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Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen, BWV 56

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Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen (Gladly shall I bear the cross), BWV 56, is a solo cantata for bass by Johann Sebastian Bach. It was first performed in Leipzig on October 27, 1726.

Origin

This cantata belongs to the third cycle of cantatas in Leipzig and was created for the 19th Sunday after Trinity Sunday, which in 1726 was October 27. The original score has Bach's handwritten comment "Cantata à Voce Sola e Stromenti" (Cantata for solo voice and instruments). This is one of the few examples in which Bach uses the generic musical term cantata in his own writing.

Theme

The text, written by an unknown poet but of exceptional quality, refers indirectly to the planned gospel reading for the 19th Sunday after Trinity which deals with the healing of the man with the palsy (Matthew 9:1–8 KJV). Although there is no explicit reference to him in the text, he is customarily represented as the follower of Christ who bears His Cross and suffers torment until his sins are forgiven by Christ, so that, in the words of Revelation 7:17, "God shall wipe away the tears from their eyes". The cantata accordingly takes as its opening theme the torment that the faithful must endure in the hope of redemption in the afterlife.

The image of life as a sea voyage to the Kingdom of Heaven in the first recitative comes from the opening of the Gospel reading: "There He went on board a ship and passed over and came into His own city" (Matthew 9:1). Affirmations that God will not forsake the faithful on this journey and will lead them out of tribulation come from Hebrews 13:5 and Revelation 7:14.

The third movement expresses the joy at being united with the Saviour; the text comes from Isaiah 40:31: "Those that wait upon the Lord shall gain new strength so that they mount up with wings like an eagle, so that they run and do not grow weary."

This joy is coupled with a yearning for death, a theme that is present until the very end of the work. The concluding Chorale is taken from the sixth verse of the hymn Du, o schönes Weltgebäude by Johann Franck (1653). Before the Chorale, the final lines of the opening aria taken from Revelation 7:17 are heard once more; this unusual device appears several times in the third cycle of cantatas.

Voices and instrumentation

Bass solo, four voice chorus in the final Chorale.

Orchestra: Oboe I/II, Taille or Oboe da caccia, Violin I/II, Viola, Violoncello, Basso Continuo. Except for obligato oboe in the third aria, the three oboes double the violins and viola colla parte.

Movements

  1. Aria for bass and full orchestra, Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen [Gladly shall I bear the cross]
  2. Recitative for bass, violoncello and continuo, Mein Wandel auf der Welt / Ist ein Schiffart gleich [My life on earth / Is like a voyage at sea]
  3. Aria for bass, obligato oboe and continuo, Endlich, endlich wird mein Joch / Wieder von mir weicher müssen [At last, at last, my yoke / Shall fall from me again]
  4. Recitative for bass, strings and continuo, Ich stehe fertig und bereit [I stand here ready and prepared]
  5. Chorale for four part choir and orchestra, Komm, o Tod, du Schlafes Bruder, [Come, O Death, you brother of sleep]

Characteristics

Of moderate length (around 21 minutes), this is one of the more popular of Bach's cantatas. Both the text and the music are masterly and complement each other perfectly.

The opening aria is in bar form AAB, with two stollen (A) followed by an abgesang (B). The first stollen starts off with a ritornello for full orchestra, anticipating in counterpoint the rising and then falling motif of the bass soloist, mounting to an anguished augmented second marking the word Kreuzstab (Cross), followed by descending sighing figures signalling the bearing of the Cross. After the entry of the soloist, with its long and highly expressive melismatic lines, the three groups of strings and oboes accompany in counterpoint and echoing responses drawn from motifs of the opening ritornello. The ritornello is then taken up in the second stollen, but with significant variations because of the differing text: "It leads me after my torments to God in the Promised Land". After a repeat of the opening ritornello, the final abgesang illustrates the words, "There into my grave shall I place all my grief, Then shall my Saviour wipe the tears from my eyes". Highly charged declamatory triplets, dramatically spanning the whole bass register, are responded to by sighing motifs in the accompaniment. A reprise of the orchestral ritornello brings the aria to a close.

In the second movement, the undulation of the sea is depicted in the accompaniment by flowing semiquavers in the violoncello over repeated quavers in the basso continuo. The joyous third movement is a da capo aria, illustrating the passage from Isiah. It is a lively concertante duet for solo oboe, bass soloist and basso continuo, full of elaborate coloraturas in the solo parts. The fourth movement starts as a declamatory recitative for bass with sustained string accompaniment which after seven bars changes time signature from 4/4 to 3/4, resuming a simplified and becalmed version of the second half of the abgesang from the first movement.

The final four part chorale, with the orchestra doubling the vocal parts, is an inspired masterpiece. Based on a melody by Crüger from 1646, it takes as metaphor a ship being brought safely to port, marking the end of the metaphorical journey in the cantata. Bach introduces dramatic syncopation for each declamation in "Come, O Death, you brother of sleep"; and it is only at the end of the penultimate line that torment and dissonance are transformed into glory and harmony, echoing the words Denn durch dich komm ich herein, Zu den schönsten Jesulein [For it is through you I shall enter, To be with my sweetest Jesus].

Recordings

References

  1. ^ review by Ehud Shiloni 1998
  • Alfred Dürr (2006), The Cantatas of J. S. Bach, Oxford University Press, pp. 580–584, ISBN 0-19-929776-2, translated from German and revised by Richard D. P. Jones
  • Stokes, Richard (2000), The complete church and secular cantatas by Johann Sebastian Bach, Scarecrow Press, ISBN 0810839334, complete German texts and parallel translations into English
  • Template:De icon Alfred Dürr: Johann Sebastian Bach: Die Kantaten. Bärenreiter, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1476-3
  • Template:De icon Werner Neumann: Handbuch der Kantaten J.S.Bachs, 1947, 5th edition 1984, ISBN 3-7651-0054-4
  • Template:De icon Hans-Joachim Schulze: Die Bach-Kantaten: Einführungen zu sämtlichen Kantaten Johann Sebastian Bachs. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlags-Anstalt; Stuttgart: Carus-Verlag 2006 (Edition Bach-Archiv Leipzig) ISBN 3-374-02390-8 (Evang. Verl.-Anst.), ISBN 3-89948-073-2 (Carus-Verl.)
  • Template:De icon Christoph Wolff/Ton Koopman: Die Welt der Bach-Kantaten Verlag J.B. Metzler, Stuttgart, Weimar 2006 ISBN 978-3-476-02127-4

Template:German

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