bach in kothen

Bach in Köthen by Friedrich SmendReview by: William H. ScheideJournal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Spring, 1953), pp. 69-74Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the American Musicological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/830002 .

Accessed: 22/01/2014 04:12

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

University of California Press and American Musicological Society are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize,preserve and extend access to Journal of the American Musicological Society.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 202.45.50.243 on Wed, 22 Jan 2014 04:12:04 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=ucal

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=amusoc

http://www.jstor.org/stable/830002?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


REVIEWS 69

ing, Buchstabentonschrift (see Riemann), Cabaletta, Canarie, Cancionero, Cantus planus, Chansonnier, Chile, Chromatik, and Clarino. Even more strange is the fact that, in a German encyclopedia, there should be an article on "Choral" which turns out to be a detailed presentation of Gregorian chant (by Staiblein), without even a word being said about what this word has come to mean, first of all, to every German and to the world at large, viz., the Protestant chorale. No doubt, this subject will appear at some other place, perhaps under "Protestantische Musik" or (following Moser) under "Kirchenlied." The article on "Choralbearbeitung," on the other hand, is exclusively devoted to the German-Protestant development, al- though some modern scholars (particularly Handschin) have consistently employed this term in the sense of "polyphonic elaboration of Gregorian chant," starting with St. Martial and Notre-Dame.

Whatever importance one may attach to these flaws, they cannot, of course, impair the persistently high standard of scholarship that has distinguished MGG from its inception. In the biographical field, a comparison of the articles "Brumel" (Schmidt-G6rg), "Buonamente" (Nettl), "Campra" (Girardon), or "Ciconia" (Besseler) with those in Riemann or Grove will clearly indicate the amount of specialized investigation and detailed information presented here. In the topical field, a similar comparison could be made between Stiblein's article on "Choral" and the article on "Gregorian Chant" in the Harvard Dictionary of Music. Some of the articles would seem to be almost too long, e.g., that on "Chorbuch" (Besseler and Albrecht) and that on "Chorkomposition" (Osthoff, Noack, Gudewill), the former with i i, the latter with more than 23 full pages.

In his article on "Burgund," Besseler treats the matter from the point of view of the Burgundian dynasty, starting with Philipp (I363-i4o4) and closing with Charles V (1519-56). Consequently, his description covers a much wider range (from the successors of Machaut to Gom- bert) than is usually subsumed under the term "Burgundian School," which he him-

self introduced some 20 years ago. Hus- mann, in the article on "Cantus firmus," mentions (col. 792, bottom) Obrecht's Pater noster as a "sch6nes Muster des durchimitierenden Stils," quoting Davison- Apel's Historical Anthology of Music (0947), No. 76, as his source. Actually, this composition is by Willaert. The erroneous ascription (corrected in the second edition of HAM) goes back to an error made by Johannes Wolf in his publication of the complete works of Obrecht. In the bib- liography of J. E. Stevens's article on "Carol," Chapter IV ("Holy-Week Music and Carols at Meaux Abbey") of Bukofzer's Studies in Mediaeval and Renaissance Music (I950) should be added. Consulta- tion of Chapter V ("The Beginnings of Choral Polyphony") of the same book would certainly have resulted in a better and clearer presentation of the initial part of Osthoff's article on "Chorkomposition," which, as it now stands, is rather weak and inconclusive. The author simply lists almost the entire "vocal" literature of the I5th and I6th centuries, without ever touching upon the various problems of Auffiihbrungspraxis that should be discussed in such an article, e.g., soloist or choral polyphony, vocal or instrumental performance, size of choruses-questions which certainly ought to be raised in connection with the frottola, the madrigal, and even the motet. Various examples of choral polyphony alternating with soloist polyphony are known at least since the publication, in 1936, of van den Borren's Polyphonia sacra (see, e.g., HAM, No. 56; also the remarks in Besseler's article on Ciconia, MGG, col. i433). A composition such as Tallis's Audivi vocem de caelo (HAM, No. I27) clearly shows that the Leoninus-Perotinus-method of soloist polyphony alternating with choral plainsong was still alive in the i6th century.

WILLI APEL Indiana University

Friedrich Smend. Bach in Kothen. Berlin: Christlicher Zeitschriftenver- lag, 1951. 229 PP. SOME 60 YEARS AGO Professor Philipp Spitta, that sine qua non of Bach scholarship, was



70 JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MUSICOLOGICAL SOCIETY

looking over a number of old volumes of poetry whose lengthy title read in part: Gedichte unterschiedener Beriihmten und geschickten Mdnner . . . von MEN- ANTES; the final word he identified as the nom de plume of Christian Friedrich Hunold (1680-i72z). What especially in- terested him was that seven of the poems were directed to the Court of Anhalt- Cithen, six being of the period i718-2i, when the resident Capellmeister was Johann Sebastian Bach. It did not take long to identify one of the poems as the text for the defective Bach secular cantata known at that time as "Mit Gnaden bekr6ne" (BG, Jahrg. XXIX, p. 209). Its true beginning, for which the music is lost, is "Die Zeit, die Tag und Jahre macht." Spitta thereupon wrote an essay entitled "Bach und Christian Friedrich Hunold," which may be found in his Musikgeschichtliche Aufsdtze (i894), pp. 89 ff. In it he declared that, while in C6then, Bach composed the following Hunold texts: "Lobet den Herrn, alle seine Herrscharen" for December io, I7I8 (birthday of the reigning Prince Leopold), "Dich loben die lieblichen Strahlen der Sonne" for January I, 1720, and "Heute ist gewiss ein guter Tag" intended probably for December io, 1720.1 These are in addi- tion to "Die Zeit, die Tag und Jahre macht," composed for January I, 1719. Study of these texts enabled Spitta to decide that the C6then birthday serenade, "Durchlauchtster Leopold" (BG, Jahrg. XXXIV, p. 3, text of unknown author- ship), was composed for December o, 1717. Hunold's book contained a second text intended for December io, 1718 ("Der Himmel dacht auf Anhalts Ruhm und Gliick"), but Spitta was doubtful whether Bach composed it. Three cantatas in one month seemed to him rather excessive.

Spitta's essay has suffered undeserved

neglect. For example, he mentioned that the text of the Bach secular cantata, "Ich bin in mir vergniigt" (BG, Jahrg. XI2, p. io5), is derived from Hunold's poems. Yet one may search in vain in the com- prehensive publications of Terry, Schering, Blume, and Schmieder for this information. But most unreasonable of all is the at- titude of Friedrich Smend, the author of the book presently under review. In the fifth of a series of six pamphlets dealing with Bach's church cantatas2 he admits (p. 21, n. i) that Spitta had "discovered" the Hunold volumes. Since writing that note, Smend has examined the volumes himself, and it seems obvious that Spitta's researches first called his attention to them. Now, however, he opens the foreword of his new book as follows: "The discovery of the cantata texts written by Christian Friedrich Hunold furnished the pretext for the present study." As Friedrich Blume puts it in his article on Bach in Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, col. 979: "Only two [cantatas] were previously known; Friedrich Smend has discovered the others." Nowhere is the work of Spitta acknowledged. In fact, Smend goes out of his way to belittle Spitta's knowledge of the Cithen period. "This great scholar did not succeed," he says (p. 14), "in find- ing further documentary notes of Bach's life and work at C6then aside from entries in the church registers concerning family events."

Smend bases his own study on three sets of documents. There are first the Hunold poems, known to Spitta. Then there are the protocols of wages paid to the members of the princely Cappelle. Spitta also knew about these (see the German edition, Vol. II, p. 985) and re- wrote a passage in the English edition as a result (Vol. II, pp. 4-5). Finally there are the Cammerrechnungen, the account books, which indeed Spitta did not appear to know. But Terry, at least, did,3 so that Smend cannot be credited with their discovery.

But enough of such recriminations; for,

1 On this date there is an unresolved con- flict of opinion between Spitta and Smend. The latter gives the year as 1721 since the text speaks of "die sch6nste SchSiferin," thus conceivably alluding, in the course of its pas- toral allegory, to Leopold's marriage which took place on December 11, 1721. But Spitta had pointed out that Hunold died on August 6, 1721. I have neither inclination nor ability to resolve this difficulty, but Smend should at least have taken account of it.

2 Ein Jahrgang Johann Sebastian Bach Kirchen Kantaten (1950).

3 See Bach: A Biography, p. 122, n. 2, for example.



REVIEWS 71

whether or not Smend has been polite to Spitta, he has written a very significant book. From the account books he extracts the following information, unreported by Terry: throughout Bach's residence at Cithen there was a considerable amount of binding of music, presumably parts; during this same period there were no music purchases; in the year [719-20 alone, the number bound was about 360. If one accepts Smend's estimate that 360 parts would amount to roughly 50 ensemble works, he senses that Bach's productivity in one year at C6then may well have been far in excess of anything previously imagined. Smend quotes typical entries in his footnotes and no doubt refrains from printing all of them, to conserve space. Still, since the conclusions based on them are so important, I believe it would have been worthwhile to have set them forth more fully.

The account books also record pay- ments for the printing of "Carmina." Smend demonstrates that there were usually ("fast ausnahmslos") two of these printed after every December Io (Leo- pold's birthday) and January i. This helps to explain the problem that perplexed Spitta-the existence of two Hunold texts for December 1o, 1718. Since one of these was religious ("Lobet den Herrn, alle seine Herrscharen") and the other secular ("Der Himmel dacht auf Anhalts Ruhm und Gliick"), Smend concludes, perhaps too readily, that for the six Decembers and Januarys that Bach spent in C6then there must have been 24 cantatas, half of them religious, the other half secular. He then proceeds to find evidence in the records of other vocal performances as well.

It is obvious that, if Smend's deductions are accepted even in part, some adjust- ments in the traditional picture of the "C6then period" are in order. As Schweit- zer put it: "The Cathen Court be- longed to the reformed church; there was consequently no church music."4 But Spitta had already printed the title of the religious cantata, "Lobet den Herm, alle seine Herrscharen," which reads in part

as follows: "Cantata . . . bey gehaltenem Gottes-Dienste," i.e., for a church service. And any further doubt on this point should be dissipated when we recall the great funeral ode, featuring music from the St. Matthew Passion, which Bach as- sembled for the memorial service in 1729 after Leopold's death. A portion of its title reads: Trauer-Music . . . in der Re-

formirten Stadt- und Cathedral-Kirchen zu Cdthen . . . aufgefiibret .. ., thus ex-

plicitly stating that concerted music was, at least occasionally, performed in the reformed churches of C6then. It therefore appears that when Bach became Capellmeister he did not have to consider that he was totally renouncing the ars sacra, that he was being false to what in 17o8 he had called his "Endzweck," or ultimate purpose--a well regulated church music. Rather could he look forward to an unimpeded development of his art.

This is what interests Smend, and he uses every possible means to discover traces of C6then vocal compositions. This often involves fitting words and music together, and an inevitable element of conjecture creeps into the discussion. Nevertheless the conjecture seems well founded when Smend undertakes to discover the music for five movements of "Der Himmel dacht auf Anhalts Ruhm und Gliick" in Cantata 66, "Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen" (BG, Jahrg. XVI, p. 169). The greater appro- priateness of the duet texts and of the word "ewig" instead of "herrschet" in the chorus are quite obvious. Having now the music for most of three C6then cantatas ("Durchlauchtster Leopold," "Die Zeit, die Tag und Jahre macht,"5 and "Der Himmel

4 1. S. Bach, Vol. I, p. Io6. Almost exactly repeated in Schering, Der Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, Band III (1941), p. 20.

5 Two small errors may be noted in Smend's discussion of this cantata. The notation of the last bar in the first staff on p. 31 should be as follows:

In the text of the first bar of the third staff on p. 32 occur the words "angenehme Zeit" instead of "giildne Zeit" as given on p. 187 (also in Spitta). The version on p. 32 agrees in metrical feet with the adaptation in Can- tata 134. Use of "giildne" reduces it by one foot and forces a revision of the music. This is not at all surprising, since eight successive sixteenth notes on eight successive syllables




dacht auf Anhalts Ruhm und Gliick"), Smend analyses them for distinctive quali- ties. He finds that the recitatives tend to broaden into ariosos at the end, that there is a penchant for duets, often of a dialogue character with occasional concertante vio- lin, and that many of the concerted numbers use the dance forms of the suite. When choruses occur, the duet treatment may be used in long sections. Reasoning from these conclusions, Smend next tries to identify Leipzig church cantatas which are descended from lost C6then originals. Here he singles out Cantata 184, "Erwiinschtes Freudenlicht." The concluding chorus is certainly of much simpler proportions than is usually found in a Leipzig work. And the violoncello part contains, in place of the preceding chorale, the bass of a lost recitative with an arioso ending. But Smend does not stop at this point. After men- tioning the complexities of Bach's successive adaptations and transcriptions, he believes he can detect traces of C6then works in Cantatas 32, 35, no, 145,6 190o,7 and 193.

From this, the book proceeds to a discussion of the funeral music that Bach performed at the interment ceremonies of the Duke of C6then in March, 1729. The music is lost, but Smend has discovered three versions of the words for the composition performed at the memorial service on March 24. It contains 24 selections, of which io are recitatives. Two of the remaining numbers relate themselves without difficulty to the opening and closing

choruses of the Trauer-Ode and ten others to arias and choruses of the St. Matthew Passion, leaving only one chorus, a Biblical setting occurring twice, unaccounted for. The importance of this work lies in its connection with the St. Matthew Passion, which not only contains the same music but was performed at about the same time. The question arises: which was composed first? In the 1939 Bachjahrbuch, Arnold Schering considered the matter and noted that Bach's almost invariable custom was to adapt secular works for religious purposes, not the reverse. Therefore he de- cided that the C6then funeral music was composed first, with the Passion following and having its original performance in 1731. All this is in defiance of dates in accredited sources. Smend took issue with this stand in the 1940-48 Bachjahrbuch and showed that such a theory leads to serious difficulties. And in his present work he prints a C6then account book entry show- ing that on November 27, 1728, eight days after Leopold died, there was a sizable payment for copying and engraving music. If this refers to the funeral music, as seems reasonable, it allows an impossibly short time for a work of such size to be prepared and delivered. If, however, what was involved was mainly copying selections from the St. Matthew Passion, then there appears clearly the interesting fact that this work was composed quite some time before Good Friday, 1729. Smend's position as against Schering's is further strengthened by a comparison of the texts. In no case is the C6then version markedly more appropriate to the music than the St. Matthew. But instances of the reverse can be cited. The staccato setting of "Dass die Tropfen meiner Zaihren" in the aria, "Buss und Reu," is more fitting than "Und die Augen treuer Liebe." The melisma at the end of the aria "Blute nur" is more apt for "Schlange worden" than for "zu vergleichen." The words "Erhalte mich Gott, in der Hilfte meiner Tage" could hardly have caused the torrent of sorrow more understandably associated with the words "Erbarme Dich, Mein Gott, um meiner Zihren willen." Finally, the image of "schlummern" in the final line in the last chorus of the Passion is surely the

are rare in Bach's recitative. The revised bar could very well be as follows:

bliild all.-hier die gilNd-aP Pei, a

6 For some reason, Smend thinks that the lost C6then original (if there was one) of the chorus, "So du mit deinem Munde," must have been secular. I see no reason for such an assumption.

7 Smend stresses "Gesalbter ... Stamm und Zweige" in the last recitative as referring to Leopold and his child (born 1722) but omits "Kirch und Schul . .. Lehrer . . . Rat und Richterstuhl . . . in unsrer Stadt," which sounds more like Leipzig.



REVIEWS 73 true one, instead of "Wo dein Ruhm sich unsterblich hat gemacht."

In his examination of the court records, Smend made the interesting discovery that a second funeral music was performed on the evening of March 23 during the burial service. Neither text nor music for this work is known. But Smend wonders, and with reason, if it could not be the work referred to on pp. 8 and 368 of Forkel's Bach biography where there is mention of a C6then funeral music, spe- cifically of a "Begribnis-Feier," a burial ceremony, containing "many double choruses." Forkel knew the Trauer-Ode, but Smend shows that he probably was not acquainted with the St. Matthew Passion. As the work in Forkel's possession was presumably a score, Smend thinks it an original composition, since he believes that no score was ever prepared for the Cothen funeral music, whose text is known. This follows from his idea that to save time, parts for adapted numbers were simply copied from the scores of the originals and the new words inserted. This, he thinks, was a practice often in- dulged in by Bach in his transcriptions for occasional works. But a great deal is still unknown about the preparations for the C6then funeral music; we have no more than glimpses into what must have been a rather complicated situation. And if the problem of the score can be laid aside, it is not too hard to imagine a possible source for most of the music for this second C6then funeral music-the St. Matthew Passion again. For this purpose there would be available the opening chorus, the duet and chorus "So ist mein Jesus nun gefangen," the two arias for alto and chorus, "Ach, nun ist mein Jesus hin" and "Sehet, Jesus hat die Hand," as well as the arias, "Geduld," "K6nnen Trinen meiner Wangen," and "Gebt mir meinen Jesum wieder." All this assumes that none of the double chorus turba settings were used. In any event, it seems as though the musical reservoirs in the St. Matthew Passion should be large enough to provide the main matter of both C6then works. It might be added that the text of the opening double chorus, "Come . . .

share my weeping ... behold him," could readily enough be adapted to provide accompaniment for a funeral procession bringing both mourners and corpse into a church. This is, in fact, the exact setting pictured in the records cited by Smend.

But if, as seems likely, the St. Matthew Passion antedates the CUthen funeral works, what about Schering's contention that Bach never adapted religious works for secular purposes? Smend seems to deal with the point inferentially when he says (p. 141) that Bach "never used church works again outside a religious service." Since the C6then funeral odes were both performed in churches, his statement is literally correct. But the text is really secular, for it is ad maiorem Leopoldi gloriam. Honesty forces us to admit that if ten numbers of Leopold's funeral music (and perhaps more) were taken from the St. Matthew Passion, the procedure was in direct violation of Bach's custom.9 In fact, if we may judge from the fine and provocative discussion at the end of his book, Smend would make it a violation of Bach's whole Lutheran theology. In considering Bach's relation to the Baroque and to the question of the sa- cred versus the secular in his art, Smend develops the idea that for Bach all musical styles are to be brought into the service of God. It can, I believe, be shown that every style appearing in Bach's secular works reappears in his religious music; but the chorale, which lies at the heart of his religious works and becomes increasingly prominent in the later works, never appears in a secular guise. In the final cantatas the spectacle presented is of the entire musical wealth of the Baroque doing homage to the chorale tune. What was the process by which Bach assimilated this wealth to his vocal style? Here lies the great significance of Smend's work on Bach in Kdthen. Extending (though not acknowledging) the work of Spitta, he discovers that a substantial part of Bach's Cbthen composition was vocal and points

8 Smend, in n. 9o, wrongly cites p. 56.

9 Perhaps it is an exception prompted by Bach's feeling for the "gracious Prince . in whose service he intended to spend the rest of his life." Incidentally, Smend has some ex- cellent comments on the famous letter to Erdmann from which this quotation is derived.




to a number of actual examples. Study of the music reveals an increasing inter- penetration of vocal and instrumental forms. Choruses take on concerto quali- ties,o1 arias the rhythms of the dance suite." As Smend remarks (p. 99): "The complete synthesis of ... the Bach instrumental and vocal style must, viewed his- torically, be regarded as far and away the most important result of his years at C6then." This neatly supplements the following remark of Spitta (Vol. I, p. 565): "The Weimar period was the flowering- time of his achievements on and for the organ, particularly in the form of the chorale; and this height had to be gained before he could take a further stride and condense into vocal forms the more sub- jective and dramatic aspects of the instrumental forms." 12

Having worked in defense of Spitta throughout this review, I feel entitled to put in a word for the other side. It is time to realize that books can no longer be written using only his investigations. Bach research did not stop with Spitta nor even with Terry. Right now a great deal is going on, of which Smend's book is an important example. Spitta is still the foundation, but he is no longer the super- structure as well. The truth of this could hardly be more clearly illustrated than by Smend's work. His book is a major con- tribution to the Bach literature. It should be known and its influence felt wherever Bach is discussed.

WILLIAM H. SCHEIDE Princeton, New Jersey

to This can be made quite clear if one con- siders it reasonable to study the choruses of Cantatas 184, 66, and I34a in that order. To them can be added the chorus, "Aller Augen warten," from the Church Cantata 23, written at the end of the C6then period.

11 As in the solo wedding cantata, "Weichet nur, betriibte Schatten."

12 One lacuna in a book with a general title Bach in Keithen is the absence of any discussion of organ music. Here, there is still work to be done.

Thomas Morley. A Plain and Easy Introduction to Practical Music. Ed. by R. Alec Harman with a foreword by R. Thurston Dart. London: J. W.

Dent & Sons, 1952 [New York: W. W. Norton]. xxix, 326 pp. IN MR. HARMAN'S WORDS, "the present edition has aimed at producing the book [Morley's Introduction] in an easily read- able form . . . and is designed more for the student than for the specialist." Since any specialist may justly be presumed already to have within arm's reach the facsimile reprint of the I597 original issued with an introduction by Canon E. H. Fellowes in 1937 (Shakespeare Association Facsimiles No. 14), Mr. Harman has felt no obligation to produce a critical edition, but has instead provided an edition which can be used by the college sophomore making his first acquaintance with I6th- century music. In carrying out his an- nounced purposes, Mr. Harman has mod- ernized spelling and punctuation, replaced certain obsolete Elizabethan expressions by their modem equivalents, scored Morley's music examples in G and F clefs, added frequent explanatory footnotes, rearranged the sequence of the various sections "in a more convenient form," and suppressed as redundant eleven pages of music in Morley's original between the Peroratio and The Annotations.

The design and layout of the present edition deserve unqualified praise. The transcribed musical examples, though reaching a total of more than 300, are all engraved, a luxury which nowadays would be out of the question had such an edition been attempted in the United States. Morley's glosses, moreover, are all printed exactly as they should be in the margins, another printing luxury which would hardly have been possible had such an edition been attempted here. The footnotes, though copious (there are 300 on the first I19 pages, many extending to a full paragraph), are all printed on the page to which they belong' and fre- quently contain interspersed musical examples of Mr. Harman's own choice in a running text. As if these refinements did not add sufficiently to the cost of book production, Mr. Harman has gone further

1 In music examples extending over several pages, however, footnotes are held in reserve until the end of the example.



bach in kothen

Documents