Simon

Some needed time off from social media; but looking forward to ploughing on through these cantatas!

I’m glad I spent some time with this, as it did reward it. But I can’t help but think the Thomaskirche faithful would have been wondering — ‘what the hell just happened? [9/9]

And then — rather than slinking out the back door — the closing chorale lifts its head and steps into the light. Not triumphant, not stern, just quietly radiant. The war is over. There’s still time for a hymn and a slice of something sweet. [8/9]

But if that whispered “stay with us” into a fog of grief, here we get weary confidence: the ache of life giving way to the restfulness of death. This isn’t loss, it’s release. Where the Emmaus disciples plead for comfort, the soul here is already halfway home. [7/9]

I’m still not sure whether I’m fully on board. The following movements: a mellifluous tenor recit (with a jarringly masochistic text) followed by a glorious lullaby of an aria (‘Bleib bei uns’), whose words recall the longing of BWV 6 [6/9]

And the Bass recitative (II) thunders in to proclaim it — before, instead of a feast or joy, or a stern debrief, a sweet duet of woodwind comes in. [5/9]

I personally love it: complex, ever tumbling; at times breathtakingly emotional, at others mysterious and intricate. In the central section you really feel like the divine battle stands in doubt but then, without you even noticing, it phases back in and we stand victorious. [4/9]

Instead the waves crashed onto a gently sloping beach and bubbled harmlessly up to tickle my toes.

The opening chorus is what a lot of people would probably identify as essential Bach: a bewildering whorl of fugue that either enchants or alienates. [3/9]

BWV 19 is a slippery beast. The wild drama of the opening chorus had me prepared either for a melodramatic, weaving, recit-fuelled Divine Comedy; or for a dogmatic brow-beating by a booming bass. [2/9]

Bach, J.S.: Cantatas, Vol. 7 - Bwv 17, 19, 25, 50, 78, 130, 149 Johann Sebastian Bach · Album · 2000 · 41 songs

BWV 19 Cantata for the Feast of St Michael ‘Es erhub sich ein Streit’ (‘A war arose’)
John Eliot Gardiner / Monteverdi Choir / English Baroque Soloists
[1/9]
open.spotify.com/album/6OUDQA...
(From track 28)

the congregation sings of fear and doubt, but also insists that if we trust the Word, then we’ll be safe: Lutheran duality, dressed lightly.

There was some meat left from the Christmas feasting after all — next Sunday, you’re staring Lent down the barrel. [9/9]

And the final chorale feels perfunctory: dying embers of a fire that never really caught.

Overall, despite the weight of the theology, Bach doesn’t browbeat his midwinter congregation.

There’s a lightness of touch in BWV 18 that reflects a theological paradox — [8/9]

Where Bach’s callowness (a relative term, of course) comes through more than his thrilling invention is in the more conventional fare. The soprano aria is a little clunky after the glories of the litany — not bad, just uninspired. [7/9]

But the lucid, otherworldly interjections from the boy soprano, and the steadying choral invocations, give it a wonderful shape. For once, I was disappointed that a litany was so short. [6/9]

And the litany structure of the central movement is fantastic. A proper workout for hapless tenor and bass, chuntering away in continuo-fuelled declamation, battling against a slightly surreal alliance of the Devil, the Pope, and the Turks(!). [5/9]

and it kind of makes it thrilling when something imposes itself on you.

Take that awkward, obsessively repeating ground in the opening sinfonia — it wouldn’t sound out of place in a Michael Nyman soundtrack. It seems to grapple with Satan, perhaps. Or February. Or both. [4/9]

But here I am, speeding through Romagna on a spring day rather than shivering on a wooden bench in Saxony, and I’m rather enjoying this curious early offering from JSB. [3/9]

There’s a bit of an apprentice’s paradox to BWV 18. Some of the polish of Bach’s Leipzig years is absent —

It continues to baffle me that the Sundays after Epiphany are absolutely stacked with theological Sturm und Drang — as if impending Lent wasn’t penitential and miserable enough already. [2/9]

Bach: Sacred Cantatas, BWV 10 - 14 & 16 - 19 Johann Sebastian Bach · Album · 2025 · 61 songs

BWV 18 - Cantata for Sexagesima Sunday ‘Gleichwie der Regen und Schnee vom Himmel fällt‘ (’Just as rain and snow falls from Heaven‘)
Nicholas Harnoncourt / Concertus Musicus Wien

[1/9]

#bach #cantata #baroque #classicalmusic #bwv18

open.spotify.com/album/6qGUdO...

But this is, perhaps, the hidden star of BWV 17. Our summery polyphonic praise gives way to soft, almost wistful, autumnal monophony. But I suppose salvation is comfort, and Bach sets a cosy fire for us as the nights draw in.
[9/9]

Like Jesus in the Trinity 17 Gospel reading, Bach exalts with the grateful cured Samaritan, rather than censures his missing companions.

I wasn’t expecting the closing chorale to offer me more. They usually range from the boring to the non-descript, with the occasional satisfying ‘clinch’.
[8/9]

The more earthy second half uses the lower voices to deliver the theological why to the first half’s what. But we avoid shouty dogma: the recits and arias are rich and, again, intricately textured. The praises bring the tenor soaring into the rafters.
[7/9]

Surely this is beyond the musical comprehension of a preteen choirboy? Anna Magdalena would have been able to do it justice, though. It’s so tantalising to think!
[6/9]

We start in the lofty open sky, with a sumptuous alto recit framing the message to give thanks for all God’s work: the air, the water, the earth, and the heavens. The soprano then trios with nightingale-like violins in an aria of stunning lucidity.
[5/9]

Gardiner offers a different kind of brilliance: his more intimate, solo-voiced approach lets each line glimmer. But both shine. It’s noon for Lutz; golden hour for JEG.
[4/9]

The ebullient opening in the Lutz recording is joyous — and a little disarming. I felt wrong-footed by such sunny major-key confidence. But even as the contrapuntal texture piles in, it’s delicate rather than overwhelming.
[3/10]

Written in two parts, for before and after the sermon, it’s no surprise that Bach uses this structure consummately to create a gem of a cantata.
[2/10]

Bachkantate, BWV 17 - Wer Dank opfert, der preiset mich (Live) Johann Sebastian Bach · Album · 2020 · 7 songs

BWV 17 - Cantata for the 17th Sunday after Trinity ‘Wer Dank opfert, der preiset mich’ (‘They that offer thanks praises me’)
Rudolf Lutz / Orchester und Chor der J.S. Bach-Stiftung
#bach #bwv17 #baroque #classicalmusic #cantata
[1/9]

open.spotify.com/album/3bUuQX...

And then the comedown. But Bach turns our hangover into comfort with a more conventional and predictable recit. And finally the enveloping duvet of low-woodwind-plus-balmy-tenor.. TRUST Ye The Lord. And we do. Oh we so do. [8/8]

My cup overfloweth: and so do the strings. And the brass. And the chorus. Everything overawed and shouting for joy, in continually surprising ways: short trumpet bursts;, fluttering, leaping violins. It’s wonderful. [7/8]