Bach, J.S.: Favourite Cantatas

Various

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Cat No: 8554042

Release Date: 12 January 1999

Label: Naxos - Nxc / Naxos Classics

Packaging Type: Jewel Case

No of Units: 1

Barcode: 636943404225

Genres: Classical

Composer/Series: BACH, J.S.

Description
Johann Sebastian Bach(1685-1750)Weichet nur, betr??bteSchatten, BWV 202 "Wedding Cantata" Ich habe genug, BWV 82Herz und Mund und Tatund Leben, BWV 147The career of JohannSebastian Bach, the most illustrious of a prolific musical family, falls neatlyinto three unequal parts. Born in 1685 in Eisenach, from the age of ten Bachlived and studied music with his elder brother in Ohrdruf, after the death ofboth his parents. After a series of appointments as organist and briefly as acourt musician, he became, in 1708, court-organist and chamber-?¡musician toDuke Wilhelm Ernst of Weimar, the elder of the two brothers who jointly ruledthe duchy. In 1714 he was promoted to the position of Konzertmeister to theDuke, but in 1717, after a brief period of imprisonment for his temerity inseeking to leave the Duke's service, he abandoned Weimar to become courtKapellmeister to Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cothen, a position he held until1723. From then until his death in 1750 he lived in Leipzig, where he was Thomaskantor,with responsibility for the music of the five principal city churches, in 1729assuming direction of the university collegium musicum, founded by Telemann in1702.At Weimar Bach hadbeen principally employed as an organist, and his compositions of the periodinclude a considerable amount written for the instrument on which he wasrecognised as a virtuoso performer. At Cothen, where Pietist traditionsdominated the court, he had no church duties, and was responsible rather forcourt music. The period brought the composition of a number of instrumentalworks. The final 27 years of Bach's life brought a variety of preoccupations,and while his official employment necessitated the provision of church music,he was able to provide music for the university collegium musicum and to writeor re-arrange a number of important works for the keyboard.In addition to the 200or so surviving church cantatas Bach wrote a number of secular cantatas for avariety of occasions. Weichct nur, betr??bte Schatten, BWV 202, scoredfor soprano, oboe, strings and basso continuo, was seemingly written during thecomposer's contented stay in Cothen, a period brought to an end by the marriageof Prince Leopold to a woman that Bach later described as "amusica".The work is a wedding cantata, a composition intended for performance during awedding banquet, its text a poem about spring and love, the author of whichremains unknown, but might have been Salomo Franck, court poet and librarian atWeimar. One of the arias from this cantata was later used to provide thesubject of a movement of the sixth of the sonatas for violin and harpsichord.Cantata 82 (Ichhabe genug) was written forthe Feast of the Purification (2nd February) in 1727. In accordance with theprinciples of Pietism the text does not refer directly to a biblical event (inthis case, the reaction of Simeon to the experience of seeing the infant Jesusin the temple), but obliquely, in paraphrase. It reflects upon approachingdeath, depicting a p
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