The Role of Faith in the Music of J. S. Bach

The Role of Faith in the Music of J. S. Bach

In Bach's music we can meet other compositions in which the church feasts are celebrated by a sort of religious faith. [1] These compositions have been called oratorios. Spitta considers them to be a revival of the medieval religious spectacles rather than true oratorios, and he considers it more reasonable to call them mysteries. [2] We have seen that Bach's last composition was a chorale for organ which he dictated shortly before his death to his son-in-law Altnikol. His first attempts at instrumental music were also possibly pieces based on German hymns. Young organists started with exercises of this type. An organist's apprenticeship was usually undertaken on the clavier or the clavichord. The pupils were not allowed to practice on the organ until they were skilled enough not to damage this precious instrument by their clumsiness. On the other hand, by playing the sacred melodies they entertained in their homes a kind of prayer, somewhat of a stammer, no doubt, repeated painfully and full of faults, but devout ears could find in them the same charm as in those phrases of the psalter which children spell out in Kindergartens. Moreover, the chorale, which is the soul of Lutheran religious music, had its very roots in the heart of the people. Everything the congregation had loved before the Reformation in the way of Gregorian melodies lived once more in these new prayers. One can recognise the chant of the clergy, slowed down and translated so that everyone could understand it as they sang. But one also discovers in them the traces of the old Teutonic laments written for the church, and the memory of a few secular melodies sometimes peers through.

In every musical part," Bach clearly shows us his significant intentions about faith. J. S. Bach is usually thought not to be the arranger, and as with BWV 539, details make it unlikely to be authentic. Philipp Spitta considers the earliest of the surviving cantatas to be the Easter cantata: Denn du wirst meine Seele nicht in der Hölle lassen (B.G. 15). This work was later revised by the composer but several sections remain intact. The composition undoubtedly dates back to the Arnstadt years. In the introductions to both the first and second parts, Hoffer found a succession of slow orchestral chords, separated by long rests, as in the introductions of Buxtehude. After a few mysterious and solemn bars, the trumpets burst out in full harmony echoed by the strings. The marvelously triumphal character of this cantata is thus apparent from the very start. In it Bach chants Jesus Christ's victory over Death. Clear motives and very robust tones ring out in several airs with gay magnificence. It is powerful, festive music. [3] Bach's taste for antithesis already appears in a duet for a soprano and alto, accompanied by the strings and the organ. While one of the two voices proclaims ...