Sumer is icumen in...

Welcome Summer! Today is the Summer Solstice, aka Midsummer Day, aka Litha, the day when the sun reaches the Tropic of Cancer, the farthest point north in its path along the earth's axial tilt. This is the Longest Day, with 15 hours of daylight; after this the days get gradually shorter on the way to the Winter Solstice in December, the Longest Night. The crops are planted and growing, the landscape is green and rich, and it gets hot by the middle of the day. The Spring flowers have faded away and now the first of the Summer flowers are starting to bloom - Day Lilies, St. John's Wort, and Deptford Pinks, to name a few here in Central PA. The first haying should be done by now. Unfortunately we've had an unusually wet Spring, and our only dry days were three or four starting a week ago. My friend Wade was rushing last week to get at least 30 acres cut and baled, but the wet weather came back sooner than expected. Still, he got a good-sized section done!

It rained yesterday and overnight until around 9:00 this morning, so my Summer Solstice walk in the Dykeman Spring Nature Park was a tad soggy, but raindrops on flower petals and leaves add a certain extra dimension to the flower pictures I took on that walk. Come along with me and welcome Summer in!

Day Lilies along the Dykeman Walking Trail

Due to all the rain we've been getting the trail is looking very lush and green

St. John's Wort on the banks of the north duck pond

Looking across the pond from my usual Sunday "pew"

Daisy Fleabane in the still uncut section of the upland meadow

Deptford Pinks in the same section of the meadow

The song "Sumer is icumen in" is a 13th Century round in Middle English that was often sung at Midsummer and is still much beloved of Early Music and Madrigal ensembles. Here's the Hilliard Ensemble welcoming Summer. Sing Cuckoo!

© 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Sunday Bach - Trinity 3

Bach wrote two cantatas for the third Sunday after Trinity, and today's choice is the masterpiece - BWV 21, Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis (I had much sorrow, Weimar 1714). There's such a variety of style here, as well as some firsts for Bach himself; this is early on in his career and he's feeling out what he'll be allowed to do. This is his only Weimar cantata that is divided in two parts, with the sermon being preached between the two. I think this may be the first time he used an instrumental sinfonia as a prelude, and it was definitely the first time he used the fugue form for the opening chorus; in fact, he was much criticized for doing so. Here's Michael Beattie of Emmanuel Music on this great cantata:

Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis, BWV 21 - in two parts - is the longest and grandest of all the cantatas. It has a complicated history. The first nine movements may have constituted a cantata per ogni tempo [for any occasion] written in Weimar as early as 1713. There were many subsequent revisions, culminating in today’s 1723 version (minus the trombones!) which includes two additional movements. 

Given the wide range of styles found in this cantata, it is a piece of remarkable dramatic cohesion. It moves progressively from darkness into light. The mysterious opening sinfonia is a dialogue between oboe and solo violin (accompanied by a halo of strings) which seems to lead directly into the first chorus.

Almost all of the choruses of BWV 21 are based on psalm texts. In Part I, the choral writing is very text specific. Like the great motet composers of the previous generation, Bach finds a striking new character for each line of text. In some cases even a single word is given its own special color (the freeze-frame moment on the word aber [but] in the first chorus is one example). Bach was mocked by his contemporaries for the stuttering repetition of the first word (Ich, ich, ich…); today it seems a moment of breathtaking drama.

The soprano aria “Seufzer, Tränen”, in spite of its overwrought text, is a marvel of stark simplicity, especially given the density of everything that surrounds it. The anguish of the text is mirrored in the tortured intervals found in the voice and oboe part. The tenor recitative and aria are on a different scale entirely. Bach’s response to this highly dramatic text is appropriately extravagant, with especially picturesque orchestra writing.

Part II opens with a dialogue between the bass and soprano (Jesus and the Soul). Craig Smith wrote: “These dialogues are often associated with the erotic love poetry of the Song of Songs. A popular example of this genre [can be found] in the love duets in the cantata Wachet auf! Today’s cantata was one of the few Bach pieces in Baron von Swieten’s library in Vienna. Clearly Mozart saw the piece there, for the duet is inspiration both for “La ci darem”from Don Giovanni and the third act Susanna-Count duet from Le Nozze di Figaro.” 

The monumental choral prelude “Sei nun wieder zufrieden” moves in yet another stylistic direction. The interpolated chorale text appears first in the tenor section surrounded by complex counterpoint in the solo voices. Later it is taken over by the sopranos upon the entrance of full chorus and strings.

The intimate tenor aria that follows is scored only for continuo - its lightness and optimism providing a perfect bridge to the final brilliant chorus. The text of the closing chorus is the same as that which concludes Handel’s Messiah (‘Worthy is the Lamb’). The entrance of the trumpets and timpani is a thrilling moment. After a brief introduction, the piece concludes with one of the most viscerally exciting fugues that Bach ever wrote. It cranks along at an almost hyperventilating pace before exploding ecstatically heavenward.

© Michael Beattie

Today's performance is by La Chapelle Royale and the Collegium Vocale Gent under the direction of Phillipe Herreweghe. Enjoy!

Photo © 2012 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Stovetop Portraits in Black & White

I shot the water kettle last night on a whim, and then this morning I decided to add other shiny objects to the collection. Just me playing in b&w. Shot in b&w and processed in Photoshop, and further processed in Exposure 2 with the Kodak Tri-X 400 film emulator.

The Whistler

I love coffee, I love tea

Stir it up

© 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger  

Summer Approaches

Summer is a week away, and both Mama Gaia and the weather are showing it. After a lot of rain in the past month or so we're finally getting a stretch of at least five warm, dry days. The Spring flowers are dying off and the Summer ones are starting to bloom. And the tall grass up on the meadow in the Dykeman Spring Nature Park is very tall indeed, and browning up. My friend Wade finally has a chance to get at it on his old Case tractor, and he was up there today mowing away. He told me he was going to try to get 30 acres cut and baled in that five-day stretch. And if the usual storms don't appear after that, he may try for the whole shebang. Fingers crossed!

Crown Vetch along the Dykeman Walking Trail

Canada Thistle in the Dykeman Spring wetland

Mama Mallard takes the kids out for a spin on the north duck pond

A view across the meadow

Another view across the meadow

Let the first haying begin!

© 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Sunday Bach - Trinity 2

Today is the second Sunday after Trinity, and Bach wrote two cantatas for this Sunday. I posted his first one last year, so this year I'm posting his other one, BWV 2, Ach Gott, vom Himmel sieh darein (Ah God, look down from Heaven, Leipzig 1724). This is a chorale cantata, based on Martin Luther's chorale setting of Psalm 12. When dealing directly with Luther's words Bach almost always went old school rather than innovating, quoting Luther directly and using a deliberately archaic musical style, a la Pachelbel. Here's the late Craig Smith of Emmanuel Music on this compelling cantata:

Martin Luther's chorale version of Psalm 12 is the sole source for Cantata BWV 2. While the unnamed author of the text has arranged the various verses into chorus, recitative, and aria format, the sense and character of the Luther chorale remains unusually pure. It is characteristic of Bach when dealing with Luther that the ideas remain more or less unadulterated.

Bach treats the opening verse of the chorale in an archaic neo-Renaissance manner. A strict four-voice texture with independent continuo line is observed throughout. Of the five chorale-based choruses in this style, four are to Luther texts. It is clear that Bach associates this manner with bedrock Lutheran theology. By having the chorale in the alto voice rather than the usual soprano, Bach submerges the sinner in the texture, looked down upon from heaven by the sopranos. The harmony is of the densest sort. Phrygian melodies are among the most difficult to convert to tonality, but here Bach jumps into crabbed and ambiguous harmony from the outset. It must be a manner that he associates with this tune, for the organ setting in the Kirnberger collection is similar in density and unique in that collection for its harmonic daring.

It is interesting that the phrase structure remains quite clear and one could almost say simple. When we think of the elaborate phrase overlaps in the treatment of the previous week's chorale tune, O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort, these phrases seem very direct. One senses that the very complexity of harmony is enough for Bach here. Also there is an extraordinary economy of motive. The subject, derived from the tune and two counter-subjects, contains virtually all of the material in the movement. The doubling by the trombones emphasizes the archaic nature of the music.

A line of the chorale sung by the solo tenor with continuo sets off the following recitative. While this seems at first to be in Bach's familiar manner of chorale with tropes, no further musical reference to the tune occurs, so we must assume that Bach feels the need to make a transition to the more modern recitative style. The elegant alto aria with solo violin is in striking contrast to the severity of what has come before. Clearly the chattering violin part is meant to represent the Rottengeistern and the Ketzerei. There is a marvelous moment when the suave continuity comes to a stuttering halt at the words Trotz dem. A fragment of the chorale tune enters like a beacon bringing us back to the seriousness of the subject.

After the harshness of the harmony in the opening chorus and the elegance of the alto aria, Bach finds yet another color for the bass recitative. Here is a marvelous example of the variety to Bach's chromaticism, harsh dissonance and vertiginous progressions in the first chorus, melting and soft edged progressions for this recitative. The first two bars of recitative show how carefully Bach gauges his harmonic color. Notice the darkness at the word verstört; the stab of pain at the word Ach. This is not only a change from the brittle Bb major of the alto aria, but a transition to the radiance of the “alchemy” aria #5.
In a work such as this cantata one can be so amazed by the harmonic detail and astonished by the contrapuntal deftness, that the sheer melodic invention can be forgotten. Certainly a tune such as in the aria Durchs Feuer wird das Silber rein reminds one that the lessons learned by Bach in his transcription of Italian concerti were as important as his German contrapuntal heritage. The principal melody is worth looking at in some detail: notice how the eighth and two sixteenth note figure is turned upside down in bars 2-3. The beginning sequence of bars 2-3 is itself turned upside down in the 4th bar. This is yet another example of subtle changes in what could be a garden-variety sequence to create a varied and highly profiled melody. It is one of those tunes that once heard is never forgotten. Clearly, Bach found the metaphor of the refining of the silver as central to the message of the cantata.

The final chorale, while still very chromatic, has somehow lost the harsh language of the opening chorus. Bach never leaves the listener unchanged by his musical experience.

© Craig Smith

Today's performance is by the Collegium Vocale Ghent under the direction of Philippe Herreweghe. Enjoy!

Photo © 2014 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Sight and Sound - Main Street USA

Main Street USA in the Window

A shot of the gazebo across the street taken through my partially open front window and given the watercolor treatment in Photoshop™. King St. is Shippensburg's "Main St.", and all of the town's holiday parades go right by the gazebo, so it's kept patriotically decorated all Summer long. When I saw this through the window it immediately reminded me of some shots taken by Henri Cartier-Bresson (one of my photographic heroes) on Cape Cod in the '50s. I gave it the watercolor treatment to give it the feel of a Wyeth painting. Americana at its most basic! And the following song was running in my head as I was processing the shot.

Photo © 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

O What a Beautiful Day!

After much chaotic, nonsensical weather - unusually hot temperatures, tropical humidity, and all too much rain - the perfect Spring day arrived today: 50s in the morning and 70s in the afternoon, blue sky and puffy clouds, and a fragrant breeze. Just a perfect late Spring day! And having the day off, I headed out into it, taking a walk in the Dykeman Spring Nature Park. Mama Gaia provided much photogenic material.

The Yarrow bushes are blooming along the Dykeman Walking Trail

A Spring Azure butterfly and its shadow along the trail

The red bridge over the creek appears out of the lush foliage

Reflections in the north duck pond

Daisy Fleabane in the upland meadow

A panoramic view from the meadow

© 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Sunday Bach - Trinity 1

Now the Lutheran liturgical calendar enters Ordinary Time, when the parables of Jesus are used to teach the Christian catechism to the congregation. For this first Sunday after Trinity in Bach's time the Gospel reading for this day is the story of the rich man and the beggar from Luke 16. Bach wrote three cantatas for this Sunday, and the one I've chosen today deals with the idea of sharing food with the poor - BWV 39, Brich dem Hungrigen dein Brot (Break thy bread for the hungry, Leipzig 1726). This isn't one of Bach's grand cantatas, but rather one of his quieter ones, a bit of serenity after the drama of the Easter and Pentecost seasons. Here are the program notes from Emmanuel Music on this cantata:

Today’s cantata, Brich dem Hungrigen dein Brot, exhorts the theme of loving one’s neighbor, allied with the parable of the rich man who, should he share that which he has with the less fortunate, will ensure his own grace in the eyes of the Lord. The plea for generosity in feeding the hungry is emphasized in the text of the opening chorus from today’s Hebrew Bible reading Isaiah 58: 7-8. Like many of the cantatas from Bach's third Leipzig cycle, the huge opening chorus dominates the work. The short notes from the recorders, oboes and strings can either be read to represent the breaking of the bread or, more compellingly, the teardrops of the hungry. In any case the orchestra is a stunning backdrop for what is at the beginning a deeply felt and emotional fugue and later on an energetic call to arms.

The bass recitative takes the form of a sermon. The lovely alto aria with violin and oboe obbligati is an inward and stunningly pure vision of the touching words. The text speaks of imitation or reflection of the Creator’s goodness, concluding with the metaphor of sowing on earth those seeds that we will harvest after death.  These two clear images are captured in the music: that of imitation (the oboe follows the violin throughout) and the scattering of fertile seeds (the melisma on the word ‘streuet’).

The stern, preachy bass aria is a splash of cold water - Bach at his most severe and Lutheran. The sweet soprano aria with recorder breaks that mood with a touching child-like sweetness. The personal element continues in the penultimate movement, a recitative for alto accompanied by lush string chords. Almost working against the positive nature of the text, this recitative is set mostly in minor, perhaps reminding us of the challenge of faith. The final chorale setting, one of Bach’s simplest and most direct, provides a phrase structure that is symmetrical and predictable until the last two phrases. Each of these is two-and-a-half bars long, having the effect of extending outwards beyond ourselves.

© Ryan Turner and Craig Smith

Today's performance is from a recording by the Collegium Vocale Ghent under the direction of Philippe Herreweghe. Enjoy!

Photo © 2010 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

A Damp Morning Walk

I went for my weekly morning walk in the Dykeman Spring Nature Park yesterday, but as I put a lot of time-consuming work into my annual Memorial Day post I didn't have the time to post the results of that walk until today. We had had rain the day before, and the conditions were still overcast and slightly misty yesterday morning, so things were a bit damp. The most noticeable change since my last walk is that the Multiflora Roses have bloomed. I know, I know, they're an invasive species and tend to squeeze out native plants, but the smell is heavenly! I always associate the smell of Multiflora Roses with late Spring/early Summer, and it brings back great memories. In any case, here is some of what I saw yesterday.

Part of a bank of Multiflora Roses

Looks like there's going to be a bumper crop of Blackberries this year

The dampness creates a perfect environment for growing mushrooms

I found this tiny snail on a Dandelion leaf in the wetland

Nightshade blossoms by the north duck pond

A female Zabulon Skipper butterfly fluttered down and came to rest in front of me just as I was leaving the park

© 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Memorial Day 2018

Today in the US we memorialize those who have been claimed by war. It's usually celebrated as a great patriotic event, with martial songs and chest-thumping nationalism, all about the glory of dying for your country. What egregious nonsense! As any battle-scarred veteran can tell you, war isn't glorious; it's a gory, bloody, loud hell of a meat-grinder, and the meat being ground is the young of the nation, fed into it by old men who hold grudges or who see a profit to be made, win or lose. I've always said that if the fat old men who declared wars actually had to fight in them, we'd have world peace overnight.

Here are some potent quotes about the reality of war:

"And I can't help but wonder, now Willie McBride,
Do all those who lie here know why they died?
Did you really believe them when they told you 'The Cause'?
Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
Well the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame,
The killing, the dying, it was all done in vain.
For Willie McBride, it all happened again,
And again, and again, and again, and again."
– Eric Bogle, "No Man's Land" 

"Either war is finished, or we are."
– Herman Wouk, War and Remembrance 

"War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other's children."
– Jimmy Carter, Nobel Lecture, December 10, 2002 

"I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its stupidity."
– Dwight D. Eisenhower, speech, January 10, 1946 

"If civilization has an opposite, it is war. Of these two things, you have either one, or the other. Not both."
– Ursula K. LeGuin, The Left Hand of Darkness

Probably the greatest antiwar poem ever written is "Dulce et Decorum Est" by Wilfred Owen, an Oxford scholar and poet who enlisted at the beginning of WWI, and who was killed just one week before the armistice which ended it. During the war he wrote his poems in the letters he sent home, and as the conflict continued he used these poems to vent his anger and cynicism at the futility, the barbarity, and the stupidity of it all. "Dulce et Decorum Est" could just as well have been titled "The Lie", the lie in question being the quote from the Roman poet Horace that is fed to soldiers in time of war: "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori"; the English translation is "It is sweet and proper to die for one's country". Obviously Owen disagreed, and I'm with him.

Dulce et Decorum Est - Wilfred Owen 

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And toward our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind. 

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime...
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning. 

In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning. 

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obsceneas cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, –
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum estPro patria mori.

Today we lament the deaths of young people killed by adherence to an anachronism, and pledge to end the scourge that killed them. Here are two songs that lament the deaths of soldiers - Eric Bogle's "No Man's Land" and Mark Knopfler's "Brothers In Arms".

Memorial Day 2018 - "Let there be peace on Earth, and let it begin with me!"

Photo © 2009 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Sunday Bach - Trinity Sunday

Dame's Rocket, Dykeman Spring Nature Park 

Trinity Sunday starts off the long stretch of the holiday-less Ordinary Time with a celebration of the Holy Spirit as the soul of the Church. Bach wrote several cantatas for this Sunday, and this one is his earliest - BWV 165, O heilges Geist- und Wasserbad (O bath of Holy Spirit and of water, Weimar 1715). This is a fairly simple cantata, with the text by Bach's favorite poet of the time, Salomo Franck. Here's the late Craig Smith's commentary:

Most of the cantatas Bach wrote during his tenure in Weimar are to texts of Salomo Franck, the head of the mint at the Weimar court. Franck is the best of all the poets that Bach set, and our cantata today BWV 165 is one of his greatest works. The subject is the purification of the human spirit by baptism, and Franck constructs a moving and poetic set of images to discuss this difficult topic. 

The opening soprano aria uses the image of bath water as the purifier of the soul and as the inscriber in the book of life. Bach’s music is both watery and visionary. The fugue for strings and soprano voice resembles some of the ethereal slow fugues found in the Well-Tempered Clavier. The religious ecstasy achieved at the words “and grants us the new life” is breathtaking even for Bach. 

The first bass recitative vividly characterizes both the guilt of the sinner and the radiance of being clothed in the “white silk of Christ’s innocence.” The alto aria is disciplined in its utterance. The slow motor of the continuo acts like a prayer wheel, a sure and steady path to salvation. The ecstasy returns in the marvelous accompanied recitative again for bass. It should be noted that there are two separate snake references. The first is the more common image of Satan. The second, the “blood-red serpent image” refers to a common medieval portrayal of Christ in Limbo as a snake on the cross. This was already an archaic metaphor in Bach’s day but the church at Weimar had a well-known icon with this image. The reference was thus clear to parishioners there. The obbligato for all the violins in the tenor aria snakes along and clearly has the both Satanic and the Christ-like function. A harmonization of “Nun lasst uns Gott, dem Herren” completes the cantata. 

© Craig Smith

Today's performance is from a recording by the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra and Choir under the direction of Ton Koopman. Enjoy!

Photo © 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Festival Bach - Pentecost III

Today is the final day of Pentecost, and the long stretch of the everyday Ordinary Time begins. Bach navigates the segue from one to the other with a lovely little solo cantata, BWV 175, Er rufet seinen Schafen mit Namen (He calls his sheep by name, Leipzig 1725). Here's the late Craig Smith of Emmanuel Music with the commentary:

Bach Cantata BWV 175 is something of a curiosity. Most of the music probably comes from secular sources, but only the tenor aria is known in another version. The work begins with a gorgeous tenor recitative with three obbligato recorders. That same instrumental texture continues in the pastoral alto aria. Another tenor recitative follows, this time secco. The tenor aria has a delightful bouncy cello obbligato that underpins the anticipation of the coming of Jesus in the text. The following recitative is curiously the only movement that calls for violins and violas. The bass aria with brilliant obbligati for two trumpets changes the character of the cantata from pastoral to martial. The harmonization of "Komm, heiliger Geist" is one of the greatest chorale harmonizations in all of the cantatas, and the doubling of the voice parts up an octave by the recorder gives it a particularly lustrous sheen.

© Craig Smith

Today's performance id by the English Baroque Soloists and the Monteverdi Choir under the direction of John Eliot Gardiner. Enjoy!

Photo © 2008 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Festival Bach - Pentecost II

Whit Monday, the second day of the three-day Pentecost festival, traditionally begins the liturgical period known as Ordinary Time, the long stretch until Advent where there are no major church festivals. Sundays in Ordinary Time are given over to the parables and teachings of Jesus, a sort of yearly reiteration of catechism. But the glory of Pentecost isn't over quite yet, and this cantata is the best proof of that: BWV 174, Ich liebe den Höchsten von ganzem Gemüte (I love the Almighty with all my heart, Leipzig 1729). And the most glorious part is that Bach begins the work with a sinfonia that is an expansion of the first movement of his Brandenburg Concerto #3. Here's Bach Cantatas Website commenter Peter Bloemendaal on this work:

This cantata has the most magnificent, extraordinary opening movement one could dream of. Christoph Wolff observed that, since the Leipzig audiences had been deprived of their own opera house, they had to resort to the Royal Opera at Dresden to satisfy their cultural needs. Bach also went there regularly with his eldest son and must have said more than once, “Friedemann, shan’t we go again to hear the lovely Dresden ditties?” Although spoken in jest, Bach had every right to say so. His secular show pieces in honour of the electoral-royal family, 9 drammi per musica, five secular cantatas and one serenade between 1727 and 1742, were by no means inferior to real opera. His compositions show at every step full mastery of the dramatic genre and the proper pacing of the dialogues. Each separate movement was infinitely more elaborate than those ordinarily found in opera scores, yet no less moving, meaningful or effective. Bach’s genius of musical imagery and technical sophistication, together with his being the leading performing artist as well, warranted great performances, which were more than just substitutes for the no longer extant Leipzig opera. By converting them into sacred cantatas, Bach made these works accessible to a larger audience. 

Already from the beginning of his Leipzig period, Bach, as Director of the Collegium Musicum, could draw from a large pool of musicians, which had a beneficial and stabilizing effect on the performing ensemble he needed for St. Thomas’s and St. Nicholas’s and to some extent helped offset the city council’s unwillingness to provide more and better-paid personnel. One of the first manifestations of Bach’s newly-won “command” over the city’s best musicians occurred on the second day of Pentecost in 1729, shortly after he had become Collegium Director. At this performance, he opened the cantata BWV 174 with a festive sinfonia (Mvt. 1) that was a lavishly expanded version of the first movement of the third Brandenburg Concerto, with a large ensemble of 2 horns, 3 oboes, 3 solo violins, 3 solo violas, 3 solo cellos, ripieno strings, and continuo including bassoon and violone, the likes of which had not been heard before. “In der Beschränkung zeigt sich der Meister”, but here Bach proved himself a master of masters. 

The first aria, for alto (Mvt. 2), has a lovely accompaniment by two oboes, who are at times developing their own themes, sometimes underlining or playing on top of the human voice, sometimes imitating or weaving around it, then alternating it in a lively duet. In contents, the aria is based on the gospel reading, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life.” 

After this long aria, there follows an interesting recitative for tenor (Mvt. 3), supported by the entire string section besides the BC, again stressing the fact that God, by sending his son as a ransom for our trespasses, has given us access to heaven, so that the destructive powers of hell are trembling for God’s love. 

In the second aria, a wonderful piece for bass solo (Mvt. 4), the violins and violas are combined to form an unisono obbligato voice. The message is that we just have to seize the salvation Jesus offers us. In return we should remain faithful and loyal to him until the end of our earthly days. 

The final chorale (Mvt. 5) is a testimony of our love for Jesus, a confession of faith and a plea for support in order to remain faithful for ever! One recognizes the melody of the concluding chorale of SJP (BWV 245) “Ach Herr, laß dein lieb Engelein”. 

How wonderful the message, how splendid the music!

Today's performance is another from the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra and Choir under the direction of Ton Koopman. I may be committing blasphemy, but I'm finding Koopman's approach to Bach more to my liking than Gardiner's, and Gardiner is considered the standard by whom every other conductor of Bach's work is judged. For me, that "standard" may need to be reexamined. Enjoy!

Photo © 2008 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

May Flowers... and a Flicker

Spring is in full bloom. The trees are fully leafed, most of the Summer birds are back, and the traditional May flowers are brightening the scenery. My Sunday walk in the Dykeman Spring Nature Park was truly a morning well spent!

Dame's Rocket along the Dykeman Walking Trail

Yellow Flag in the Gum Run wetland

Daisy Fleabane, with a small visitor, in the Dykeman Spring wetland

A Northern Flicker rested briefly atop the martin house in the wetland

Swamp Buttercup in the Dykeman Spring wetland

© 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Festival Bach - Pentecost I

In Bach's time, and indeed through much of the history of the Church, Pentecost was the major festival of the church year, even more so than Christmas and Easter. Why? Because Pentecost marks the birthday of the Church itself, when the disciples, energized and emboldened by the descent of the Holy Spirit, emerged from hiding in the upper room and went out into the world to spread the Good News. These days, and especially here in the United States, it's less so, mostly due to the influence of evangelicalism, which has that uniquely American distrust of any and all institutions and sees Christianity not as the Church Universal but more as a way to advance the "salvation" of the individual; for them Pentecost is a nod to the emergence of the Holy Spirit as another of those personal benefits of being a Christian.

But in Bach's time Pentecost was a three-day celebration of the birth of the Church, and some of Bach's best writing was done for this celebration. Like last year I'll be posting cantatas for all three days. Today we'll be listening to BWV 74, Wer mich liebet, der wird mein Wort halten (He who loves me will keep my word, Leipzig 1725). This is a particularly magnificent cantata because it's a showcase for the varied styles of Bach's writing, especially that very Italianate aria for alto in the midst of the work. Here's the late Craig Smith of Emmanuel Music on this cantata:

The texts of Marianne von Ziegler always are supported by biblical passages. In the Pentecost cantata BWV 74, there are three movements based upon the Gospel reading in John. In addition, three of the movements are arrangements of a smaller Pentecost cantata, BWV 59. Of all the von Ziegler texts this is perhaps the most successful, mainly because such a large percentage is either from the Bible or chorale texts. The two readings for Pentecost are unique in that the actual narrative is not from the Gospel but from from Acts. The speculative commentary is in the Gospel reading from John. This very metaphysical Gospel reading is the source of all three movements based upon biblical passages. 

The first chorus is an expansion of the soprano-bass duet that begins Cantata BWV 59. Of all of Bach’s arrangements of his own music, this is one of the most remarkable successful. There is something sketchy, even patchy, about the original duet. Its two trumpet parts sound rather puny and the duet writing is unvaried and a little hollow sounding. In examining the two movements, one perceives the choral version to be longer and much more detailed. In fact, the two are exactly the same length and there is no change in any details of the phrasing. Rather, by adding two oboes and oboe da caccia, a third trumpet, and expanding the duet voices to four-voice chorus, Bach opens up the texture and makes something richly varied and exquisitely delicate out of something perfunctory. The expansion of the voice parts is even more ingenious: what were the third and fourth imitative voices in the first violin and first trumpet of BWV 59 become the tenor and alto parts in BWV 74. The orchestra is limited to accompaniment until the first violin and first oboe imitative entrances of the countersubject. What was confusing and a bit jumbled in the earlier version becomes here very clear. Perhaps because of its thinner first version, there is wonderful transparency and delicacy to the chorus. No trumpet and drum chorus in all of Bach has as much quiet music as this one. 

Bach made quite extensive adjustments to von Ziegler texts. His adaptation of her first aria text is a skillful adaptation of a text to fit already extant music. The BWV 59 version has an octave difference between the violin and bass solos. That displacement is eliminated in the more poetic combination of soprano and oboe da caccia. What is rather surprising is how the childlike openness of the soprano aria text seems more in line with the character of the music than the original bass aria text. 

After a brief secco alto recitative, the second biblical passage, a stern sentence in which Jesus quotes from himself becomes a bass aria with continuo. Throughout the cantata there is a richness and variety of orchestral scoring. This aria stands in relief, with its bleak, continuo only texture. Certainly there is Lutheran preacher quality to the setting. The text surely refers back to the wavering faith of the disciples during the passion time. Jesus admonishes the disciples, almost challenging them to take the leap of faith. The grinding and earthbound bass line certainly is in wild contrast to the extravagant and airborne string writing of the following tenor aria. Its capacious orchestra tuttis remind one of the sacred arrangements of secular Cöthen pieces that Bach had done the year before. It is possible that all of this cantata, not just the BWV 59 music, is recycled. For all of its brilliance and appropriateness stylistically, almost none of this cantata sounds like music that Bach had been writing in his second Jahrgang. The aria is certainly the most outwardly exuberant and animated things to appear in this cantata up to this point. Bach goes to great lengths to heighten the intensity and vitality of the writing throughout the movement. Notice how the empty spaces of the opening tenor entrance are filled in at the da capo. 

The influence of Mariane von Ziegler’s rhetorical, rather than poetic, bent is even felt in the third biblical passage to appear in this cantata. Here, rather than using either the gospel or the epistle for the day, a line from Romans is set as an accompanied recitative. There is, unusually in a recitative, even an emphatic text repetition. This recitative not only sets off the wild storm that is the alto aria, but reintroduces the wind choir that is to be so prominent in that aria. The Vivaldian brilliance of the solo violin part in the bravura alto aria is also uncharacteristic of Bach’s Leipzig string writing. Certainly this aria brings a kind of brilliance and energy unheard up to this point in the cantata. In the opening chorus we heard placid and lyrical exchanges between the string and wind choirs. Here they have a pounding intensity further augmented by the fiery solo violin figuration. The violin part clearly has a Tartini-like devilish quality, while it also illustrates the “rattling chains” of hell. Even the references to Jesus’ passion and death have huge hammer-stroke string chords in the Italian manner. Writers have been perplexed and seemingly a little embarrassed by the Italianate vigor and extroversion of this aria. Its fiery rhetoric does not line up with most people’s idea of Pentecost. 

The beautiful chorale melody “Kommt her zu mir, spricht Gottes Sohn” appears here in a grave and quiet setting. Certainly there is a conscious effort to bring the cantata to an inward and quiet close. There is no Pentecost piece quite like Cantata BWV 74. Its relative obscurity clearly generates from confusion about the extraordinary variety of its various movements. The dramatic continuity is difficult to follow, but we have here one of the great visionary metaphysical cantatas in all of Bach. 

© Craig Smith

Today's performance is from a 2001 recording by the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra and Choir under the direction of Ton Koopman. Enjoy!

Photo © 2008 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Sunday Bach - Sunday After Ascension (Exaudi)

Bach composed two cantatas for Exaudi, the Sunday after Ascension Day. Last year we listened to BWV 44, so this year we'll give a listen to BWV 183, Sie werden euch in den Bann tun (II) (They will put you under a ban, Leipzig 1725). The mood is somber, and the disciples are depressed and afraid now that the center of their world is gone. Here's Ryan Turner of Emmanuel Music on the subject:

The cantata "Sie werden euch in den Bann tun II," BWV 183, was written in May of 1725 during of flurry of creative output for Bach--in a three-week period, he wrote five cantatas. Although it is of modest length and without an opening chorus, this cantata calls for a large number of musicians, which is quite unusual in this context: four soloists, chorus, and an instrumental ensemble of strings and basso continuo enriched with two oboes d'amore, two oboes da caccia and a violoncello piccolo. Bach must have had at that time a variety of fine instrumental possibilities at his disposal in Leipzig, which enabled him to give voice to very distinct sound colors. 

In the gospel reading upon which the cantata is based, John announces the coming of the Spirit of truth, which will be sent to Christians as Comforter for the persecutions they are to endure. The author of the libretto, Christiane Mariane von Ziegler, uses as an epigraph Christ's words reported by St John, "They shall put you under banishment...", and goes on to express the Christian's acceptance of sacrifice and death, through his faith and trust in the Holy Spirit.

The cantata opens with this direct gospel quote by the bass soloist, as the voice of Jesus. Severely orchestrated for four oboes and continuo, including bassoon, the resulting sonority is rather dense, severe and tense. The da capo aria marked molto adagio for anguished tenor that follows, with violoncello piccolo (here played by cello), is an emotionally expressive declaration that "I do not fear the horrors of death". The B section of the aria briefly takes on a tone of consolation ("Jesus will shield me with his protective arm”) escorted by the constant rocking of the cello solo while the continuo marks out the regular pulsation of passing time.

However, hanging over this quiet confidence is tormented chromaticism and doubt of the believer. The short alto recitative that follows is a small masterpiece. Amidst a cushion of chords played by the strings, the oboes, in pairs, volley a short, obsessive figure of four notes -- the same figure sung by the alto on the text "lch bin bereit" (I am ready).

At last prepared by this spiritual realization, the flashy soprano aria is a florid prayer of confidence accompanied by two oboes da caccia in unison and strings. The final chorale borrows the fifth strophe of a hymn by Paul Gerhardt, the chorus singing, "You are a Spirit which teaches how to pray as one should", to the melody of "Helft mir Gotts Güte preisen" ("Help me to praise God's loving-kindness"). 

© Ryan Turner

Today's performance is from a 2000 recording by the English Baroque Soloists and the Monteverdi Choir under the direction of John Eliot Gardiner. Enjoy!

Photo © 2013 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Bach for Easter - Ascension Day

Today is Ascension Day, commemorating the day when Christ ascended into heaven. Bach wrote several cantatas for this celebration, and I've chosen the earliest, BWV 37, Wer da gläubet und getauft wird (He who believes and is baptised, Leipzig 1724). For a major church festival you would expect Bach to pull out all the stops, full of brass fanfares and grand choral glorias, but this is a surprisingly gentle, almost pastoral, approach to such a major liturgical event. Here's John Harbison of Emmanuel Music on this cantata:

One sentence, from Jesus’ last injunction to the disciples, after his resurrection, before he ascends to heaven, from Mark 16:16, forms the complete text for the opening chorus of this cantata. In his other two cantatas for Ascension Sunday Bach provides Tintoretto-like representations of an impossibly radical action - horns, trumpets and athletic strings are engaged. Here drama is avoided. “Whosoever believes and is baptized shall become blessed”. The concentration is upon belief and baptism.

A single libretto decision determines the character of his piece. The text does not attach Jesus’ next phrase, “and he that believeth not…” and thus the piece is not about the endangered soul (as are many of the cantatas) but about a route to transcendence. Sonority, the glow of A Major, the even flow of unremarkable elements in equilibrium is enough to set this cantata in motion. The oboes state the very elegant and plain principal tune, the violins add a more active motive which quotes the chorale “these are the holy ten commandments”, the basses play a descending scale pattern ending in a cadence, a generic pattern which is conveniently equivalent to the final phrase of the chorale used in the third movement of this cantata. From these ordinary ideas comes a limpid and unburdened music. 

The brief tenor aria celebrates the gift, from Jesus, of faith. Most exceptionally it continues both the key and the character of the chorus, a personal version of the collective statement. It too is warm and devotional, not trying to impress. Unfortunately the violin solo part was lost (from a piece which survived only in parts). There are at least a dozen such situations in the Bach cantatas. It is possible (with varying degrees of difficulty) to replace all of them in an inevitably approximate way which nevertheless preserves continuity and proportion.

At the center of the cantata comes the ‘morning star’ chorale, presented as a vocal duet over an unexpectedly florid cello accompaniment. In the muted frame of the piece as a whole, this is the most eventful, colorful moment. The two singers trade off as leader and follower in a delightful way, and the over-exuberant cello is far more than a commentator.

“Let Jesus deal with good works,” sings the bass in his recitative, “you must make yourself right with God through faith.” At this point in the cantata we wonder whether the baptism theme has been lost, in favor of making the full Lutheran statement about faith, but it reappears most striking at the end of a series of needlessly and brilliantly inventive passages for the singer. Each Noun has a slightly different figurative shape, jagged cursives for the Seal of Grace, upward thrust toward Heaven, at last a very long unwinding stream for Baptism. These lead into a Chorale where for the first time, with suitable restraint, the text and harmony sound a darker tone.

© John Harbison

Today's performance is by the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra and Choir under the direction of Ton Koopman. Enjoy!

Photo © 2014 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Spring!

It's finally starting to look like Spring here. The weather has been cooler than normal and all the blooming and sprouting was at least two weeks late, if not more. We finally warmed into more seasonable temperatures, and then last week we had a three-day heat wave with temps into the low 90s (around 33º C). It seems that May has brought it's traditional flowers despite the late start to the season. I went wandering this morning and I've brought you some sights of Spring.

This Dogwood tree is up the street and around the corner from my house

Lots of birds are back for the season, including this Gray Catbird in the Dykeman Spring wetland

The Lilacs are blooming and scenting the air

This magnificent ornamental Cherry is next to the old hatchery house at the Dykeman Spring

The Wild Mustard is up and blooming in the upland meadow in the Dykeman Park

© 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger 

Sunday Bach - Fifth Sunday After Easter

 

Bach wrote two cantatas for Rogation Sunday, the fifth Sunday after Easter. We listened to the first of those, BWV 86, last year, so this year we'll listen to the other - BWV 87, Bisher habt ihr nichts gebeten in meinem Namen (So far you have not asked anything in my name, Leipzig 1725). This is also a small, intimate cantata like last year's, but a bit darker. Still, there's lots of musical beauty here. The late Craig Smith of Emmanuel Music talks about this:

The Rogation Sunday cantata BWV 87 Bisher habt ihr nichts gebeten in meinem Namen is one of the most successful of the von Ziegler cantata texts. As is typical with this poet there are two biblical quotations, which generate all of the poetic text. The first is John 16:24. In it Jesus tells the disciples that they will soon understand the difficult metaphors that he has been using. Bach sets this rather severe text in a dense imitative aria for bass with strings doubled by two oboes and oboe da caccia. The duality of God and Son emphasized in the passage is ingeniously portrayed by the fact that the countersubject is a condensation of the last half of the main subject. This gives the movement a circular, layered effect. The continuation of the countersubject is compact and detailed. These three ideas are thrown into every possible combination and key. The aria has the effect of being a tight knot, which is gradually unraveled by the next three movements.

Von Ziegler finds the biblical passage alarming rather than reassuring. It sets off a warning to pray for forgiveness. The secco alto recitative is jagged and austere, as open and barren as the previous aria is dense. The following alto aria with two oboes da caccia obbligato is one of the longest arias in all of the cantatas. It is as if the breadth is needed to explicate the tough nut of the bass aria. The musical materials are complex. The continuo alternates between isolated eighth notes and a rising arpeggio figure. The opening line of the two oboes da caccia generates from the words. The aria is unusually chromatic, even for Bach. The sound of the two oboes da caccia with the alto is so ravishingly beautiful and the harmony so rich, that clearly Bach is portraying mankind's plight and confusion as unusually compelling. The shear repetition of the "vergib" motive is bearable because of the amazing harmonic detail of its context. This motive plays unchanged throughout both the A and B sections. Although this piece was written three years before the St. Matthew Passion, the scoring, the sound and the harmonic language are identical with the arioso, "Ach, Golgatha."

After the dank oboe da caccia texture, the strings in the following tenor recitative are a warm relief. The bass again sings the words of Jesus from John 16: 33 in a brief aria with continuo. Here the texture is much more open and overtly expressive than the beginning aria. Its placement between the string recitative and string aria of the tenor is interesting. The effect is of liberating the tenor to sing his ravishing siciliano aria. It is surprising to find perhaps Bach's most sheer and beautiful siciliano in such a dour context, but the effect is of a great weight being lifted off the soul. The potency of the aria gives it a climactic role in the cantata.

The harmonization of "Jesu meine Freude" is connected to the music of the opening aria. It is no accident that the bass line in many of its phrases encompasses the sixth leap that is the head theme of the first aria. This is in every way an unusual but absolutely top-drawer cantata. The combination of very short and very long sections is calculated and effective. The juxtaposition of the dense style of the opening with the arias is potent and brilliantly achieved.

© Craig Smith

Once again this year I've chosen a performance by the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra & Choir under the direction of Ton Koopman. Enjoy!

Photo © 2016 by A. Roy Hilbinger