Today is the Vernal Equinox, the first day of Spring, and in 1685, the same can be said of musical excellence, both in the Church and in the West, as within them the full vibrance of musical life was born, as well – with the birth of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), the man known as the Greatest Composer in the History of Western Civilization. We have written much on Intrepid Lutherans about this creative Master, a fiercely orthodox Lutheran who infused his faith into his compositions through the language of counterpoint, in it battling not only Pietism but, as we detailed in our post, Music for the Twelve Days of Christmas, Part 3: Johann Sebastian Bach, the apostasy of the Enlightenment. The first post in which we first featured J.S. Bach, Music for Holy Week, Part 1 – excerpts from Matthäus Passion, we summarized Bach's life and accomplishments, as follows:
“Bach perhaps needs little introduction: he was and remains the master of counterpoint and represents the pinnacle of Baroque musical achievement. In addition to his many secular works, as Cantor of St. Thomas Church in Leipzig he composed a full series of Cantatas to accompany the Lutheran liturgy for each week of the Church Calendar, along with many other Sacred works as he was commissioned... It is worth noting, however, than in addition to his status as a composer, Johann Sebastian Bach was also fiercely orthodox in his Lutheranism. Being active as a composer during the rise of German Pietism and attempting to ward it off through the Sacred works he was often commissioned to compose, his professional library was proliferate with personally annotated works of Lutheran theology – he had the library of a theologian, and he used it as reference material in the composition of his works.”
Schütz studied under the Renaissance Master of antiphonal and polychoral composition, Giovanni Gabrieli, at St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice. So remarkable was his performance as a student, that Master Gabrieli was compelled to recommend him with the words, “In Schütz you will have a musician such as one will not find in many other places”. Indeed, upon his death in 1612, Gabrieli willed his signet ring to Schütz. Heinrich Schütz was appointed Kapellmeister at the Royal Court in Dresden in 1615, and from there through the remainder of his career, he masterfully wedded the highest musical art of the Renaissance with the German language, the purest manifestation of which, for him, was Martin Luther's translation of the the Bible.
“the advent of the chordal style dispensing with linear but rich polyphonic textures made it possible for technically less accomplished composers to shine with concertante figured-bass music. According to Schütz, there were hardly any younger composers in Germany willing to deal with the more profound aspects of composition. So their tonal idiom was bound to become increasingly shallow and banal.”
As a result, he published his Geistliche Chormusik (Sacred Choral Music) in 1648, dedicating it to the choir of St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, to “encourage budding German composers, before they would try their hand at the concertante style ...to first demonstrate their skill in this area.” O that today's Lutheran composers would follow this advice, and avoid their own “shallow and banal tonal idiom!”
It seems to be unknown whether Bach took the recommendation of Schütz to heart, or whether those responsible for calling Bach to be Cantor at St. Thomas in Leipzig were seeking to diligently live up to the encouragement Schütz obviously meant for them, or whether his Geistliche Chormusik had any such impact by that time at all. But it is, at least, an interesting coincidence. Other interesting coincidences include Bach's place in time: Heinrich Schütz died as Pia Desideria (published 1675) was percolating in the mind of Philipp Jakob Spener (1635-1705); Bach was born as plans for the Pietist learning center, University of Halle were being drawn; while Bach served in Leipzig, the last of the Lutheran theologians from the Lutheran Age of Orthodoxy, and vigorous opponent of Pietism, Valentin Ernst Löscher (1673-1749), served as Superintendent and as pastor at the Kreuzkirche in Dresden (practically a stone's-throw from the Royal Court, and a place known to benefit from regular collaboration with Schütz); and both Bach and Löscher, being in such proximity, battled with fierce dedication against Pietism in their respective vocations. Löscher and Bach died at the opening of the Enlightenment, in 1749 and 1750, respectively – with no one, really, to take their place.
With the death of Bach, accompanied by the demise of the Lutheran Age of Orthodoxy, the Spring of musical expression also came to an end, and along with it was left behind the Source of New-Life, the True teaching of God's Word upon which this Spring emerged. God's Truth gave way to Man's pride, the searing heat of Enlightenment notions, such as the “perfectibility of man,” invading both the Fine Arts and Christian Theology, first vaunting the objectivity of man's intellect, then vaunting the subjectivity of man's social and emotional existence, each iteratively warring against the other. Today, we live in the Autumn of both the Arts and the visible Church, the clouds of post-Modernism increasingly obscuring the light of Truth, upon which true art and true theology depend. We await with dread the dark Winter that is fast upon us, ready to endure it for the sake of Christ and the benefit of our neighbor, yet wondering what misery it will bring. But we remember the Spring. And we long for its return.
Johann Sebastian Bach is recognized as the Greatest Composer in the history of Western Civilization; and the work recognized as the Greatest Work of the Greatest Composer is nothing other than a Lutheran Mass – Bach's Lutheran Mass in B-Minor. We offer for our readers today, in celebration of the birth of the Greatest Composer to have ever lived, and in fond remembrance of the Spring that once was, this, a full performance of Bach's Greatest Work.
Lutheran Mass in B-Minor – by Johann Sebastian Bach
Bach perhaps needs little introduction: he was and remains the master of counterpoint and represents the pinnacle of Baroque musical achievement. In addition to his many secular works, as Cantor of St. Thomas Church in Leipzig he composed a full series of Cantatas to accompany the Lutheran liturgy for each week of the Church Calendar, along with many other Sacred works as he was commissioned... It is worth noting, however, than in addition to his status as a composer, Johann Sebastian Bach was also fiercely orthodox in his Lutheranism. Being active as a composer during the rise of German Pietism2 and attempting to ward it off through the Sacred works he was often commissioned to compose, his professional library was proliferate with personally annotated works of Lutheran theology – he had the library of a theologian, and he used it as reference material in the composition of his works.
Bach's genius as a composer was not entirely his own. He is known to have studied the Masters of the previous generation and incorporated their genius into his own art: men like Michael Praetorius, Samuel Scheidt, Johann Schein, and especially Heinrich Schütz – who was the subject of Part Two of this Music for the Twelve Days of Christmas series. Indeed, Bach's relationship to Schütz is almost serendipitous. Recall from Part Two the concern Schütz had in the second third of his life over the decline in compositional integrity he had been witnessing, for "
the advent of the chordal style dispensing with linear but rich polyphonic textures made it possible for technically less accomplished composers to shine with concertante figured-bass music. According to Schütz, there were hardly any younger composers in Germany willing to deal with the more profound aspects of composition. So their tonal idiom was bound to become increasingly shallow and banal.
As a result, he published his Geistliche Chormusik (Sacred Choral Music) in 1648, dedicating it to the choir of St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, to "encourage budding German composers, before they would try their hand at the concertante style ...to first demonstrate their skill in this area."
It seems to be unknown whether Bach took the recommendation of Schütz to heart, or whether those responsible for calling Bach to be Cantor at St. Thomas in Leipzig were seeking to diligently live up to the encouragement Schütz obviously meant for them, or whether his Geistliche Chormusik had any such impact by that time at all. But it is, at least, an interesting coincidence. Other interesting coincidences include Bach's place in time: Heinrich Schütz died as Pia Desideria (published 1675) was percolating in the mind of Philipp Jakob Spener (1635-1705); Bach was born as plans for the Pietist learning center, University of Halle were being drawn; while Bach served in Leipzig, the last of the Lutheran theologians from the Lutheran Age of Orthodoxy," and vigorous opponent of Pietism, Valentin Ernst Löscher (1673 - 1749), served as Superintendant and as pastor at the Kreuzkirche in Dresden (practically a stones-throw from the Royal Court, and a place known to benefit from regular collaboration with Schütz); and both Bach and Löscher, being in such proximity, battled with fierce dedication against Pietism in their respective vocations. Löscher and Bach died at the opening of the Enlightenment, in 1749 and 1750, respectively – with no one, really, to take their place.
Art following the Enlightenment ceases to speak of objective subjects The opening of the Enlightenment, around 1750, marks the end of the Baroque Period, and the beginning of the Classical Period. This period lasts roughly until the period in which German Romantic philosophy began to have cultural significance, around the turn of the 19th Century; this is about the time that Romanticism began to displace Classical expressions of the Enlightenment. But what is it about Baroque music that sets it apart? What really were the "the more profound aspects of composition" referred to by Heinrich Schütz (above)? Why does there appear to be a rigid structure and order in the Baroque period, to the point where J.G. Walther (a cousin of Bach) would define such music as "a heavenly philosophical and specifically mathematical science?"3 From the time of Plato and re-emphasized by Martin Luther, music was viewed as a direct reflection of and "evidence of divine order,"4 in the world and in the Universe. Johannes Kepler wrote "Now one will no longer be surprised that man has formed this most excellent order of notes or steps into the musical system or scale, since one can see that in this matter he acts as nothing but the Ape of God, the Creator, playing, as it were, a drama about the Order of celestial motions."5
As a result of such a lofty view of music and composition, Baroque composers infused their music with numerical code and allegory, attaching meaning to specific numbers and ratios, and in this way, the learned composer attempted "to replicate in earthly music the celestial harmony with which God had joined and imbued the Universe."6 Therefore, as Luther put it, music is the "faithful servant of theology" and ought to deliver "sermons in sound."7
Contrary to those of later era's, like the Classical and Romantic, the Baroque composer saw
"himself as an artisan: not an artist 'expressing' a personal idea or feeling – a conception the Baroque composer would have found entirely strange – but as a professional with an assigned task and learnable, teachable methods of doing it. Combined with the Baroque infatuation with encoded allegory, this concept of music as an oratorial craft inspired a vast compositional vocabulary of passages, rhythms, key changes, and other devices that could telegraph in music the meaning of a text, the language of which came to be known as musical-rhetorical figures."8
Thus we see the force of Natural Law9, observations of Divine Order and understanding of their significance, informing the expression of Baroque "artisans."
"The rich acoustic medium of the medieval stone church had encouraged composers' experiments writing note against note (punctus contra punctum) and eventually of braiding related vocal lines through one another to form increasingly rich weaves of melody. The most rigorous of part-writing, such as cannon and fugue, came to be known collectively as learned counterpoint."10
"For Bach and his musical ancestors ...composing and performing music was ...a deeply spiritual enterprise whose sole purpose, as his works were inscribed, was for the glory of God. [And to His glory], Bach represented Church music and especially the learned counter-point of cannon and fugue"11
Yet, as the Age of Lutheran Orthodoxy came to a close, as the strong Lutheran voice in culture began to wane, as fidelity to God's Word in thought, word and deed gave way to new ways of thinking, and as man in his natural state of rebellion thereby sought freedom from God and the Church, clinging to the only other tools available with which to make sense of the world, empiricism and reason, the necessity and reality of Divine grace also gave way to "confidence in human perfectibility."12 Oddly, the result in artistic expression was that instead of outward or objective subjects, the work of the composer became significantly more subjective, especially by the time of the Romantic Era, standing as much as self-projection as anything else:
"the expression of feeling in music was all, and the affectation that mattered was not a text or other object for depiction but the feeling state of the performer and composer... the new 'enlightened' composer wrote for one reason and one only: to please the audience."13
In this way, the subject of musical compositions following the Enlightenment became the composer, became his thoughts and his feelings as he struggled to give voice to them through his art, while the performer strove to abscond with that subject by embodying and personifying the composition in his own performance of it, thus making himself the subject of the art.
"denigrated counterpoint as the vestige of an outworn aesthetic, extolling instead the 'natural and delightful' in music, by which they meant the easier pleasure of song, the harmonious ornamentation of a single line of melody... For Frederick, the goal of music was simply to be 'agreeable,' an entertainment and a diversion, easy work for the performer and audience alike. He despised music that, as he put it, 'smells of the Church,' and Bach's chorales specifically as 'dumb stuff.'"14
Bach's Evening in the "Palace of Reason" Later in life, Bach was given the opportunity to respond to the Enlightenment, in one of his most outstanding works. As one who represented the modern philosophies of his day, Frederick the Great of Prussia grasped an opportunity to summon the elderly Johann Sebastian Bach to his palace in 1747, for the purpose of presenting "history's greatest master of counterpoint the most taxing possible challenge to his art,"15 for what seems to have been simply a joke out of contempt for the "old" style of music which Bach so ably represented – that of the "learned counterpoint" of cannon and fugue which had been used for centuries to mirror the celestial harmony of heaven and nature. Frederick proceeded to play for Bach a melody of twenty-one notes which had been "constructed to be as resistant to counterpoint as possible"16 and then challenged the elderly composer to improvise a three-part fugue using the theme he had played. Bach, who had mastered the art of his craft and who understood the mechanics as well as the power of music to communicate, was able then and there to improvise "a three-part fugue on Frederick's Royal Theme [which] had all the intellectual rigor of a finished work."17 Not impressed, Frederick demanded that Bach start over, this time composing a fugue in six parts – something which Bach had never done. Bach agreed, but added that he would need time to work out the composition. Two months later, Bach had finished his six-part fugue – but not only this, for Bach had something to say to the monarch who had not simply challenged him, but who had rejected God and the music of the Church. In that time he had composed two fugues, the first being the three-part fugue requested by Frederick, the second being the six part fugue he had also requested, along with ten cannons (each representing the Ten Commandments) and a sonata, bundling them in a single work he titled, Musikalisches Opfer (Musical Offering). The two fugues he named Ricercar, a term he had never used as a title for a fugue. The term is at once a Latin acronymn representing the words Regis Iussu Cantio Et Reliqua Cononica Arte Resoluta (At the king's command, the song and the remainder resolved with cannonic art), and is also a Latin word meaning, "to search out with diligence."18 Bach wove his message to Frederick throughout his composition, using musical-rhetorical tools such as rising and sinking keys. For example, inscriptions were written to the king in the cannons, telling him in one cannon to "Seek and ye shall find" (referring to God's mercy), and indicating the fate of Enlightenment thinking in another cannon which was inscribed to represent the king's glory: though the notes would rise, it never seemed to have left its original key or to go anywhere. One could say that this "Musical Offering to Frederick represents as stark a rebuke of his beliefs and worldview as an absolute monarch has ever received,"19 and at the same time "it is one of the great works of art in the history of music."20 And this is but a small taste of what was going on in art of the Baroque Period. Not just vague sentiment the artist attempted to evoke in the heart of his viewer or hearer, but a specific message using a system long developed according to observation of God's General Revelation.
Bach: Weinachts Oratorium For this final installment of Christmas Music, we present Bach's Weinachts Oratorium. It's six parts were intended for the context of worship on three generally observed Church holidays immediately following Christmas Day: Parts 1 and 2 for the Feast of Christ's Circumcision (celebrated on January 1), Parts 3 and 4 for the Sunday following the New Year, and Parts 5 and 6 for the Feast of Epiphany. There are multiple recurring themes in Bach's Christmas Oratorio – one of which is a Lutheran lenten theme the reader may recognize from Bach's use of it in his Matthäus Passion. What does he do with this theme throughout the Oratorio? As you listen, what else do you hear?
Johann Sebastion Bach: Weinachts Oratorium The standard recording of this piece in our household, should the reader be interested, has become that of the Dresdner Kreuzchor, under Martin Flämig
This full recording of Bach's Weinachts Oratorium is broken into two videos, which play consecutively. It is about 2.5hrs in length.
------------ Endnotes:
I had planned additional installments, but illness has prevented me from getting to them – so I publish this post, even though it is no longer Christmas, but the first day of Epiphany. In fact, credit for most of the content of this post belongs to my wife, who, as an accomplished vocalist and skilled artist, knows these details better than I do. Since her interest and growing area of expertise is cultural apologetics, I asked her to help me out, giving her a few guidelines from which she produced most of the above...
Ibid., pg. 81. Note also, that numbers not only had significance in music, they had significance in Lutheran theology at the time and even today, particularly in the interpretation of prophetic books of the Bible: the numbers 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 10 & 12 have long been recognized as significant – Dr. Siegbert Becker's (WELS) work on Revelation, Revelation: The Distant Triumph Song, and Rev. Wayne Mueller's (WELS) follow-up commentary on Revelation for the People's Bible Commentary series, are evidence of this significance. Rev. Jack Cascione (LCMS) published a work studying the use of number in prophetical books of the Bible, entitled In Search of the Biblical Order, and the publisher of this book, Biblion Publishing, used his research in their typesetting of of the Book of Revelation that appeared in the Lutheran translation of the New Testament, God's Word to the Nations (1988), to visually, and very effectively, impress upon the reader how number was being used in the text.
Ibid., pg. 81. See also this Wikipeadia article on "'musical-rhetorical' figures," a.k.a. Musica Poetica
Throughout this Holy Week, we have been featuring excerpts from recordings of liturgical compositions which deliver to their hearer the very words of Christ's Passion according to Gospel writers, in song. During Holy Week, the historic Lutheran Church had selected lessons from each of the Gospels for each day of the week, such that the Passion of Christ would be heard by the congregation from the perspective of each Evangelist, and these lessons were presented to the congregation as part of the liturgy. It was also customary that the Gospel not be merely read, but chanted or sung. The excerpts we have featured this week demonstrate various liturgical compositions via which liturgists would deliver these lessons -- and not just any compositions, but the works of two of the most important German composers in Western history: Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz. On Monday, in Part 1 of this "Music for Holy Week" series, we provided a brief biography of these composers, including some details indicating their importance to Lutheran liturgical music and its resulting impact, and we invite the reader to visit that post for further information.
We have, in the previous four days this week, visited the Passion accounts of St. Matthew (Monday), St. Mark (Tuesday), St. John (Wednesday), and St. Luke (Thursday). Today, Good Friday, we revisit the Passion according to St. John in a recording of Johann Sebastian Bach's Johannes Passion, and also hear a composition by Heinrich Schütz that would be heard during the Good Friday Tenebrae Service: Die Sieben Worte Jesu Christi am Kreuz -- the Seven last Words of Christ on the Cross.
Here are two musical settings of the Gospel accounts. The first is an excerpt from Bach's Johannes Passion; the second is a full performance of Schütz's Die Sieben Worte Jesu Christi am Kreuz.
Throughout this Holy Week, we will be featuring excerpts from recordings of liturgical compositions which deliver to their hearer the very words of Christ's Passion according to the Gospel writers, in song. The Lutheran composers we have selected are mounted high on the throne of Baroque artistic achievement, and have been thus recognized for generations the world over: Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz. On Monday, in Part 1 of this "Music for Holy Week" series, we provided a brief biography of these composers, including some details indicating their importance to Lutheran liturgical music and its resulting impact. One of those details included the liturgical practice of chanting or singing the Gospel lesson, rather than merely speaking it. That is what these Passion compositions, written by Lutherans for the purpose of Lutheran worship, are: liturgical compositions which set the words of the Passion accounts to music, so that they can be sung as part of the liturgy of the church. That is to say, these singing liturgists were functioning as God's Ministers. Yesterday, in Part 3 of this "Music for Holy Week" series, we stated without commentary the fact that women were not part of these liturgical choirs. This practice was not a culture of sexism invading the church, nor was it a chauvinistic devaluation of their gifts. It was the application of clear Scripture teaching. Because such singing was liturgical, it was also ministerial and authoritative, a role from which females are directly prohibited in Scripture, as such public actions amount to usurpation of God's will for the ordering of His Church on Earth (1 Ti. 2:5-3:2; Ti. 1:5-9; 1 Co. 11:8-10;14:33-40; Ep. 5:18,21-24; 1 Pe. 3:1-6; Co. 3:17-18,23-25). The question of who may function as a liturgist in our own congregations, is answered today with the same abundant clarity of these Scripture references: only males may function as ministers in Christ's congregation, and this includes liturgists, whether they are singing or speaking the message of Scripture.
We have in the previous three days of this week visited the Passion accounts of St. Matthew (Monday), St. Mark (Tuesday) and St. John (Wednesday). Today, Maundy Thursday, we hear excerpts from performances of musical settings of St. Luke's account of the Passion of Christ, Lukas Passion, which were composed by Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz, respectively, below:
Yesterday, in Part 1 of this Music for Holy Week series, we introduced the historic practice of daily lessons through Holy Week covering the Passion accounts from each of the Gospels and reported how "The Singing Church" delivered the words of these accounts to their hearers in song. Yesterday, we heard excerpts from compositions of Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz, the two greatest German composers in history, which gave the account of Christ's Passion according to the Gospel of St. Matthew. Today, with much less introduction to the composer and his work, we share with our readers excerpts from Johann Sebastian Bach's Markus Passion. It is important to note, however, that these were not composed as performance pieces. These were works of liturgical music, which set the appointed Gospel lesson to music and were intended for the context of worship. For more details on the composers, and their liturgical compositions, please refer to yesterday's post. In addition to excerpts from Markus Passion, today we have included some images of the recently restored Frauenkirche in Dresden, in which one of the recordings featured below was made.
The site of the present-day Frauenkirche had been occupied by a large Gothic structure since the Middle Ages, but by 1722 had fallen into such a state of disrepair that it needed to be demolished and rebuilt. The rebuilding began in 1726 under the watchful eye of Dresden superintendent, Valentin Ernst Löscher (1673-1754) -- the last of the orthodox Lutheran theologians to emerge directly from the Lutheran Age of Orthodoxy. He is remembered for his vigorous polemic against the German Pietists under August Hermann Francke (1663-1727) and Joachim Lange (1670-1744), which is preserved for us in his Complete Timotheus Verinus, recently translated into English by Robert Koester and James Langebartels and currently available from Northwestern Publishing House. Designed by George Bähr and finally completed in 1744, the Frauenkirche stood from that time forward as a marvel of architectural engineering, until it was destroyed in the 1945 fire-bombing of Dresden. It sat, awaiting the fall of the Berlin Wall, as a dingy pile of rubble. Immediately following the end of Soviet occupation of East Germany, in 1989, efforts to rebuild it were organized, and work began in 1993. Working from original plans and historic photographs, the rubble was sifted for re-usable materials so that new materials could be constructed as required. It was completed in 2005.
The video excerpts, below, come from a musical setting of St. Mark's account of the Passion of Christ, Markus Passion, which was composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. The first video was performed at the Frauenkirche in Dresden, Germany:
Excerpt from Bach's Markus Passion (Recorded at the Frauenkirche in 2009)
It may sound "a bit much" to the ears of modern American church-goers, who busy themselves about their business through the week, going to-and-fro, hither-and-thither. These days, mid-week services themselves seem to be regarded as a bother, and this Holy Week, when we Lutherans generally have two mid-week services, attendance can really seem to be a burden. But in "times of yore," for each day of the week leading up to the most important Festival of the Church Calendar, The Festival of Christ's Resurrection, there were appointed lessons, telling the story of Christ's Passion from the perspective of each Gospel writer.
By the early 16th Century, the Western system of musical notation had been so sufficiently developed (mostly in ecclesiastical circles), that systematic exploration of polyphonic forms, which were championed most notably in Paris and Florence in the centuries leading up to the Renaissance, could be broadly pursued. As a consequence of Renaissance humanism and the invention of the printing press, Europe enjoyed an explosion of such exploration. The result for the Church was the great gift of high-art in musical form, which was produced most significantly from the Renaissance period through the Baroque – art which continues to set the bar of excellence for sacred musical expression even today.
In the generation following the Reformation, Lutherans began emerging as leading composers of sacred works, whose creativity and excellence continue to inspire the world. For example, Michael Praetorius, whose father was a pastor and student of Martin Luther's, was a solid Lutheran composer who is considered to be the greatest organist to have ever lived. His three-volume Syntagma musicum, a treatise on baroque instruments, composition, and performance, is considered definitive even today. If one has ever had the good fortune of listening to Praetorius - Lutheran Mass for Christmas Morning, however, one will notice at least one peculiar thing: the Gospel lesson (track 9) is not spoken; rather, it is chanted. This was a rather common practice -- perhaps giving us, in our day and age, a more full idea of what it meant that the Lutheran Church was considered "The Singing Church." In a comment to the post C.F.W. Walther: Filching from sectarian worship resources equals "soul murder", C.P. Krauth was quoted regarding the prominent role of music in the Lutheran Church, characterizing it as follows:
“But especially in sacred song has the Lutheran Church a grand distinctive element of her worship. 'The Lutheran Church,' says Schaff, 'draws the fine arts into the service of religion, and has produced a body of hymns and chorals, which, in richness, power, and unction, surpasses the hymnology of all other churches in the world.' 'In divine worship,' says Goebel, 'we reach glorious features of pre-eminence. The hymns of the Church are the people's confession, and have wrought more than the preaching. In the Lutheran Church alone, German hymnology attained a bloom truly amazing. The words of holy song were heard everywhere, and sometimes, as with a single stroke, won whole cities for the Gospel'” (Krauth, C. (1871). Conservative Reformation and its Theology. Philadelphia: Lippincott. pp. 152-154)
And this musical character extended to the liturgy as well, especially given that, prior to the Enlightenment, congregational singing was generally a cappella (Kretzmann, P. (1921). Christian Art: In the place and in the form of Lutheran Worship. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House. pp. 405-410 – and I urge the reader to find these pages and absorb their content fully). The main task of church musicians was not to apply themselves to the accompaniment of worshipers in the congregation as they sung hymns, but to use instrumental music to accompany the liturgy, and move it forward. One of the main tasks of church composers, therefore, was to compose liturgical music that would accompany the liturgy and the proclamation of the Gospel. We see this in the fairly popular recording of Praetorius - Lutheran Mass for Christmas Morning, mentioned above, but more so in the various Baroque compositions of Christ's Passion. In these compositions, the Gospel accounts are not spoken, but sung or chanted. In this way, in this musical way, 17th Century Lutheran churchgoers would have the account of Christ's Passion delivered to their ears during Holy Week.
Throughout this Holy Week, we will be featuring excerpts from recordings of such compositions, written by two Baroque composers who are considered Germany's greatest: Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz. Bach perhaps needs little introduction: he was and remains the master of counterpoint and represents the pinnacle of Baroque musical achievement. In addition to his many secular works, as Cantor of St. Thomas Church in Leipzig he composed a full series of Cantatas to accompany the Lutheran liturgy for each week of the Church Calendar, along with many other Sacred works as he was commissioned. The definitive collection of Bach's works, the life's work of maestro Helmuth Rilling (a recognized specialist in the compositions of Bach), contains this entire series of Cantatas in addition to the rest of his body of Sacred and secular works. It is worth noting, however, than in addition to his status as a composer, Johann Sebastian Bach was also fiercely orthodox in his Lutheranism. Being active as a composer during the rise of German Pietism and attempting to ward it off through the Sacred works he was often commissioned to compose, his professional library was proliferate with personally annotated works of Lutheran theology – he had the library of a theologian, and he used it as reference material in the composition of his works.
Unlike Bach, it is likely that Heinrich Schütz, along with Praetorius, is an unfamiliar name. Yet, Schütz is considered to be the greatest German composer second to Johann Sebastian Bach, his works consequently being of significant influence on Bach and others. How can it be that a composer of such stature – second in line to Bach, and one whom Bach himself looked to for inspiration – is generally unknown? Answer: like Praetorius, he composed almost exclusively for the Lutheran Church. Heinrich Schütz studied at St. Mark's Basilica in Venice under none other than Giovanni Gabrieli, who, along with his uncle Andrea, was of prime influence in the development of Western music during the Renaissance, particularly that of antiphonal and polychoral music. This was the influence that Schütz brought back to Germany and upper Europe, and which he masterfully wedded with the German language, the purest manifestation of which, for him, was Martin Luther's translation of the the Bible. In other words, it is impossible to substantively confront the compositions of Heinrich Schütz without also being confronted by the message of the Holy Scriptures. This makes him politically incorrect and therefore rather unpopular these days, despite his importance as a composer.
Finally, it might be noticed that the compositions of Schütz seem somewhat "stark." This was neither a factor of style nor indicative of a lack of talent, as his Doppelchörige Motetten, Psalmen Davids, and especially his Geistliche Chormusik fully attest -- but of social and political conditions during most of his career: the period of the Thirty Years' War. The devastation wrought by this extended conflict resulted in a dearth of musicians. So, the musical genius of Heinrich Schütz was applied to the task of creating liturgical compositions for small ensembles of moderate ability.
Here are a couple video excerpts from performances of musical settings of St. Matthew's account of the Passion of Christ, Matthäus Passion, composed by Johann Sebastian Bach and Heinrich Schütz respectively:
Note: Intrepid Lutherans cannot endorse all the content found at the following links, and expects that the visitor accessing them will exercise mature Berean judgment in assessing and making use of them.
Today is the Vernal Equinox, the first day of Spring, and in 1685, the same can be said of musical excellence, both in the Church and in the West, as within them the full vibrance of musical life was born, as well – with the birth of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), the man known as the Greatest Composer in the History of Western Civilization. We have written much on Intrepid Lutherans about this creative Master, a fiercely orthodox Lutheran who infused his faith into his compositions through the language of counterpoint, in it battling not only Pietism but, as we detailed in our post, Music for the Twelve Days of Christmas, Part 3: Johann Sebastian Bach, the apostasy of the Enlightenment. The first post in which we first featured J.S. Bach, Music for Holy Week, Part 1 – excerpts from Matthäus Passion, we summarized Bach's life and accomplishments, as follows:
It seems to be unknown whether Bach took the recommendation of Schütz to heart, or whether those responsible for calling Bach to be Cantor at St. Thomas in Leipzig were seeking to diligently live up to the encouragement Schütz obviously meant for them, or whether his Geistliche Chormusik had any such impact by that time at all. But it is, at least, an interesting coincidence. Other interesting coincidences include Bach's place in time: Heinrich Schütz died as Pia Desideria (published 1675) was percolating in the mind of Philipp Jakob Spener (1635-1705); Bach was born as plans for the Pietist learning center, University of Halle were being drawn; while Bach served in Leipzig, the last of the Lutheran theologians from the Lutheran Age of Orthodoxy, and vigorous opponent of Pietism, Valentin Ernst Löscher (1673-1749), served as Superintendent and as pastor at the Kreuzkirche in Dresden (practically a stone's-throw from the Royal Court, and a place known to benefit from regular collaboration with Schütz); and both Bach and Löscher, being in such proximity, battled with fierce dedication against Pietism in their respective vocations. Löscher and Bach died at the opening of the Enlightenment, in 1749 and 1750, respectively – with no one, really, to take their place.
