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Cantata No. 202, “Wedding Cantata” In addition to the nearly 200 extant church cantatas Johann Sebastian Bach composed during his lifetime, he also composed numerous cantatas for secular occasions. Some of them, such as the Coffee Cantata, were for pure fun, while others honored his various aristocratic employers or provided entertainment for court events. As is the case with many of Bach’s works, we know little or nothing of the origin of the Wedding Cantata. No original manuscript of the work has survived. For a long time scholars posited that Bach composed the cantata during his tenure as Kapellmeister at the court of Cöthen (1717-1723). One even suggested that the Cantata was for Bach’s own wedding in 1721 to his second wife, Anna Magdalena, herself an accomplished soprano. But since the text refers to the dawning of both spring and love, and the Bachs wed in December, the theory loses credibility. More recent opinions favor an even earlier date, during Bach’s tenure in Weimar (1708-1717). In all of the posts Bach held, he was quite literally worked to a frazzle, expected to churn out new music on a weekly basis and frequently more often. With a houseful of kids, musical ensembles to conduct, Latin classes to teach and civic responsibilities, he was by force a resourceful recycler of his own music. That being said, he was usually scrupulous about matching music to texts, however trite or cloying. Bach and his contemporaries subscribed to Affektenlehre (doctrine of the affections), which maintained that certain musical phrases, harmonies and rhythms were intrinsically associated with specific emotions. Everyone knew the system – one that persists today in film scores – and Cantata 202 provides numerous examples. Scored for solo soprano, oboe, strings, and basso continuo, the Cantata consists of nine numbers: five arias – four of them da capo – separated by four short recitatives. As with most Baroque arias, the singer enters only after the obbligato instrument(s) play a ritornello – in effect, the main theme. The Cantata opens with an aria, “Weichet nur betrübte Shatten” (Yield , ye brooding shadows), the text of which seems at first out of sync with the somber music. Bach’s intention, however, seems to be to musically portray the brooding shadows of winter in the first part of this da capo aria – note the poignant harmony on the word “betrübte” – contrasting it with “Florens Lust” (Flora’s mirth) in the middle section.  & Bach continues to focus on the overall gist of the text in the second aria, “Phoebus eilt mit schnellen Pferden,” (Phoebus flies with speedy horses). The ritornello is more a galloping rhythm than a melody and pervades the entire piece. The long, serpentine melismas in the vocal line are a standard device for portraying speed. The text of the third aria, “Wenn die Frühlingslüfte streichen,” (When the vernal breezes ramble) gives little opportunity for tone painting. Bach shifts the mode to minor and shifts from oboe to violin obbligato, perhaps simply to provide variety. In the following recitative, however, he seems unable to resist lingering on the word “Segen” (Blessing) with a serpentine melisma illustrating the blessing sparkling like a gem. The fourth aria “Sich üben im Lieben,” (To practice sweet courtship) is the most famous and is frequently excerpted for vocal recitals. The lively 6/8 meter is the key here to the relationship between the music and a text that describes frolicking. And the final aria bears the heading “Gavotte,” although we have no idea whether this was Bach’s, his publisher’s or someone else’s down the centuries. It is the shortest of the five arias and in the form of a dance with a characteristic repeat structure – the soprano repeats the ritornello, and the da capo is also a repeat for oboe and continuo. The anticlimactic nature of the conclusion of this Cantata is somewhat puzzling, suggesting that perhaps the final recitative and aria were a later accretion. | ||||||||||
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Symphony No. 1 in D Major In the late 1880s Gustav Mahler was building his reputation as a symphonic and operatic conductor. As he moved from one conducting post to another, usually as the assistant conductor in opera houses, he had only limited time for composing. It took him from 1883 to 1888 to finish the First Symphony and another eleven years to have it ready for publication. In the interval, the symphony underwent major changes. At its premiere in Budapest in 1889, Mahler called it a ”Symphonic Poem in two parts” and added an elaborate literary program which he later repudiated. In its first version, the symphony had five movements, but Mahler immediately discarded the original second movement. He also expanded the size of the orchestra and revised the orchestration drastically. The discarded second movement, an andante titled “Blumine,” resurfaced only in 1967 and is occasionally performed with the symphony. At the time he started the symphony, Mahler was also composing a cycle of four songs with orchestra, entitled Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer). The themes from two of these songs found their way into the symphony: The second song, "Ging heut Morgen übers Feld", became the main theme of the first movement, while the fourth song, "Die zwei blauen Augen," became a variation on the main theme of the third movement. In light of Mahler’s later symphonies, the First is relatively tame and conservative. Nevertheless, it was received with hostility and ridicule at the first performance, bewildering the audience and annoying the critics. Its originality lies in the innovative orchestration and harmonies and in the intensity of the emotions it conveys. “Of all romantics, this arch-romantic has most to give to the music of the future,” wrote Copland in 1941, before the resurgence of Mahler’s popularity. The first movement begins with an eerie introduction, the first two notes of which later become a birdcall, as well as the first two notes of the main theme. It is punctuated by a distant fanfare and a wailing oboe cry. The allegro section begins with the second Wayfarer Lied in the cellos, the heart and soul of the symphony that serves not only as the main theme of this movement, but also as the basis of the themes of the second and final movements. & The birdcall from the introduction and another call also play an important accompanying role throughout this movement. The music of the introduction recurs in the middle of the movement. Mahler's genius was his ability to keep all his thematic balls in the air at the same time, as in the coda. The second movement, the scherzo, has the rhythm of the Ländler, an Austrian folk dance. Although it conforms to the classic minuet and trio structure, Mahler spins out the first section far beyond the standard repeat structure. The Trio recalls the birdcall theme from the first movement. The third movement, a funeral march, starts with a macabre timpani beat and uses a lonely double bass to introduce the main theme: none other than the nursery rhyme “Frère Jacques.” It is a spooky parody, said to have been inspired by the popular picture by the French painter Jacques Callot of a dead hunter accompanied to his grave by the forest animals; and Mahler continues the theme with the traditional canon. But, as evidenced in the example above, Mahler had already used this motive in the opening of the fourth Wayfarer song, "Die zwei blauen Augen." He then transforms the theme into a dance with more than a hint of Jewish folk music, an aspect of Mahler’s heritage about which he manifested considerable ambivalence. The middle section in this movement, both hypnotic and calming, comes directly from part of the fourth Wayfarer song. In the following example, the Jewish klezmer band appears combined with the sweeping strings reminiscent of a Viennese waltz; symbolic of the two conflicting sides of Mahler's identity and sense of self? Perhaps. The Scherzo leads directly to the stormy finale, which in the original program notes was titled Dall’ Inferno al Paradiso – from hell to heaven. It opens with one of the most threatening passages in classical music. The theme is then taken up in the main body of the allegro. In the Finale, Mahler ties together the previous themes, even those of the discarded "Blumine" movement as a gentle, even comforting, second theme. The development section introduces a transformation of the theme that opens a glimpse of pathway to "Heaven" and as if coming from off-stage. There are also reprises of material from the first movement, here combining it with the funeral march motive from the Scherzo. The road, however, is not an easy one, with moments of intense gentleness interrupted by more than one backward glance. The final resolution comes in a coda of heroic proportions, including a triumphant, full-voiced reprise of the distant fanfare from the opening of the Symphony. | ||||||||||
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| Copyright © Elizabeth and Joseph Kahn 2009 | ||||||||||
