Bach: Cantata Ein feste Burg

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J.S Bach profile

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. He is known for instrumental compositions such as the Brandenburg Concertos and the Goldberg Variations as well as for vocal music such as the cantata "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott". He wrote over a thousand works in his lifetime and can be regarded as one of the greatest composers that ever lived.

The Bach family already counted several composers when Johann Sebastian was born as the last child of a city musician in Eisenach. After becoming an orphan at age 10, he lived for five years with his eldest brother, after which he continued his musical development in Lüneburg. From 1703 he was back in Thuringia, working as a musician for Protestant churches in Arnstadt and Mühlhausen and, for longer stretches of time, at courts in Weimar—where he expanded his repertoire for the organ—and Köthen—where he was mostly engaged with chamber music. From 1723 he was employed as Thomaskantor (cantor at St. Thomas) in Leipzig. He composed music for the principal Lutheran churches of the city, and for its university's student ensemble Collegium Musicum. From 1726 he published some of his keyboard and organ music. In Leipzig, as had happened in some of his earlier positions, he had a difficult relation with his employer, a situation that was little remedied when he was granted the title of court composer by the King of Poland in 1736. In the last decades of his life he reworked and extended many of his earlier compositions. He died of complications after eye surgery in 1750.

Bach enriched established German styles through his mastery of counterpoint, harmonic and motivic organisation, and his adaptation of rhythms, forms, and textures from abroad, particularly from Italy and France. Bach's compositions include hundreds of cantatas, both sacred and secular.[4] He composed Latin church music, Passions, oratorios, and motets. He often adopted Lutheran hymns, not only in his larger vocal works, but for instance also in his four-part chorales and his sacred songs. He wrote extensively for organ and for other keyboard instruments. He composed concertos, for instance for violin and for harpsichord, and suites, as chamber music as well as for orchestra. Many of his works employ the genres of canon and fugue.

Throughout the 18th century Bach was mostly renowned as an organist, while his keyboard music, such as The Well-Tempered Clavier, was appreciated for its didactic qualities. The 19th century saw the publication of some major Bach biographies, and by the end of that century all of his known music had been printed. Dissemination of scholarship on the composer continued through periodicals and websites exclusively devoted to him, and other publications such as the Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis (BWV, a numbered catalogue of his works) and new critical editions of his compositions. His music was further popularised through a multitude of arrangements, including for instance the Air on the G String, and of recordings, for instance three different box sets with complete performances of the composer's works marking the 250th anniversary of his death.

Great Composers: J.S. Bach (Embed)

A Brief History of Bach (Embed)

These are some of Bach's most famous works:

Mass in B minor

St Matthew Passion

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Ein feste burg context

In the centuries before the Reformation, music held a key place in worship. In the Middle Ages, plainchant (sung by priests) became a vehicle for bringing the text of the Latin liturgy to life. Over the course of time, harmony was added to this plainchant and, by the Renaissance period, the emergence of complex polyphonic textures had become evident in church music. Such was its complexity that trained choirs were required to sing this music.

The moment that Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg in 1517 has been viewed as firing the starting gun for the Protestant Reformation, which irreversibly transformed the religious landscape of Europe. As a priest and professor of theology, Luther came to reject many of the teachings and principles of the Roman Catholic Church, particularly its view on indulgences (the topic of his 95 Theses).

When Luther refused to denounce his own writings in 1521 at the Diet of Worms (an assembly of the Holy Roman Empire), he was excommunicated by the Pope and outlawed by Emperor Charles V. Luther was hidden by Elector Frederick III (‘the Wise’) of Saxony, and was installed in a secret location near Eisenach. It was during this time that Luther translated the New Testament into German, making it more accessible to congregations, which also had a lasting impact on the church and German society

The sacred cantata held a prominent place in the Lutheran liturgy of Leipzig. The subject matter would often be linked to the content of the Gospel reading that came immediately before the cantata in the service. Very much like its predecessor, Schütz’s sacred concerto, a cantata would include choruses, solo arias and chorales.

The churches in Leipzig required 58 cantatas each year, as well as music for other significant church feasts (Good Friday, festivals, weddings, funerals, and an annual cantata for the installation of the city council). Between 1723 and 1729, Bach composed four complete annual cycles of cantatas, each with about 60 cantatas.

Over 200 of Bach’s cantatas have been preserved, some of which were new compositions for Leipzig, and others of which reused material from his earlier works. It is impossible to generalise about their character, but it can be said that in the early cantatas, Bach responded to the changing affections and images of the text with some true expression and intensity in his music. In contrast, his Leipzig cantatas seem less subjective in feeling and more regular in structure.

Though mainly sacred, Bach also composed a number of secular cantatas throughout his life. Some were for royalty, or for public or private occasions, while others had a plot line and were written in opera buffa style (eg Bach’s Coffee Cantata BWV 211).

‘Ein feste Burg’ is one of 52 chorale cantatas that Bach composed. He wrote approximately 40 of these in his role as Thomaskantor in Leipzig, which form the backbone of his chorale cantata cycle. A chorale cantata is a church cantata based on a Lutheran hymn (both in terms of text and melody). It is not certain when this version of the cantata was composed, but it is in the format of Bach’s second cantata cycle, in which all the cantatas are based a Lutheran hymn tune.

The cantata was written for Reformation Day: a feast day in the Protestant Church celebrated on 31st October. This cantata was first performed between 1727 and 1731 and was probably composed either in 1723 or between 1728 and 1731. It is based on the earlier cantata Alles, was von Gott geboren, which was produced in Weimar in 1715 or 1716 for the fourth Sunday after Easter.

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musical analysis

The cantata consists of eight movements:

1. Chorus: Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott

2. Aria and duet (bass and soprano): Alles, was von Gott geboren

3. Recitative and arioso (bass)

4. Aria (soprano)

5. Chorale

6. Recitative and arioso (tenor)

7. Duetto (alto, tenor)

8. Chorale: Das Wort sie sollen lassen stahn

The cantata is scored for four vocal soloists (soprano, alto, tenor and bass), a four-part SATB choir, three oboes, and violin 1 and 2. Unusually, in this cantata, Bach writes for ‘Violoncello e cembalo’ and ‘Violone e organo’. In this recording, a sackbut strengthens the lower part. J.S. Bach’s son Wilhelm Friedemann Bach later added trumpet parts which give an additional sense of grandeur.

Movement 1

This is scored for SATB choir and tutti orchestra. The vocal lines are closely doubled by the orchestra. The texture is highly contrapuntal and written in a fugal style. At the start of the movement there are fugal entries which are presented in a layered manner building up from tenor, alto, soprano and finally bass.

The melodies in the first movement are mainly conjunct with occasional leaps, reflecting the original shape of Luther’s hymn tune. Luther’s congregations would have been able to sing these simple melodic lines. There are, however, many passages of melismatic writing, which reflect the fact that these cantatas were written for trained choirs. The melodies are mainly diatonic with occasional chromatic movement, which can be heard in bar 86 in the soprano part and again bar 91 in the same part.

Movement 2

This aria is a duet for soprano and bass with string accompaniment and solo oboe. The oboe essentially doubles the soprano line, which provides the chorale melody but with additional ornamentation. The bass sings an almost independent aria. The soprano and oboe sing and play a decorated version of the cantus firmus, but the melody is still clear to the listener. The oboe’s cantus firmus is more embellished than the soprano’s, but the outline of the melody remains clear. The text is set both melismatically and syllabically, and the melodies are mainly conjunct.

Movement 8

This chorale is for four-part SATB choir with orchestral accompaniment which exactly doubles the vocal lines.