Whoever exalts himself should be humiliated
| Bach cantata | |
|---|---|
| Whoever exalts himself should be humiliated | |
| BWV: | 47 |
| Occasion: | 17th Sunday after Trinity |
| Year of origin: | 1726 |
| Place of origin: | Leipzig |
| Genus: | cantata |
| Solo : | SB |
| Choir: | SATB |
| Instruments : | 2Ob 2Vl Va Org Bc |
| text | |
| Johann Friedrich Helbig | |
| List of Bach cantatas | |
Whoever exalts himself should be humiliated ( BWV 47) is a church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach . He composed it in Leipzig in 1726 for the 17th Sunday after Trinity and performed it for the first time on October 13, 1726.
Story and words
In his fourth year in office in Leipzig, Bach composed the cantata in 1726 for the 17th Sunday after Trinity. It is assigned to his 3rd cantata cycle. The prescribed readings for Sunday were Eph 4.1–6 LUT , the exhortation to unity in the spirit, and Lk 14.1–11 LUT , the healing of a dropsy on the Sabbath.
The text comes from Johann Friedrich Helbig (1680–1722), who was court poet in Saxony-Eisenach from 1718 . The text appeared in the collection of cantata texts in 1720 to encourage prayer for a year . It is the only cantata text by the poet that Bach set to music, and it is not known whether Bach knew him from the publication mentioned or from a cantata by Georg Philipp Telemann , who used many of the poet's texts for use in Eisenach. Telemann had set Helbig's text as part of his “Sicilian” cantatas year 1719/20 ( TWV 1: 1603).
The starting point of the text is the last line of the Gospel (sentence 1), in the following it is warned in strong words against pride, the last aria is a prayer for humility. The final chorale is the eleventh and last stanza of Why do you grieve yourself, my heart (Nuremberg, 1561), which Bach processed in 1723 in the cantata Why do you grieve yourself, my heart .
Occupation and structure
The cantata is occupied by two vocal soloists ( soprano and bass ), four-part choir, two oboes , two violins , viola , obbligato organ and basso continuo .
- Coro: Whoever exalts himself should be humiliated
- Aria (soprano): Whoever wants to be called a true Christian
- Recitativo (bass): Man is excrement, stench, ash and earth
- Aria (bass): Jesus, bow my heart
- Chorale: I would like to do without temporal honor
music
The opening choir is the main focus of the work. The long ritornello is somewhat similar to Bach's Organ Prelude in C minor (BWV 546), transposed to G minor . The oboes play a motif that rises in sequences , which later becomes a fugue theme in the vocal parts in order to represent self-exaltation. A counter-subject in the opposite direction illustrates the humiliation. The fugue is closed by a homophonic affirmation . The sequence of fugue and postscript is repeated one more time, then the ritornello is repeated with a built-in choir that reinforces the entire text.
The soprano aria was originally accompanied by an obbligato organ, like the aria I go and seek with longing three weeks later . In a later performance, Bach chose the violin instead. The da capo aria describes humility in the first section, arrogance in the middle section through unruly rhythm ( Alfred Dürr ), while the continuo retains themes from the first section. The only recitative is the central movement of the cantata and is accompanied by strings. The second aria is in three parts, but without sung da capo . The oboe and violin are equal partners to the bass voice in a prayer for humility. The final chorale is composed of four voices in striking simplicity.
Recordings
- LP / CD
- JS Bach: Cantata BWV 10, BWV 47; Sanctus BWV 241. Paul Steinitz , London Bach Society , English Chamber Orchestra , Sally Le Sage , Neil Howlett . Oryx, 1965.
- JS Bach: Cantata No. 47; WA Mozart: Missa Brevis. Rudolf Barshai , Yurlov Choir , Moscow Chamber Orchestra , Galina Pisarenko , Alexander Vedernikov . Melodiya, 1966.
- JS Bach: The Cantata Work - Sacred Cantatas, Vol. 3. Nikolaus Harnoncourt , Vienna Boys Choir , Concentus Musicus Vienna , Soloist of the Vienna Boys Choir, Ruud van der Meer . Teldec , 1974.
- The Bach Cantata, Vol. 53. Helmuth Rilling , Gächinger Kantorei , Bach-Collegium Stuttgart , Arleen Augér , Philippe Huttenlocher . Hänssler, 1982.
- Bach Cantatas Vol. 9: Lund / Leipzig / For the 17th Sunday after Trinity / For the 18th Sunday after Trinity. John Eliot Gardiner , Monteverdi Choir , English Baroque Soloists , Katharine Fuge , Stephan Loges . Soli Deo Gloria, 2000.
- JS Bach: Complete Cantatas, Vol. 18. Sound Koopman , Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra & Choir , Sandrine Piau , Klaus Mertens . Antoine Marchand, 2003.
- JS Bach: Cantatas for the Complete Liturgical Year, Vol. 12: "Why do you grieve, my heart" - Cantatas BWV 138, 27, 47, 96. Sigiswald Kuijken , La Petite Bande , Gerlinde Sämann , Petra Noskaiová , Christoph Genz , Jan van der Crabben . Accent, 2009.
- JS Bach: Cantatas Vol. 47 - Cantatas from Leipzig 1723. Masaaki Suzuki , Bach Collegium Japan , Hana Blažíková , Peter Kooij . UNTIL 2010.
- DVD
- “He who exalts himself should be humiliated”. Cantata BWV 47. Rudolf Lutz , choir and orchestra of the JS Bach Foundation , Sibylla Rubens (soprano), Klaus Mertens (bass). Including an introductory workshop and reflection by Volker Meid . Gallus Media, 2014.
literature
- Alfred Dürr : Johann Sebastian Bach: The Cantatas. Bärenreiter, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1476-3 .
- Andreas Marti : "... to hear the teaching of life". An analysis of the three cantatas for the 17th Sunday after Trinity by Johann Sebastian Bach from a musical, rhetorical and theological point of view . Lang, Bern / Frankfurt am Main / Las Vegas 1981, ISBN 978-3-261-04867-7 .
- Werner Neumann : Handbook of the cantatas J. S. Bachs. 1947, 5th edition Breitkopf & Härtel, Wiesbaden 1984, ISBN 3-7651-0054-4 .
- Hans-Joachim Schulze : The Bach Cantatas: Introductions to all of Johann Sebastian Bach's cantatas . Evangelische Verlags-Anstalt, Leipzig / Carus, Stuttgart 2006 (Edition Bach-Archiv Leipzig) ISBN 3-374-02390-8 (Evang. Verl.-Anst.), ISBN 3-89948-073-2 (Carus-Verlag).
- Christoph Wolff , Ton Koopman : The world of Bach cantatas. J. B. Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2006 ISBN 978-3-476-02127-4 .
Web links
- Whoever exalts himself should be degraded, BWV 47 : Sheet music and audio files in the International Music Score Library Project
- Cantata BWV 47 “He who exalts himself should be humiliated” on bach cantata's website
- Who increases himself on the Bach website
- BWV 47 “He who exalts himself should be degraded” Text, structure, cast University of Alberta
Individual evidence
- ↑ Johann Friedrich Helbig (librettist) ( English ) bach-cantatas.com. 2003. Retrieved October 10, 2011.
- ^ Werner Menke: Thematic index of the vocal works by Georg Philipp Telemann. Volume 1. Cantatas for worship use. 2., ext. Edition. Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main 1988, ISBN 3-465-01835-4 .
- ^ Brit Reipsch: Annotations on Georg Philipp Telemann, Johann Friedrich Helbig and Johann Sebastian Bach. In: Brit Reipsch, Wolf Hobohm (eds.): Telemann and Bach: Telemann contributions. (= Magdeburg Telemann Studies. Volume 18). Olms, Hildesheim 2005, ISBN 3-487-12837-3 , pp. 63–85 ( limited preview in Google book search)
- ↑ Why are you sad, my heart / Text and Translation of Chorale ( English ) bach-cantatas.com. 2006. Retrieved October 10, 2011.
- ↑ John Eliot Gardiner : Cantatas for the Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity / Allhelgonakyrkan, Lund ( English , PDF; 137 kB) bach-cantatas.com. 2009. Retrieved October 11, 2011.
- ↑ Julian Mincham: Chapter 27 BWV 47 Who Exalts Himself ( English ) jsbachcantatas.com. 2010. Retrieved October 10, 2011.
- ↑ Chorale Melodies used in Bach's Vocal Works / Why do you grieve, my heart . bach-cantatas.com. 2005. Retrieved October 11, 2011.
