This page was created by James A. Brokaw II. The last update was by Angela Watters.
Süßer Trost, mein Jesu kömmt BWV 151 / BC A 17
Third Day of Christmas, December 27, 1725
It was not until shortly before 1970 that the arranger of our cantata’s libretto could be researched,1 when a long-missing volume of cantata poetry turned up in the Darmstadt State and University Library entitled Gottgefälliges Kirchen-Opffer (Church offering pleasing to God). This volume was published in late 1711; the texts it contains were meant for Darmstadt court music director Christoph Graupner in particular. Of the roughly fourteen hundred cantatas preserved in Darmstadt, over forty are associated with this annual text cycle. All were written between Pentecost 1711 and the end of 1712.Georg Christian Lehms came from Liegnitz in Lower Silesia. The year of his birth (1684) lies between those of Graupner (1683) and Bach (1685). Following Gymnasium in Görlitz, in the summer of 1706 he went to the University of Leipzig. Perhaps he encountered Graupner during this period; it is certainly possible, for shortly thereafter, Graupner fled Leipzig for Hamburg due to the invasion of Swedish troops under King Charles XII, while Lehms remained in the trade fair city and, during his period of study, gained recognition as a successful author of cantata and opera librettos. Ultimately, they met one another, as Lehms was appointed court poet and librarian in the fall of 1710, and Graupner was active as court music director after January 1709.
Lehms was granted not even seven years in his position before he contracted an insidious disease in May 1717. Until shortly before his death he continued to prepare texts for church music in Darmstadt. The annual text cycles, printed at the court’s cost, were entitled Das singende Lob Gottes in einem Jahr-Gang andächtiger und Gottgefälliger Kirch-Music (The singing praise of God in an annual cycle of devotional and God-pleasing church music), Davids Heiligtum in Zion oder ein neuer Jahr-Gang andächtiger Kirch-Music (David’s sanctuary in Zion or a new annual cycle of devotional church-music), and, simply, Ein neues Lied, so dem Herrn dieses gantze 1716. Jahr hindurch . . . soll musiciret werden (A new song that the Lord through this entire year of 1716 . . . shall be celebrated with music).
The first cycle, printed in 1711, must have found its way to Weimar only shortly thereafter. In any case, the organist at the court of Saxe-Weimar, Johann Sebastian Bach, composed at least two of the texts in the form of solo cantatas before 1715. Around the turn of 1725–26 in Leipzig, he produced six further cantatas, which were followed in the summer of 1726 by two more solo cantatas.
The cantata Süßer Trost, mein Jesus kömmt BWV 151 (Sweet consolation, my Jesus comes) belongs to the group of works composed in quick succession at the end of 1725 and beginning of 1726. For the most part, its text consists of joyous announcements of the birth of Jesus. Thus the first aria reads:
Süßer Trost, mein Jesus kömmt,
Jesus wird anitzt geboren!
Herz und Seele freuet sich,
Denn mein liebster Gott hat mich
Nun zum Himmel auserkoren.
Sweet consolation, my Jesus comes,
Jesus is now born!
Heart and soul rejoices,
For my dear God has
Now predestined me to heaven.
The lapse in subject-verb agreement and the use of several filler syllables and words reveal a poet not yet fully versed in his métier. It becomes even worse at the beginning of the first recitative:
Erfreue dich, mein Herz,
Denn itzo weicht der Schmerz
Der dich so lange Zeit gedrucket.
Rejoice, my heart,
For now vanishes the pain
That so long time oppressed you.
The poet praises as a “wundervoller Tat” (wonderful act) that God sent his most beloved son in order to free the world from its “Sklavenketten” (slave chains) and then transitions, not without skill:
Gott wird ein Mensch und will auf Erden
Noch niedriger als wir und noch viel ärmer werden.
God becomes a man and wishes on Earth
To become still lowlier than we and far poorer.
The third aria pursues this line of thought:
In Jesu Demut kann ich Trost,
In seiner Armut Reichtum finden.
Mir macht desselben schlechter Stand
Nur lauter Heil und Wohl bekannt,
Ja seine wundervolle Hand
Will mir nur Segenskränze winden.
In Jesus’s humility I can find consolation;
In his poverty, wealth.
His poor station makes known to me
Only pure salvation and well-being.
Indeed, his wonderful hand
Will twine for me only wreaths of blessing.
The last recitative anticipates the closing chorale rather abruptly, with its formulation:
Du teurer Gottessohn,
Nun hast du mir den Himmel aufgemacht
Und durch dein Niedrigsein
Das Licht der Seligkeit zuwege bracht.
You dear son of God,
Now you have opened heaven for me
And through your lowliness
Brought about the light of salvation.
The eighth strophe of Nikolaus Herman’s Christmas chorale Lobt Gott, ihr Christen allzugleich (Praise God, you Christians all as one) concludes the cantata text:
Heut schleußt er wieder auf die Tür
Zum schönen Paradeis,
Der Cherub steht nicht mehr dafür,
Gott sei Lob, Ehr und Preis!
Today he again throws open the door
To fair paradise.
The cherub stands in front no more,
To God be glory, honor, and praise!
With the possible exception of this closing chorale, the librettist seems to have conceived his first-person recitatives and arias, which he calls “Andacht auf den 3. Weihnachtsfeiertag” (Devotion on the third day of Christmas), as text for a solo cantata. Instead of granting him this favor, Bach’s composition instead deploys all four voices. In this regard, the soprano clearly enjoys the lead role, especially in the large three-part aria “Süßer Trost.” In the slow opening section, which is repeated at the aria’s close, voice and oboe d’amore move together, gently rocking above static basses. The gentle balance of
8 meter, tender melody, and simple harmonies can be taken to evoke the very image of rocking the infant’s cradle. Yet this is enriched and illuminated by the prominent flute part, which might symbolize inward rejoicing over “Süßer Trost, mein Jesus kömmt”—in accordance with a long tradition in which the word “süß” (sweet) is associated with the sound of the flute. A more energetic tone is struck by the middle section. Here again the flute takes the lead, but the voice, with long coloraturas, takes up the challenge of the woodwind’s extended garlands of triplets and successfully holds its own.
In following this imposing beginning, the other movements have a difficult job. The second aria, following a brief bass recitative, is given to the alto as well as to an instrumental obbligato part comprising violins, viola, and the oboe d’amore. The voice and obbligato instruments move primarily in downward-directed intervals and passages, symbolizing the “Demut und Armut” (humility and poverty) sketched out by the text. The rigor and austerity of the three-part texture and the sharpness of the intervallic leaps scarcely allow the players to take a breath and, even less, gain any relief from the “imperative mandate” of the libretto.
The brief tenor recitative and the cheerfully relaxed mood of the closing four-part chorale combine for a pleasant conclusion.