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== History and context ==
== History and context ==
[[File:Nuremberg-Chronicles-1493-Strasburg-Argentina.jpg|thumb|upright=1.4|Woodcut of [[Strasbourg]] from ''[[Nuremberg Chronicle]]'', [[Hartmann Schedel]], 1493: [[Strasbourg Cathedral|Cathedral]] (r) and [[St Thomas' Church, Strasbourg|St Thomas]] (l)]]
[[File:Nuremberg-Chronicles-1493-Strasburg-Argentina.jpg|thumb|upright=1.4|Woodcut of [[Strasbourg]] from ''[[Nuremberg Chronicle]]'', [[Hartmann Schedel]], 1493: [[Strasbourg Cathedral|Cathedral]] (r) and [[St Thomas' Church, Strasbourg|St Thomas]] (l)]]

[[File:Straßburger-Gesangbuch-1541.jpeg|thumb|upright=1.1|Title page of the 1541 ''Straßburger Gesangbuch'']]
[[File:Straßburger-Gesangbuch-1541.jpeg|thumb|upright=1.1|Title page of the 1541 ''Straßburger Gesangbuch'']]


Revision as of 00:02, 31 March 2018

"An Wasserflüssen Babylon"
Lutheran hymn
Super Flumina Babylonis, "An Wasserflüssen Babylon," from the 1541 Straßburger Gesangbuch
TextWolfgang Dachstein
LanguageGerman
Based onPsalm 137
Published1525 (1525)

"An Wasserflüssen Babylon" (By the rivers of Babylon) is a Lutheran hymn by Wolfgang Dachstein, which was first published in Strasbourg in 1525. The text of the hymn is a paraphrase of Psalm 137. Its singing tune, which is the best known part of the hymn and Dachstein's best known melody, was popularised as chorale tune of Paul Gerhardt's 17th-century Passion hymn "Ein Lämmlein geht und trägt die Schuld". With this hymn text, Dachstein's tune is included in the Protestant hymnal Evangelisches Gesangbuch.

Several vocal and organ settings of the hymn "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" have been composed in the 17th and 18th century, including 4-part harmonisations by Johann Schein, Heinrich Schütz and Johann Sebastian Bach. In the second half of the 17th century, Johann Pachelbel, Johann Adam Reincken and Bach's cousin, Johann Christoph, arranged settings for chorale preludes.

The arrangements of "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" by Reincken and Pachelbel form the earliest extant transcriptions of Bach, copied on a 1700 organ tablature in Lüneberg when he has still a youth; remarkably, they were only unearthed in Weimar in 2005.

In 1720, in a celebrated organ concert at Hamburg, Bach extemporised a chorale setting of "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" in the presence of Reincken, two years before his death. Bach also composed three versions of the chorale prelude "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" as part of the Great Eighteen Chorale Preludes, the last dating from 1740–1750 in Leipzig, possibly as a tribute to Reincken's well-known chorale fantasia.

History and context

Woodcut of Strasbourg from Nuremberg Chronicle, Hartmann Schedel, 1493: Cathedral (r) and St Thomas (l)
Title page of the 1541 Straßburger Gesangbuch

"An Wasserflüssen Babylon" is a Lutheran hymn written in 1525 and attributed to Wolfgang Dachstein, organist at St Thomas' Church, Strasbourg.[1][2][3] The hymn is a closely paraphrased versification of Psalm 137, "By the rivers of Babylon", a lamentation for Jerusalem, exiled in Babylon. Its text and melody, Zahn number 7663, first appeared in Strasbourg in 1525 in Wolf Köpphel's Das dritt theil Straßburger kirchenampt. This Strasbourg tract, which comprised the third part of the Lutheran service, is now lost. Despite the lost tract from 1525, the Strasbourg hymn appeared in print from 1526 onwards, starting with Psalmen, Gebett und Kirchenordnung wie sie zu Straßburg gehalten werden.[4][1][5]

Wolfgang Egeloph Dachstein was born in 1487 in Offenburg in the Black Forest. In 1503 he became a fellow student with Martin Luther at the University of Erfurt. He entered the Dominican monastic order in around 1520 in Strasbourg, where he started a collaboration with Matthias Greiter, a friend and contemporary. Greiter was born in 1495 in Aichach, near Augsburg in Bavaria, where he attended a Latin school, before enrolling in theology at the University of Freiburg in 1510 and becoming a monk in Strasbourg in 1520.[6]

During the Reformation, Protestantism was adopted in Strasbourg in 1524. The reforms involved the introduction of the German venacular, the use of Lutheran titurgy ("Gottesdienstordnung") and congregational singing. Both Greiter and Dachstein renounced their monastic vows and married in Alsace. Their association continued, with Greiter becoming a cantor in the Cathedral and Dachstein an organist at St Thomas. Both played an important role in the musical life of Strasbourg, with many contributions to Lutheran hymns and psalms. Daniel Specklin, a 16th-century architect from Alsace, where the region Dachstein takes its name, described in detail how the pair engaged in "das evangelium" and "vil gute psalmen". The Lutheran Straßburger Gesangbuch was published in 1541 as part of the reforms, with a preface by Martin Bucer; the title, text and psalm were printed in characteristic red and black. (All Straßburger Gesangbuch (Strasbourg hymnal) editions of the 16th century contained the "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" hymn, starting from the 1526 version titled Psalmen, Gebett und Kirchenordnung wie sie zu Straßurg gehalten werden.)[5][7] During the Counter-Reformation, however, the Augsburg Interim resulted in Strasbourg reinstating Catholicism in October 1549: both Dachstein and Greiter renounced Protestantism.[6]

Dachstein's hymn "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" was rapidly distributed—it was printed in Luther's 1545 Babstsches Gesangbuch[8]—and spread to most Lutheran hymnbooks by central Germany.[1] After the Sack of Magdeburg in 1631, during the Thirty Years' War, it was decreed that Dachstein's 137th Psalm would be sung every year as part of the ceremonies to commemorate the destruction of Magdeburg.[9]

The melody of the hymn became better known than its text, through the association of that melody with Paul Gerhardt's 17th-century Passion hymn "Ein Lämmlein geht und trägt die Schuld".[5][9] With that hymn text, the hymn tune of "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" is adopted as EG 83 in the Protestant hymnal Evangelisches Gesangbuch.[10][11] The hymn tune is Dachstein's best known composition.[3]

Miles Coverdale provided an early English translation in the Tudor Protestant Hymnal "Ghostly Psalms and Spiritual Songs," 1539. These Lutheran versifications were written in continental Europe while Coverdale was in exile from England.[12][13]

Text

The Lutheran text of Dachstein first appeared in 1525.[1] The English translations by Miles Coverdale date from 1539.[13][14]

German text

    English translation

1. An Wasserflüssen Babylon,
   Da saßen wir mit Schmerzen;
   Als wir gedachten an Sion,
   Da weinten wir von Herzen;
   Wir hingen auf mit schwerem Mut
   Die Orgeln und die Harfen gut
   An ihre Bäum der Weiden,
   Die drinnen sind in ihrem Land,
   Da mussten wir viel Schmach und Schand
   Täglich von ihnen leiden.

     At the ryvers of Babilon,
     There sat we downe ryght hevely;
     Even whan we thought upon Sion,
     We wepte together sorofully.
     For we were in soch hevynes,
     That we forgat al our merynes,
     And lefte of all oure sporte and playe:
     On the willye trees that were thereby
     We hanged up oure harpes truly,
     And morned sore both nyght and daye.

2. Die uns gefangen hielten lang
   So hart an selben Orten
   Begehrten von uns ein Gesang
   Mit gar spöttlichen Worten
   Und suchten in der Traurigkeit
   Ein fröhlichn Gsang in unserm Leid
   Ach lieber tut uns singen
   Ein Lobgesang, ein Liedlein schon
   Von den Gedichten aus Zion,
   Das fröhlich tut erklingen.

    They that toke us so cruelly,
    And led us bounde into pryson,
    Requyred of us some melody.
    With wordes full of derision.
    When we had hanged oure harpes alwaye,
    This cruell folke to us coulde saye:
    Now let us heare some mery songe,
    Synge us a songe of some swete toyne,
    As ye were wont to synge at Sion,
    Where ye have lerned to synge so longe.

3. Wie sollen wir in solchem Zwang
   Und Elend, jetzt vorhanden,
   Dem Herren singen ein Gesang
   Sogar in fremden Landen?
   Jerusalem, vergiss ich dein,
   So wolle Gott, der G'rechte, mein
   Vergessen in meim Leben,
   Wenn ich nicht dein bleib eingedenk
   Mein Zunge sich oben ane häng
   Und bleib am Rachen kleben.

    To whome we answered soberly:
    Beholde now are we in youre honde:
    How shulde we under captivite
    Synge to the Lorde in a straunge londe?
    Hierusalem, I say to the,
    Yf I remember the not truly,
    My honde playe on the harpe no more:
    Yf I thynke not on the alwaye,
    Let my tonge cleve to my mouth for aye,
    And let me loose my speache therfore.

4. Ja, wenn ich nicht mit ganzem Fleiss,
   Jerusalem, dich ehre,
   Im Anfang meiner Freude Preis
   Von jetzt und immermehre,
   Gedenk der Kinder Edom sehr,
   Am Tag Jerusalem, o Herr,
   Die in der Bosheit sprechen:
   Reiss ab, reiss ab zu aller Stund,
   Vertilg sie gar bis auf den Grund,
   Den Boden wolln wir brechen!

     Yee, above all myrth and pastaunce,
     Hierusalem, I preferre the.
     Lorde, call to thy remembraunce
     The sonnes of Edom ryght strately,
     In the daye of the destruction,
     Which at Hierusalem was done;
     For they sayd in theyr cruelnes,
     Downe with it, downe with it, destroye it all;
     Downe with it soone, that it may fall,
     Laye it to the grounde all that there is.

5. Die schnöde Tochter Babylon,
   Zerbrochen und zerstöret,
   Wohl dem, der wird dir gebn den Lohn
   Und dir, das wiederkehret,
   Dein Übermut und Schalkheit gross,
   Und misst dir auch mit solchem Mass,
   Wie du uns hast gemessen;
   Wohl dem, der deine Kinder klein
   Erfasst und schlägt sie an ein Stein,
   Damit dein wird vergessen![15]

     O thou cite of Babilon,
     Thou thy selfe shalt be destroyed.
     Truly blessed shall be that man
     Which, even as thou hast deserved,
     Shall rewarde the with soch kyndnesse
     As thou hast shewed to us gyltlesse,
     Which never had offended the.
     Blessed shall he be that for the nones
     Shall throwe thy chyldren agaynst the stones,
     To brynge the out of memorie.

Hymn tune

Below is the 1525 hymn tune by Wolfgang Dachstein.

{ \key f \major \set Score.tempoHideNote = ##t \tempo 2=72 \set Staff.midiInstrument = "english horn" \override Score.TimeSignature #'transparent = ##t \override Score.BarNumber #'transparent = ##t \time 6/2 c''2 d''4 c'' a'2 c'' bes'4 bes' a'2 g'2 a'4 bes' c''2 bes'4 a' g'2 f' c''2 d''4 c'' a'2 c'' bes'4 bes' a'2 g'2 a'4 bes' c''2 bes'4 a' g'2 f' f'2 g'4 a' bes'2 g' a'4 g' f'2 f'2 a'4 bes' c''2 d'' a'4 bes' c''2 \time 5/2 a'2 c''4 d'' c'' a' bes'2 a' \time 7/2 d''2 d''4 d'' g'2 c'' bes'4( g') a'2 g' bes'2 a'4 g' f'2 g' e'4 (f') d'2 c' \time 8/2 c'2 f'4 g' a' bes' c''2(a'4 bes' g'2) f'1 \bar "|."}

Musical settings

Vocal settings

Cantus and verses of An Wasserflüssen Babylon from Heinrich Schütz's 1628 Becker Psalter[16]

There are several vocal works based on the hymn "An Wasserflüssen Babylon". In 1544 Georg Rhau composed two settings for several parts for his collection Neue Deutsche Geistliche Gesänge für die gemeinen Schulen.[17] Sigmund Hemmel used the text in the 1550s in his four-part setting of the psalms, with the cantus firmus in the tenor, which was printed in 1569.[17] Johann Hermann Schein composed a setting of "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" for two sopranos and instrumental accompaniment, which he published in 1617.[18][better source needed] His 1627 Cantional contained a four-part setting of the hymn,[19][better source needed] a setting which was republished p. 706 of Vopelius's Neu Leipziger Gesangbuch.[1][better source needed][20][better source needed] In 1628 Heinrich Schütz published a four-part harmonisation of "An Wasserflüssen Babylon", SWV 242, in the Becker Psalter, Op. 5.[16][21] Bach also composed a four-part setting, BWV 267, which appeared around 1735 in the Dietel manuscript.[22][23] That harmonisation is found as well in G major and in A-flat major in 18th-century chorale collections, both as "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" and as "Ein Lämmlein geht und trägt die Schuld".[23] For instance, its publication in the Breitkopf edition of the 1780s has it as No. 5 in G major under the former title and as No. 308 in A-flat major under the latter title.[23][better source needed]

Organ settings

Portrait of Reincken, 1674
Reincken's organ chorale "An Wasserflüssen Babylon" in a tablature copy once owned by Bach
Autograph manuscript of Bach's BWV 653
BWV 653b, with a double pedal part, not necessarily by Bach.[24]

The hymn also inspired seventeenth and early eighteenth century organ compositions in Northern Germany. Organ chorale preludes and free works (fantasias) by Johann Adam Reincken[25], Johann Pachelbel[26], Johann Christoph Bach[27] (Johann Sebastian's first cousin once removed) and Johann Sebastian Bach[who?] have been based on "An Wasserflüssen Babylon".[citation needed][better source needed]

Reincken's extended chorale fantasia elaborates the hymn tune with a broad variety of techniques.[28] The young Johann Sebastian Bach owned a copy of this work when he studied with Georg Böhm in 1700. Bach's copy, in organ tablature, was rediscovered in 2005 at the Herzogin Anna Amalia Bibliothek in Weimar by Michael Maul and Peter Wollny. These scholars believe the tablature to be in Bach's hand, which is however doubted by Kirsten Beißwenger. If it is, it would be one of Bach's oldest extant manuscripts.[29][better source needed][30][31][32][33][34][35]

An Wasserflüssen Babylon, BWV 653, is a paraphrase of Psalm 137, a sorrowful lament of the Israelites, exiled in Babylon. Bach's two monumental Passions are heard in the closing choruses in the same kind of melancholic sarabande-like music as the third chorale of the "Great Eighteen Chorale Preludes". After bar 48, the musical development, particularly the chromaticism, becomes more concentrated, creating a mood of pathos. The use of the reprise at the start of the ritornello, without any variants, is unusal and might have been unintentional during the preparation of the manuscript. Stinson's describes a concert in 1720, when Bach extemporised for "almost half an hour" on An Wasserflüssen Babylon at the organ loft of St. Catherine's Church, Hamburg, with a well-known comment of the 97-year-old Reincken: "I thought that this art was dead, but I see that in you it still lives."[36] The coda in Bach's BWV 653 shares many compositional features of Reincken's chorale prelude: the 4-bar flourish at the end of Reincken's coda

can be compared with Bach's closing coda of BWV 653.

Coda of BWV 653

As Stinson suggests, this might have been some form of musical homage to Reincken. In Bach's closing pedal point in the lower alto manual, the upper manual develops the two-part ritornello accompanied during 4 bars of pedal; in the next 2 bars, there is a double pedal before the fermata; during the ritornello motives of the upper manual, the tension is ingeniously and peacefully resolved through contrary motion in rising and falling scales in the middle voices, ruffled only by a passing major seventh.[37] Although BWV 653 was composed in Leipzig within the traditions of Thuringia, Bach's contemplative "mesmerising" mood is far removed from his earlier improvisatory compositions: the later work, BWV 653, is understated, with its alto cantus firmus subtly embellished.[38][39]

Further reading

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e Leahy 2011, pp. 37–38, 53
  2. ^ Terry 1921, pp. 101–103
  3. ^ a b Julian 1907
  4. ^ Zahn 1893, p. 7
  5. ^ a b c Zahn 1891
  6. ^ a b See:
  7. ^ Zahn 1893, p. 7
  8. ^ Krummacher 2001, pp. 194–195
  9. ^ a b Werner 2016, p. 205
  10. ^ Axmacher & Fischer 2002
  11. ^ "Ein Lämmlein geht und trägt die Schuld" (in German). Württembergische Landeskirche. Retrieved 24 February 2018.
  12. ^ Coverdale 1846, pp. 571–572
  13. ^ a b Terry, Charles Sanford. "Bach's Chorals. Part III: The Hymns and Hymn Melodies of the Organ Works". oll.libertyfund.org. Retrieved 24 February 2018.
  14. ^ Coverdale 1846, pp. 571–572
  15. ^ Modernised orthography, while the original wording is found in Philipp Wackernagel: Das deutsche Kirchenlied von der ältesten Zeit bis zu Anfang des 17. Jahrhunderts. Vol. III. Teubner, 1870, No. 135 (p. 98)
  16. ^ a b Schütz 1628
  17. ^ a b "An Wasserflüssen Babylons". The Scroll Ensemble. Retrieved 3 March 2018.
  18. ^ Johann Hermann Schein / An Wasserflüssen Babylon / aus: Opella Nova (1618), Teil 1 / 1617 Carus
  19. ^ Johann Hermann Schein (1627). Cantional, Oder Gesangbuch Augspurgischer Confession. Leipzig: Schein, pp. 325–327
  20. ^ Gottfried Vopelius (1682). Neu Leipziger Gesangbuch. Leipzig: Christoph Klinger, pp.706–709
  21. ^ Schütz 2013
  22. ^ D-LEb Peters Ms. R 18 (chorale collection Dietel) at Bach Digital website. 6 August 2017.
  23. ^ a b c Luke Dahn. BWV 267 at www.bach-chorales.com. 2017.
  24. ^ Williams 2003, pp. 350–351
  25. ^ 2017 & Beißwenger, pp. 243–244
  26. ^ 2017 & Beißwenger, p. 242
  27. ^ Rose 2017, pp. 228–229
  28. ^ Shannon 2012, p. 207.
  29. ^ Adler, Margit (31 August 2006). "Earliest Music Manuscripts by Johann Sebastian Bach Discovered". www.klassik-stiftung.de. Klassik Stiftung Weimar.
  30. ^ Maul & Wollny 2006
  31. ^ Stinson 2012
  32. ^ Williams 2016
  33. ^ Yearsley 2009
  34. ^ Beißwenger 2017
  35. ^ Rose 2017, pp. 226–227
  36. ^ Bach 1998, p. 302
  37. ^ Stinson 2001, pp. 78–80
  38. ^ Geck 2006, pp. 507–509
  39. ^ Williams 2003, pp. 348–349

References

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