We're going to a wedding today! Wheeeee! The Gospel text for the 20th Sunday after Trinity is the parable of the wedding of the king's son in Matthew 22, and Bach used that parable as the basis for all three of the cantatas he wrote for this Sunday, using it as a metaphor for Christ's love for the human soul, casting Christ as the groom and the soul of the believer as the bride. For today I've chosen the final of the three cantatas, BWV 49, Ich geh’ und suche mit Verlangen (I go forth and seek with longing, Leipzig 1726). This is a solo cantata featuring bass and soprano (no chorus this time), some beautiful duets that almost sound Mozartian, and some virtuoso organ playing. The opening sinfonia alone is a joyous uprush of organ and orchestra that'll set your feet to dancing. Here's the late Craig Smith of Emmanuel Music on this joyful cantata.
Bach Cantata BWV 49 dates from Bach’s fourth season in Leipzig. By this time Bach was rather disheartened by the level of playing in the orchestra and began to feature the organ as the principal instrument. Also by this time his son Carl Phillip Emmanuel was old enough to be playing keyboard continuo. The work begins with an arrangement for organ of the third movement of the E Major harpsichord concerto. Bach has added oboe d’amore to the strings of the concerto.
Bach has taken the parable of the wedding feast and made it the basis for a complex and textured dialogue between Jesus and the Soul. Both the father’s search for wedding guests and the husband’s search for a wife become metaphors for the searching of the soul for Christ. The opening aria takes the beautiful passage from the Song of Songs and turns it into an aria of longing for bass with elaborate organ obbligato. The dialogue that follows for bass (Jesus) and soprano (Soul) gets at the core of the message: the state of grace achieved with the communion of the Soul and Christ. A beautiful aria for soprano, oboe d’amore, viola and continuo follows. This is one of the very great Bach arias. There is further dialogue between the Soul and Christ that leads into the marvelous duet that closes the cantata. Here the voice of Jesus speaks of the consummation of the marriage. The soprano sings a verse of the chorale, “Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern.”
© Craig Smith
Today's performance is from a recording by the ensemble Il Gardellino under the direction of Marcel Ponseele. Enjoy!
Photo © 2018 by A. Roy Hilbinger
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