Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven

by Gardiner, John Eliot

  The springboard of his achievement is his direct interaction with the Gospel itself – its underlying themes, its antitheses and symbols – here more perceptibly than in the following Matthew Passion. The symbols spring to life every time the music is performed and help us to make sense of the outrage and pain of suffering, the contradictions and perplexities of the Passion story. Bach connects all along with the underlying human drama in John’s account and brings it to the surface with the sympathetic realism of a Caravaggio or a Rembrandt. The equivalent to their masterly brushwork is his highly developed sense of narrative drama and his unerring feel for an appropriate scale and tone for each and every scene. Akin to the priority both painters gave to the play of darkness and its opposite is the way Bach’s music is suffused with a translucency exceptional even by his standards. When speaking of Rembrandt’s religious paintings, Goethe implied that the painter not so much ‘illustrated’ biblical events as took them ‘beyond their scriptural basis’.44 That is exactly what Bach does here: but rather than pigment it is the musical substance that is ‘shone through’.

  It is peculiarly difficult for us to grasp the prodigious craftsmanship and palpable sense of purpose in a work as complex as the John Passion. Bach seldom draws attention to the technical workings that underpin his compositional skills. Yet, like Brahms, he would have been quick to acknowledge that ‘without craftsmanship, inspiration is a mere reed shaken in the wind’. Whether this can mean that his music was spiritually inspired (or, as some might claim, divinely engendered) depends of course on how we choose to reflect on the sources of his inspiration. When questioned further about the source of his inspiration, Brahms pointed to John’s Gospel and to Jesus’ words: ‘the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works … He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do’ (14:10–12). Bach’s answer could have been identical. The John Passion holds our attention from beginning to end – its music stirring, disturbing, exultant and profoundly moving. In this work Bach found his own first triumphant vindication of Luther’s injunction that ‘Christ’s Passion must be met not with words or forms, but with life and truth.’

  * * *

  a Bach’s startling use of opposites here – between Jesus’ glorification (Herrlichkeit) and his abasement (Niedrigkeit) – can be traced back to Johann Arndt’s three sermons on Psalm 8 (Auslegung des gantzen Psalters Davids (1643)).

  b John Butt suggests that in Britain, at any rate, ‘the public disgrace of not performing in the “approved” historical style was simply too heavy to bear for cash-strapped orchestras; moreover, the Matthew Passion’s traditional outing on Good Friday began to make much less sense as the public grew ever more indifferent to the notion of such a Friday. Greatly valued and still performed the Matthew Passion might be, but no longer as an unquestioned part of the mainstream repertoire’ (John Butt, Bach’s Dialogue with Modernity: Perspectives on the Passions (2010), p. 18).

  c Nevertheless there was a tradition of support for concerted music within the liturgy by some of the Orthodox clergy in Leipzig, including August Pfeiffer (1640–98), who enthused about the importance of music in worship, even though he was stone deaf (his Apostolische Christen-Schule (1695) was in Bach’s library), and Johann Benedikt Carpzov III, archdeacon of the Thomaskirche between 1714 and 1730 and whose family had connections to the Bachs (see Chapter 9, p. 318). We should not rule out the possibility that some of the clergy may well have been bowled over by the scale of Bach’s John Passion, which was unprecedented in its length, drama and rhetorical force.

  d In his ‘Meditation on Christ’s Passion’, Luther had stressed its central importance for the believer: ‘It is more beneficial to ponder Christ’s Passion just once than to fast a whole year or to pray a psalm daily, etc.’; ‘Unless God inspires our heart, it is impossible for us of ourselves to meditate thoroughly on Christ’s Passion’ (Eyn Sermon von der Betrachtung des heyligen Christi (1519) in LW, Vol. 42).

  e Telemann’s student ensemble, the collegium musicum, continued to give concerts of church music in the university church on feast days and during the fairs, while at the Neukirche, under Telemann’s successors (Hoffmann, Vogler and Schott), music impregnated with the Italian operatic style went on being performed there during the first two decades of the eighteenth century.

  f All that was missing were the operatic sets and costumes. Brockes’s was the most celebrated in a genre called Passion oratorios, set to a completely original and non-liturgical poetic text that was distinct in purpose and structure from the oratorio-like Passions, which faithfully adhered to the biblical text (normally confined to one of the four Gospels but sometimes synthesising their accounts), even when varied with meditative aria-interpolations and, of course, chorales. His sentimental literalism has much in common with the sculptures to be found in Bavarian Catholic churches of the time, which, at their worst, degenerate into a zealous but dismal kitsch, a pageant of often sado-masochistic imagery. Basil Smallman draws attention to the paradox that ‘these libretti [by Brockes and others] were part of a reaction again the Pietist cult of simplicity … their tasteless imagery and their preoccupation with the grosser physical aspects of pain and suffering – traits which were characteristic of Pietist poetry’ (The Background of Passion Music (1971), p. 76).

  g This was a practice going back to 1530 in which, at the main service on Good Friday, in place of the Gospel, John’s account of the Passion story was chanted in front of the lectern in the chancel ‘by an alumnus as Evangelist … [while] a deacon had the role of Christ and the choir that of the people’ (Bildnisse der sämmtlichen Superintendenten der Leipziger Diöces (1839), p. 54). The fact that as late as 1722 a new set of parts of Walter’s Passions were written out for the turba chorus – simple four-part chordal responses, in contrast to the monophonic delivery of the biblical narrative – is an index of this enduring tradition (H.-J. Schulze, ‘Bachs Aufführungsapparat’ in Die Welt der Bach-Kantaten, Christoph Wolff (eds.) (1999), Vol. 3, p. 148).

  h We learn that Bach was paid twelve thalers for this guest appearance and that twenty copies of the libretto of that particular Passion setting were printed for use by the courtiers; but we do not know whether the fee was paid for composing, as opposed to supervising the performance of someone else’s music (A. Glöckner, ‘Neue Spuren zu Bachs ‘Weimer’ Passion’, Leipziger Beiträge zur Bach-Forschung, Vol. 1 (1995), p. 35 NBR, p. 78).

  i A ‘short’ conducting score survives in a later copyist’s hand, extracts of which appeared in Arnold Schering’s Musikgeschichte Leipzigs ((1926), Vol. 2, pp. 25–33) – enough to demonstrate Kuhnau’s mastery of recitative style but not a lot else besides. Johann Adolph Scheibe evidently knew Kuhnau’s Mark Passion: ‘sometimes he succeeded in writing deep and poetic music [as] shown by … his last sacred works, especially his Passion Oratorio which he finished a few years before his death … We see how clearly he understood the employment and laws of rhythm, we see too how careful he always was to make his sacred works melodious and flowing, and in many cases really affecting’ (Critischer Musikus (1737), Vol. 2, p. 334). Against this, Schering’s study of the surviving Kuhnau fragment elicited disparaging observations upon it: its overall value is ‘astonishingly limited in terms of fantasy … narrow in its musical horizon … a mosaic of backward-looking forms in terms of style and expression’ (Schering, op. cit.). Yet the sexton of the Thomaskirche, Johann Christoph Rost, marked down the premiere of Kuhnau’s Passion in his diary as a red-letter day: ‘On Good Friday of the year 1721, in the Vespers service, the Passion was performed for the first time in concerted style [musiciret]’ (BD II, No. 180/ NBR, p. 114).

  j Standing behind Kuhnau’s experiment was a century and a half of varied attempts at Passion oratorios and oratorio Passions beginning with Antonio Scandello’s John Passion (1561), in which plainsong alternated with short bursts of polyphony. To me by far the most intriguing of these prototypes are the three modally structured se
ttings by Heinrich Schütz: his Luke Passion of 1664, his John of 1665 and his Matthew of 1666. Restricted to a small a cappella vocal ensemble, Schütz evolves his own idiosyncratic style of recitation, one that proves far more expressive than that of many of his successors, balancing it with brief but striking choral interventions. Between Schütz and Kuhnau probably the most notable examples are those by Thomas Selle – his John Passion (1641) being the first to include instrumental interludes, and four Matthew Passions: by Christian Flor (1667), in which there is the embryo of orchestrally accompanied turbae; by Johann Sebastiani (1672), the first to include simple chorales; by Johann Theile (1673), in which the Evangelist is accompanied by viols; and by Johann Meder (1701), in which Jesus’ words are set in arioso. Here at last there are signs of expressive tension at the more dramatic junctures as well as a few well-crafted strophic arias. But only in Schütz’s Passions does one encounter a strong creative imagination flying free of the liturgically imposed restrictions, although in a more etiolated style than that of his successors, opening the door to a rich world of biblical exegesis. Performances today of any one of his three settings still prove capable of holding an audience in their spiritual and emotional grip.

  k In his comparison of the two painters’ Descent from the Cross, Simon Schama suggests ‘where the emphasis in the Rubens is on action and reaction, in Rembrandt’s version it is on contemplation and witness … doers are perforce replaced by watchers’ (Rembrandt’s Eyes (1999), pp. 292–3). That, too, is the main difference, albeit oversimplified, between Bach’s John and Matthew Passions.

  l Spitta is the first in a line of commentators who fail to detect in Bach’s opening chorus any of the ‘ideas of tenderness or love’ we associate with John’s Gospel. I feel this is wrong. A lot, of course, hinges on interpretation. To my mind the B section beginning Zeig uns durch deine Passion (‘Show us through your Passion’) implies tender, dolce singing, while the upward skipping A minor scale of the sopranos (bars 77–8) signifies the joy and release implicit in Christ’s atonement. That the road to victory for humankind is shown to be bumpy and hard-going is evident from the sharp contrasts between these positive upward arpeggios (zu aller Zeit/’at all times’) and the dissonant re-descent in piano (auch in der größten Niedrigkeit/’even in the greatest abasement’). The synchronisation of a spirited vocal melisma (verherrlicht worden bist/’you have been glorified’) with the turbulent movement of the upper strings is a brilliant association of opposed ideas, one that he had already adumbrated in the final chorale of BWV 105, Herr, gehe nicht ins Gericht (see Chapter 9, p. 301).

  m Daniel R. Melamed has shown that the attribution to Keiser is found ‘in only one source not connected with the early performances [in Hamburg] and is open to question’ (Hearing Bach’s Passions (2005), p. 81). Bach brought the performing parts of this Mark Passion with him to Leipzig in 1723. Don O. Franklin makes a persuasive case for viewing this work (often cited as a model for Bach’s Matthew Passion) as an important source for the John Passion: ‘Bach drew extensively on [it] … in compiling the libretto for his first oratorio passion’ – ‘in general contour and style’ – and there is indeed a striking ‘similarity in the overall proportions of the two works’ (‘The Libretto of Bach’s John Passion and the Doctrine of Reconciliation: An Historical Perspective’ in Proceedings of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, A. A. Clement (ed.), Vol. 143 (1995), pp. 191–2, 195). That Bach held this score in high regard is given further proof in his decision to work on it further in a revival he gave of it in Leipzig in 1726.

  n None other than Bertolt Brecht was fascinated by Bach’s ‘exemplary gestural music’. He admired Bach’s precision in defining locality from the outset, in the very first words of the Evangelist: ‘Jesus … went forth with his disciples over the brook Cedron’ (John 18:1).

  o Another indicator of the potency of Bach’s use of chorales in the John Passion lies in their homophony: by adding instruments to double the vocal lines Bach tilted the balance in favour of the top and bottom, the extra edge of the oboes adding to that of the violins but softened by the flutes, the bassoon functioning the same way and supported by double bass and organ – the effect is rich but never opaque. None of this serves any purpose, of course, if there is not a total identification and understanding of the text by the instrumentalists, even to the point of imitating the exact word-shapes and vocal inflections of the hard-working singers. Bach’s music is full of instances when his singers are called on to emulate the agility and technical fluency of the instruments in the interest of clearly articulated running passages and percussive rhythms. Whereas in the turba choruses they are stretched to the limit, here in the chorales the players are required to return the compliment: to add colour and depth but never to mask or overwhelm the singers nor to reduce the hieratic impact of the sung delivery of the text.

  p Wilfrid Mellers makes a suggestive parallel here to William Blake: this is a ‘Song of Innocence’ to complement the preceding ‘Song of Experience’ (Bach and the Dance of God (1980), p. 103).

  q Peter’s twin denials (Ich bins nicht) were understood in the Lutheran tradition and by subsequent theologians to be the ‘negative counterparts’ of Jesus’ earlier insistence (Ich bins). Bach sets both as strong dominant-tonic cadences, but in Peter’s case he adds an emphatic appoggiatura to the word nicht. Significantly the modulations confirmed by Peter’s cadences, first in G, then in A, have already been established in the transitional recitatives: as Eric Chafe observes, by making Jesus ‘the agency of the modulation to sharps’, Bach ensures that we understand that he is also the agency of Peter’s redemption (J. S. Bach’s Johannine Theology: The St John Passion and the Cantatas for Spring 1725 (forthcoming)).

  r Actually this glance is described neither in Matthew’s nor John’s account: it comes in Luke (22:61) and is paraphrased in the tenth verse of Paul Stockmann’s hymn that Bach uses here as the culmination of Part I. Bach possessed a copy of Heinrich Müller’s sermons on Christ’s Passion (Von Leyden Christi) in which he says ‘The Saviour’s glance was like the sun, warming Peter’s cold heart’ (Der Blick des Heylandes war gleichsam die Sonne, / die das kalte Herz in Petro erwärmete).

  s Mellers (op. cit., p. 109) claims it is ‘the most humanly passionate music Bach ever wrote’, and one can hardly disagree with that. But in the process, as Laurence Dreyfus astutely observes, Bach plays fast and loose with the poetic structures of the text and ignores ‘certain sanctioned doctrinal views so as to highlight aspects of the experience he found more compelling’. Unconventional as Bach’s word-setting is here, its very disjointedness is, I believe, a deliberate ploy – a way of conveying despair and choking remorse. If one has done something reprehensible (like betraying one’s idol) one does not necessarily speak or sing in rhyming couplets. Dreyfus recognises this: that Bach, ‘in his anti-literary way, is busy focusing on a peculiarly personal and pointedly self-authorised reading of the text’. But to state ‘most [of the words] are drowned out by the music, by all the attention Bach has paid to the ritornello’ would indicate to me signs of a poorly conducted performance (‘The Triumph of “Instrumental Melody”: Aspects of Musical Poetics in Bach’s St John Passion’, Bach Perspectives, Vol. 8 (2011)). Indeed, it is the very subjectivity of Bach’s interpretation and the explosively expressive force of his music that makes it so compelling to us. This aria in particular is one in which, like Monteverdi before him, Bach aims to move the passions of his listeners. To arrive at this (again like Monteverdi) he himself needs to be moved. Bach is manifestly stirred by Peter’s desperate situation and is utterly true to its underlying disclosure of human failings. Proof of his success here comes via the mysterious transformative processes known to all theatre people (and some performing musicians): those experiences of actions and conditions shared between performers and audiences that seem to vault over temporal, cultural and linguistic barriers. This is the phenomenon for which the Italian neurophysiologist Giacomo Rizzolatti claims to
have found a biological explanation. His discovery of ‘mirror neurons’ suggests that we are capable of an instantaneous understanding of the emotions of others through neural imitation, and that there are cognitive processes that allow us to interpret sensory information as laden with a particular emotive significance (G. Rizzolatti and C. Sinigaglia, Mirrors in the Brain (2008)).