday 27 May 1725 Johann Sebastian Bach had presented the last cantata of his second cantata cycle, the cycle which coincided with his second year in Leipzig. As director musices of the principal churches in Leipzig he presented a variety of cantatas over the next three years. New cantatas for occasions of the liturgical year composed in this period, except for a few in the chorale cantata format, are known as Bach's third cantata cycle. His next cycle of church cantatas, the Picander cycle, did not start before St. John's Day 24 June 1728.
Sacred music of this period by Bach that does not belong to a cantata cycle includes council election cantatas, Passion music for Good Friday, and music for weddings and funerals.
Annually returning services
Johann Sebastian Bach
After Trinity of 1725 Johann Sebastian Bach began a third annual cycle, but with less consistency than the previous two.[1] The oldest extant cantata of the third cycle was composed for the ninth Sunday after Trinity 1725. The third cycle cantata for the first Sunday after Trinity was only composed in 1726. The cycle extends over several years.[2] The cantatas from 1727 have however also been termed as "between the third and the fourth cycles".[3]
There are 35 extant cantatas of the third cantata cycle, for a period with around 170 occasions. For about half of the other occasions a few new chorale cantatas by Bach (retrospectively added to the chorale cantata cycle), restagings of older compositions or presentations of works by other composers are known. Bach had acquired a cycle of cantatas by his second cousin Johann Ludwig Bach of Meiningen.[4] Together with his assistants he provided performance material for at least 18 of these cantatas, for which the Leipzig premieres are known, from Purification (2 February) to Trinity XIII (15 September) 1726.
Johann Sebastian Bach's compositions have a number according to the BWV catalogue, while Johann Ludwig Bach's have a JLB number. Through an erroneous attribution to the former the cantata Denn du wirst meine Seele nicht in der Hölle lassen, JLB21, is also known by a BWV number. The version of the St Mark Passion attributed to Keiser which Bach presented on Good Friday 1726, including the chorale harmonisations BWV500a and 1084, is indicated by a Bach Compendium (BC) number. Known works staged under Bach's directorate can in most cases also be indicated by a Bach Digital Work (BDW) number provided by the Bach-digital website.
As far as extant, Bach's third cantata cycle covers 35 of the 64 occasions of an "ideal" Leipzig cantata cycle:[5][6]
Historians of music studying the cycle have noted a greater use of solo organ parts, speculated to have been played by Bach or his son [WHICH ONE?], a wide range of texts and movements apparently borrowed from previous instrumental works.[2][4][5]
Alternatively, Bach's third cycle is described as starting with the Christmas season of 1725, running, with inclusion of the 18 JLB cantatas, for a liturgical year, and thus ending before Advent of 1726. In that format, the cycle covers over 40 occasions:[7]
Very little is known about the cantatas for recurring occasions in the year preceding the fourth cantata cycle, at least there is no new composition extant that with certainty can be attributed to the period from Trinity I 1727 to the start of that next cycle.
J.S. Bach's 3rd, 4th and 5th year as director musices in Leipzig
1 2 3 4 5 Possibly by Telemann, only text extant in Texte Zur Leipziger Kirchen-Music, Auf den Dritten Sonntag nach Trinitatis, Das Fest Johannis des Täufers, Ingleichen Den fünfften Sonntag Trinitatis, Das Fest der Heimsuchung Mariä, Und Den sechsten Sonntag Trinitatis. Leipzig: Immanuel Tietzen (1725)
↑ BWVAnh.1: lost, mentioned in a 1770 catalogue by Breitkopf, possibly identical to TWV1:617 (or 616?)[25] BWVAnh.209: lost, a Trinity VII cantata probably composed before 6 February 1727, when it was reused for a funeral service[26]
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Johannes Agricola
The librettos of the church cantatas presented for the first time in Leipzig during Bach's third to fifth year in that city have a diverse origin.[4] The most substantial group of librettos with a similar structure derives from a 1704 cycle of cantata texts printed in Meiningen, which was used for most of the cantatas presented in the liturgical year 1725–26.[28] In 1728 many of the librettos of cantatas associated with Bach's third to fifth year in Leipzig were grouped in a single publication by Christoph Birkmann.[27][29]
Trinity III to Trinity VII 1725
Erdmann Neumeister
A booklet printed in 1725, with the cantata texts from Trinity III to Trinity VI, was recovered in 1971.[30] The period covered by the booklet included the feasts of St. John and Visitation:
Trinity III, 17 June 1725: Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ, BDW01669 – the text is Johannes Agricola's 16th-century hymn with the same name. In 1732 Bach composed a per omnes versus chorale cantata with exactly the same text, Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ, BWV177, for Trinity IV, a cantata that was added to the chorale cantata cycle. Possibly BDW1669 was an early version of that cantata.[27]
St. John's Day, 24 June 1725 (coinciding with the fourth Sunday after Trinity): Gelobet sei der Herr, BDW01673 – a text by Erdmann Neumeister, from a libretto cycle published in 1711.[31]
Trinity V, 1 July 1725: Der Segen des Herrn machet reich ohne Mühe, BDW11069 – also by Neumeister (1711 cycle).[31]
Feast of Visitation, 2 July 1725: Meine Seele erhebt den Herrn, BDW01672 – Magnificat paraphrase by Maria Aurora von Königsmarck.[27]
Trinity VI, 8 July 1725: Wer sich rächet, an dem wird sich der Herr wieder rächen, BDW01670 – text from Neumeister's 1711 cycle.[31]
The musical settings of these librettos as performed in Leipzig on these days have not been recovered. A Trinity VII cantata, only known by its title,[32] is presumed to have been the cantata for the next Sunday,
It is not certain Bach composed any of the cantatas from Trinity III to Trinity VII 1725. Georg Philipp Telemann has been suggested as their possible composer: he had set all cantata librettos of Neumeister's 1711 cycle, and for the Trinity VII cantata there are two known Telemann cantatas that have the same title (TWV1:617 and 616).[4][25]
Septuagesima (third Sunday before lent), 9 February 1727: Ich bin vergnügt mit meinem Glücke, BWV84. A reworked version of the libretto of this cantata was published by Picander in his 1728–29 cantata cycle as Ich bin vergnügt mit meinem Stande, for performance on Septuagesima 13 February 1729.[36] Bach did however not seem to have considered his 1727 Septuagesima cantata as a part of the later cycle.[4]
Other early versions of librettos that were adopted by Picander in his 1728–29 cycle may have been set by Bach in 1727. Recent recovery of a copy of Birkmann's 1728 libretto cycle seems to suggest Welt, behalte du das Deine and Ich kann mich besser nicht versorgen for the first and the second Sunday after Easter respectively.[27]
Lehms' cycle of 1711
Georg Christian Lehms (1715)
A cantata with a libretto from a cycle by Georg Christian Lehms, published as Gottgefälliges Kirchen-Opffer in 1711, may have been presented on the 15th Sunday after Trinity 1725:[37]
TrinityXV, 9 September 1725: Liebster Gott, vergißt du mich, BWVAnh.209? – Music lost. In Lehms' cycle the cantata text was assigned to Trinity VII. However, since Birkmann published the cantata libretto for Trinity XV, that Sunday of 1725 is the more likely date of the cantata's first performance. Later the cantata was combined with BWV157 for a funeral cantata performed in Pomßen (6 February 1727, see above).[27]
From Christmas 1725 to the second Sunday after Trinity 1726 Bach drew most of his cantata librettos from Lehms' 1711 libretto cycle:[4]
In 1704 a cycle of cantata texts was published anonymously in Meiningen, under the title Sonn- und Fest-Andachten. Its third edition appeared under the title Sonntags- Und Fest-Andachten in 1719. Bach scholars have suggested that Ernst Ludwig I, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen, Johann Ludwig Bach's employer, might have been the author of these librettos. The librettos follow a strict format, in two variants. The short form applies to most of the cantatas:[4][28]
The build is symmetrical around the central New Testament section. The long form has a strophic poem instead of the Aria and Recitative after the New Testament section. When the cantata is split in two parts, as was customary in Leipzig, the split was usually after the third item, so that both parts started with a prose dictum (all other sections being versified). The 18 cantatas by Johann Ludwig Bach that were performed in Leipzig from Purification to Trinity XIII 1726 had a libretto from this cycle, as well as seven of the cantatas composed by Johann Sebastian Bach which were presented for the first time from Ascension to Trinity XIV 1726. Six of the extant cantatas of the latter used the short form, only the first one, for Ascension, has a libretto in the long form.[4]
Further cantatas with a libretto from the Meiningen cycle may have been presented in Leipzig in 1726, for instance on the fourth and the ninth Sundays after Trinity.[27] In chronological order:
For cantatas not belonging to the Meiningen libretto cycle, performed on the sixth and twelfth Sunday after Trinity 1726, see above in the section on Lehms' cycle of 1711. J.S. Bach's cantata for Trinity VI (with Lehms' libretto) was a short solo cantata. J.L. Bach's cantata for the same day, on a Meiningen libretto, required a chorus only for its last movement. Probably this cantata wasn't split: one of the two cantatas for this Sunday in 1726 was sung as partI, and the other as partII.
1 2 Sonn- und Fest-Andachten Uber die ordentlichen Evangelia Aus gewissen Biblischen Texten Alten und Neuen Testaments Und In der Hoch-Fürstl. Sachs. Meining. Hof-Capell Der Heil. Dreyfaltigkeit Deroselben zu Ehren abgesungen. Meiningen: 1704. 3rd edition (1719): Sonntags- Und Fest-Andachten Über Die ordentliche EVANGELIA, Auß Gewissen Biblischen Texten Alten und Neuen Testaments In der Hoch-Fürstl. Sachsen-Coburg Meinungisch. Hof-Capelle zur Heiligen Dreyfaltigkeit Deroselben zu Ehren abgesungen
↑ Christoph Birkmann. GOtt-geheiligte Sabbaths-Zehnden bestehend aus Geistlichen Cantaten auf alle Hohe Fest- Sonn- und Feyer-Täge der Herspruckischen Kirch-Gemeinde zu Gottseeliger Erbauung gewiedmet. Nürnberg: Lorenz Bieling, 1728
↑ Texte Zur Leipziger Kirchen-Music, Auf den Dritten Sonntag nach Trinitatis, Das Fest Johannis des Täufers, Ingleichen Den fünfften Sonntag Trinitatis, Das Fest der Heimsuchung Mariä, Und Den sechsten Sonntag Trinitatis. Leipzig: Immanuel Tietzen, 1725
1 2 3 Erdmann Neumeister. Geistliches Singen und Spielen – Das ist: Ein Jahrgang von Texten Welche dem Dreyeinigen GOTT zu Ehren bey öffentlicher Kirchen=Versammlung in Eisenach musicalisch aufgeführet werden von Georg. Philip. Telemann, F.S. Capellmeister und Secr. Gotha: 1711.
1 2 Salomo Franck. Evangelisches Andachts-Opffer Auf des Durchlauchtigsten Fürsten und Herrn Wilhelm Ernstens [...] Christ-Fürstl. Anordnung in geistlichen CANTATEN welche auf die ordentliche Sonn- und Fest-Tage in der F.S. ges. Hof-Capelle zur Wilhelmsburg A. 1715. zu musiciren angezündet von Salomon Francken. Weimar: 1715
↑ Picander (=Christian Friedrich Henrici). Sammlung erbaulicher Gedancken über und auf die gewöhnlichen Sonn- und Festtage. Leipzig: 1724–25
↑ Georg Christian Lehms. Gottgefälliges Kirchen-Opffer in einem gantzen Jahr-Gange Andächtiger Betrachtungen/ über die gewöhnlichen Sonn- und Festtags-Texte GOtt zu Ehren und der Darmstättischen Schloß-Capelle zu seiner Früh- und Mittags-Erbauung. Darmstadt: 1711.
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