# Bach Cantatas - A Top 20 List (Part I)



## Allegro Con Brio (Jan 3, 2020)

The most unprecedented year of 2020 allowed me to pursue several fruitful listening goals and deepen my knowledge of almost all areas of classical music. By far my favorite listening project this year, however, was my journey through all 200+ of J.S. Bach's cantatas. Starting in May and concluding in November, I listened through them according to BWV number chronology and wrote down my observations on each of them. At first this was just casual listening, but I quickly began to realize that, despite the fact that Bach is my favorite composer, I had been unjustly neglecting these wondrous works for far too long. I became positively fascinated by this body of work and concluded that, in my opinion, it is the greatest canon of musical compositions in Western history. I have since gone back and studied most of the cantatas in more in-depth fashion, comparing performances along the way. I also consulted commentaries such as those by Julian Mincham, Craig Smith, and Linda Gingrich; all of which offer far richer insights into the musical and theological depths of these works than I ever could. These works speak to the human condition, and can help any of us, no matter our worldview, come to grips with our position on earth and understand the nature of humanity just as effectively as it can enrich and intensify the faith of those who share Bach's beliefs.

After I came to the conclusion that Bach cantata study had become a downright obsession for me, I realized that I could assist others in getting to know this music that no one should go without hearing. It is absolutely incomprehensible to me how the cantatas are not generally better-known (outside of a choice three or four of them) but it is highly understandable that many are simply daunted by the sheer size of this corpus and don't know where to jump in. That's why I decided to sort the best cantatas (not all of them) into a three-tier system that can be found here. In this post, I want to list what I believe are the 20 greatest cantatas and provide a brief commentary on each. I hope that it might help anyone curious about these works or who has previously not given much thought to them to dive in and discover the incredible riches that lie within! Start with these and you will be well on your way on an artistic voyage that you will never regret.

*20. BWV 49 Ich geh und Suche mit Verlangen:* This is, for me, the finest of the Christ-Soul dialogue cantatas, in which Bach envisions the metaphysical relationship between the vulnerable spirit and its Creator as a sublime intimate drama. Other great ones include 57, 58, 152, and 140 but there is something so supremely joyful and infectious about this cantata and its extraordinarily sympathetic portrait of Christ. It is an ideal entry point into the cantatas.

*19. BWV 42 Am Abend aber Dessilbigen Sabbats:* The Sunday after Easter was a difficult day for Bach to write for because he had to expend so much creative energy for Holy Week. Here, his sorely-taxed choir was given a breather, but Bach uses the opportunity to write one of his most gorgeous and visionary works. The opening movement is a purely instrumental rendition of one of Bach's involved choruses, and the contrast between the alto aria and the following duet is remarkable - one a breathtaking lyrical idyll and the other a gruff, almost comical portrayal of the wolf that seeks to snatch the flock of Christ away. The whole cantata has a sort of transfigured halo about it that is absolutely mesmerizing.

*18. BWV 56 Ich will den Kreuzstab Gerne Tragen:* I see this cantata for solo bass as Bach's finest single-soloist cantata, even greater than the very popular BWV 51 and 82. It is a Shakesperean drama in miniature of the soul's strife-filled journey through life and subsequent apotheosis to the afterlife. Just try to get the oboe tune of the third movement out of your head! The final chorale is simply one of the most haunting, heart-rending things you'll ever hear.

*17. BWV 77 Du Sollst Gott, Deinen Herren, Lieben:* From a purely technical perspective, the opening chorus is perhaps the most mind-bogglingly complex thing that Bach ever wrote. Here is a video breaking it down if you're interested: 



 But even the casual listener will find themselves simply overwhelmed by the intellectual and emotional force of this movement. There then follows a highly sensuous soprano aria and an alto aria that combines the vulnerable and the heroic. This represents the pinnacle of Bach's creative engagement with the Lutheran faith and its dogmas.

*16. BWV 8 Liebster Gott, Wenn Wird ich Sterben* This cantata takes the most fundamental human fear of death and transforms it into art of the highest order. The first movement chorus is a marvel of imagination and is unlike anything else from the Baroque period. In it can be clearly heard the tolling of funeral bells and the ticking of a clock as our life winds to a conclusion. It has been called a portrait of "a churchyard in spring," but its effect is impossible to descrive in words. The rest is also superb, but it's worth hearing for the chorus alone.

*15. BWV 125 Mit Fried und Freud ich Fahr Dahin:* Everyone knows BWV 82 _Ich Habe Genug,_ and if you love it you ought to hear 125, another cantata for the same day - the Feast of Purification. The opening chorus sounds eerily similar to that of the _St. Matthew Passion_ but it is an entirely original work nonetheless. There are then two immeasurably profound arias - a portrayal of enfeebled old age and the commitment of one's spirit into the hands of the Lord, and an irresistably joyous representation of the "music of the spheres" that so dominated Baroque philosophical thought.

*14. BWV 60 O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort* One of two cantatas with the same chorale (don't listen to the other one, BWV 20, unless you're in the mood for some _depressing_ stuff about hellfire and damnation), the psychological realism of this work is almost too disturbing to bear. Bach was not only concerned with rosy-eyed faith - he was deeply occupied with doubt and fear, and that's exactly what we get here in this dramatic dialogue between the tenor, representing "Hope," and the alto, "Fear." The most remarkable thing is that there is not really a satisfying resolution; we leave the cantata with the same uncertainty in which we began. The closing chorale is one of Bach's most famous, for just reason - it is far, far, ahead of its time and was used in Alban Berg's sublime violin concerto.

*13. BWV 38 Aus Tiefer not Schrei ich zu Dir:* The chorus is an overpowering, granitic masterpiece of a fugue on a hymn tune by Luther and it sets the table for this concentrated and fiercely-focused masterpiece that pits the tenets of Lutheranism against the flaws and vulnerabilities of the individual. The highlight for many is the vocal trio, of which Bach only wrote three in all the cantatas and which, to me, sets the table for the greatest operatic ensemble pieces in the decades to come.

*12. BWV 4 Christ Lag in Todes Banden:* The fact that is one of Bach's earliest extant compositions, one of his two or three earliest cantatas composed when he was only 21, is almost incomprehensible. This set of variations on Luther's Easter chorale is serious and angular but shows Bach's mastery of the old German style in which he had been steeped from childhood. It is an excellent case study in how Bach could take a familiar theme and expand it into infinite possibilities, which would later find its ultimate realization in the D Minor Chaconne and the Goldberg Variations.

*11. BWV 12 Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen:* Another early masterwork, this is one of the master's most emotionally involving works, portraying the sorrows and tribulations of earthly life in astonishingly vivid fashion. The chorus is most famous for its later use as the _Crucifixus_ of the B Minor Mass, but the movements that follow all illuminate a different perspective on the ardors of human suffering and add up to a thoroughly convincing transformation which ends in the brightest and most optimistic of chorales.

Continued in next post...


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