Apart from his hundreds of church cantatas, Johann Sebastian Bach wrote secular cantatas in Weimar, Köthen and Leipzig, for instance for members of the Royal-Polish and Prince-electoral Saxonian family (e.g. Trauer-Ode),[1] or other public or private occasions (e.g. Hunting Cantata).[2] The text of these cantatas was occasionally in dialect (e.g. Peasant Cantata)[3] or in Italian (e.g. Amore traditore).[4] Many of the secular cantatas were lost, but for some of these the text and the occasion are known, for instance when Picander later published their libretto (e.g. BWV Anh. 11–12).[5] Some of the secular cantatas had a plot carried by mythological figures of Greek antiquity (e.g. Der Streit zwischen Phoebus und Pan),[6] others were almost miniature buffo operas (e.g. Coffee Cantata).[7]
Extant secular cantatas are published in the New Bach Edition (Neue Bach-Ausgabe, NBA), Series I, volumes 35 to 40, with the two Italian cantatas included in volume 41.[8] The Bach Digital website lists 50 secular cantatas by Bach.[9] Less than half of Bach's known secular cantatas survive with music. For most of the others at least the libretto survives. Some of the secular cantatas are based on music Bach had composed at an earlier date (e.g. some music of the first Brandenburg Concerto was adopted in a secular cantata), and Bach quite often parodied secular cantatas into church music: for instance his Christmas Oratorio opens with music originally written for a secular cantata.[10]
In the Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis (BWV) the range of Nos. 201 to 216a contains mostly extant secular cantatas. Other secular cantatas are in the range of the church cantatas (BWV 1–200), most of them with an "a", "b" or "c" index added to the number of a church cantata while the cantatas share the same music. The same applies for the secular cantata precursors of the Easter Oratorio. Other secular cantatas are listed in BWV Anh. I, that is the appendix of the lost works. Even for these cantatas the music can sometimes be reconstructed, based on the church cantatas that were derived from them.
In his Köthen period, Bach wrote congratulatory cantatas for his new employer, Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen, usually on the Prince's birthday, or for New Year. BWV 66a, 134a, Anh. 6, Anh. 7, 184a, 173a and Anh. 8 are examples of such cantatas, the oldest of which were composed on a libretto by Christian Friedrich Hunold. Up to this point Bach's secular cantatas are generally in the Serenata format, lighthearted music with allegorical characters conversing about the excellence of the employer, and expressing their best wishes.[13]
A secular wedding cantata, BWV 202, an Italian cantata (BWV 203), and the secular model for the Störmthal cantata BWV 194 probably originated around the same period.[9][13] From 1723 until his death in 1750 Bach was employed as Thomaskantor in Leipzig: the bulk of his around 20 extant secular cantatas originated in this period.[14] Bach's earliest known secular cantata on a libretto by Picander dates from 1725. Bach wrote or re-staged at least 36 secular cantatas in the last 25 years of his life, and around half of these were on librettos by Picander.
Occasions for Bach's secular cantatas written in Leipzig included Birthdays and name days for successive prince-electors of Saxony and other rulers, and their relatives, of principalities and duchies in Saxony, and similar occasions for academics of the university of Leipzig. Bach wrote sacred cantatas for funerals and weddings: he also wrote a few secular works for such occasions. In his Leipzig period part of Bach's secular cantata production is no longer in the Serenata format, but rather dramma per musica, implying a dramatic plot beyond mythological figures congratulating or paying homage to the person in whose honour the cantata was written.
Numerical and alphabetical
The BWV numbers assigned to the secular cantatas are random with regard to chronology and occasion. In the Bach Compendium (BC), the secular cantatas are part of series G. That series also includes two cantatas known from very scant sources (Nos. 49 and 52), insufficient to determine whether they were intended as sacred or secular.
NBA Volume 41, Varia: Kantaten, Quodlibet, Einzelsätze, Bearbeitungen, contains, apart from various pieces of sacred vocal music and the incomplete Quodlibet, Bach's two Italian cantatas:[35]
Complete recordings of the secular cantatas include those by Peter Schreier[36] and Helmuth Rilling.[37] Also Masaaki Suzuki devoted a series of recordings to the secular cantatas.[38]
^ a bDürr, Alfred (2006). The Cantatas of J. S. Bach: With Their Librettos in German-English Parallel Text. Translated by Richard D. P. Jones. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-929776-4. "Introduction", pp. 9ff.
^Terry 1933, p. 97
^Wolff, Christoph (2001). Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician. W. W. Norton. pp. 197 and 560. ISBN 0-393-04825-X.
^Picander (=Christian Friedrich Henrici). Ernst-Schertzhaffte und Satyrische Gedichte, Volume IV. Leipzig: Friedrich Matthias Friesen (1737), pp. 3–7
^Picander (=Christian Friedrich Henrici). Ernst-Schertzhaffte und Satyrische Gedichte, Volume IV. Leipzig: Friedrich Matthias Friesen (1737), pp. 14–17
^Z. Philip Ambrose. BWV 208a Was mir behagt, ist nur die muntre Jagd! at University of Vermont website.
^RISM 467004203
^Alfred Dürr (1963; 3rd edition: 2013). Festmusiken für die Fürstenhäuser von Weimar, Weißenfels und Köthen (score). at Bärenreiter website
^Alfred Dürr (1964). Festmusiken für die Fürstenhäuser von Weimar, Weißenfels und Köthen (critical commentary). at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1963; 2nd edition: 2015). Festmusiken für das Kurfürstlich-Sächsische Haus I (score). at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1962). Festmusiken für das Kurfürstlich-Sächsische Haus I (critical commentary). at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1961; 3rd edition: 2015). Festmusiken für das Kurfürstlich-Sächsische Haus II (score). at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1961). Festmusiken für das Kurfürstlich-Sächsische Haus II (critical commentary). at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1960; 3rd edition: 2012). Festmusiken zu Leipziger Universitätsfeiern (score). at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1960). Festmusiken zu Leipziger Universitätsfeiern (critical commentary). at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1975). Festmusiken für Leipziger Rats- und Schulfeiern / Huldigungsmusiken für Adelige und Bürger (score) at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1977). Festmusiken für Leipziger Rats- und Schulfeiern / Huldigungsmusiken für Adelige und Bürger (critical commentary) at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1969; 3rd edition 2013). Hochzeitskantaten und Weltliche Kantaten verschiedener Bestimmung (score) at Bärenreiter website
^Werner Neumann (1970). Hochzeitskantaten und Weltliche Kantaten verschiedener Bestimmung (critical commentary) at Bärenreiter website
^Andreas Glöckner (2000). Varia: Kantaten, Quodlibet, Einzelsätze, Bearbeitungen (score) and (critical commentary) at Bärenreiter website
^Peter Schreier's recordings date mostly from the early 1980s, but were in 2000 included as box set Vol. 7 in Brilliant Classics' Bach Edition (complete recording):
Peter Schreier's box set of the complete secular cantatas (Brilliant Classics, 2000 release at Discogs)
Peter Schreier's box set of the complete secular cantatas (Brilliant Classics, 2006 release at Amazon)
Jones, Richard D. P. "Introduction" to Part I: The Cöthen and early Leipzig years, in The Creative Development of Johann Sebastian Bach, Volume II: 1717–1750: Music to Delight the Spirit. Oxford University Press. 2013. ISBN 978-0-19-969628-4.
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