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Es ist das Heil uns kommen her BWV 9 / BC A 107
Sixth Sunday after Trinity, August 1, 1734
Although this cantata belongs to Johann Sebastian Bach’s chorale cantata annual cycle, he did not compose it during his second year in office, between the summer of 1724 to early 1725, but considerably later. The reason for this is not difficult to find: in the middle of July 1724, along with his wife, Anna Magdalena, the cantor of St. Thomas School was in Köthen, his previous post. The composition of a cantata for the sixth Sunday after Trinity stood in the way of planning for and carrying out this tour, and so a substitute for Bach, probably the organist at the New Church, Georg Balthasar Schott, would have brought in a different work for the main worship service on that day, perhaps a cantata by Georg Philipp Telemann. In July 1732 Bach filled the gap in the structure of the cantata cycle.1 He performed the cantata again only three years later, in 1735; we owe that knowledge to a remarkable circumstance. In the early 1970s several houses were being torn down in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. A worker was busy loading the rubble to be hauled away when a passerby noticed a scarcely damaged picture frame and asked whether he might have it. He could have the entire pile of rubble if he wanted it, came the answer. Afterward it turned out that the picture frame contained a music manuscript, an original duplicate flute part for Bach’s cantata Es ist das Heil uns kommen her BWV 9 (Salvation has come to us), missing for decades and long ago given up for lost. Features of the handwriting date the manuscript to 1735.2 It remains in the possession of the happy discoverer.3 There is evidence for yet another performance in Leipzig in Bach’s last decade. In 1750 the score became part of Wilhelm Friedemann Bach’s inheritance; he performed the cantata at least once during his tenure as music director at Halle.As is usually the case in Bach’s chorale cantatas, the work’s text and music are based on a single chorale. In the case of Es ist das Heil uns kommen her, it is the chorale of the same name by Paul Speratus. Three of its twelve strophes were not included; the others were either adopted without change or reshaped more or less freely to become recitatives and arias. As in most cases, the opening strophe remained untouched:
Es ist das Heil uns kommen her,
Von Gnad und lauter Güte.
Die Werk, die helfen nimmermehr,
Sie mögen nicht behüten.
Der Glaub sieht Jesum Christum an,
Der hat g’nug für uns all getan,
Er ist der Mittler worden.
Salvation has come to us
From grace and pure goodness.
Good works help us not at all,
They cannot protect us.
Faith looks to Jesus Christ,
Who has done enough for us all.
He has become the mediator.
In the freely versified movements that follow, the law is the topic at issue in many cases. On the one hand, this has to do with the chorale text by Speratus, which appears in hymnaries of the period beneath the rubric “Von der Rechtfertigung und Absolution” (Of justification and absolution), and, on the other hand, with the Gospel reading for the Sunday, which contrasts the fulfillment of the law by the Christians with that of the Pharisees.
The fall of man and the law of the Old Covenant are the topics of the first recitative-aria pair in our cantata. The extensive text of the recitative is drawn from strophes 2 through 4 of the chorale. Its beginning reads:
Gott gab uns ein Gesetz, doch waren wir zu schwach,
Daß wir es hätten halten können,
Wir gingen nur den Sünden nach.
God gave us a law, yet we were too weak
To have been able to keep it.
We went only in pursuit of sin.
It concludes with resignation:
Aus eigner Kraft war niemand fähig
Der Sünden Unart zu verlassen,
Er möcht auch alle Kraft zusammenfassen.
From their own strength no one was able
To leave the rudeness of sin,
Though he might summon all his strength.
In the ensuing aria, this penetrating depiction of the hopeless situation is pushed to the limit, whereby the connection to Speratus’s chorale source text is no longer recognizable:
Wir waren schon zu tief gesunken,
Der Abgrund schluckt uns völlig ein,
Die Tiefe drohte schon den Tod,
Und dennoch konnt in solcher Not
Uns keine Hand behilflich sein.
We were already sunk too deep.
The abyss swallowed us entirely.
Its depths threatened even death.
And therefore could, in such need,
No hand be of help to us.
In accordance with the course of the chorale, the next movement pair, again a recitative and aria, speaks of salvation through the sacrificial death of Christ. The first of the chorale strophes drawn upon for this purpose—the fifth in the hymn itself—reads as follows:
Noch mußt das G’setz erfüllet sein,
Sonst wärn wir all verdorben,
Darum schickt Gott sein’n Sohn herein,
Der selber Mensch ist worden;
Das ganz Gesetz hat er erfüllt,
Damit seins Vaters Zorn gestillt,
Der über uns ging alle.
Yet the law had to be fulfilled,
Else were we all ruined.
Therefore, God sent his son to us,
Who himself became human;
The entire law he has fulfilled,
Thereby his father’s rage quieted
That hung over us all.
As a recitative, it becomes:
Doch mußte das Gesetz erfüllet werden;
Deswegen kam das Heil der Erden,
Des Höchsten Sohn, der hat es selbst erfüllt
Und seines Vaters Zorn gestillt.
Durch sein unschuldig Sterben
Ließ er uns Hülf erwerben.
Yet the law had to be fulfilled,
Therefore, came the salvation of the earth,
The son of the Most High, who has fulfilled it himself
And quieted his father’s rage.
Through his innocent dying
He has purchased salvation for us.
On the other hand, the associated aria text is substantially more freely formed, although unlike the first aria it does not completely avoid borrowing from the chorale:
Herr, du siehst statt guter Werke
Auf des Herzens Glaubensstärke,
Nur den Glauben nimmst du an.
Nur der Glaube macht gerecht,
Alles andre scheint zu schlecht,
Als daß es uns helfen kann.
Lord, you look, rather than to good works,
To the heart’s strength of faith.
Only faith do you accept,
Only faith justifies,
Everything else shines too weakly
To be able to help us.
The penultimate cantata movement, once again a recitative, hews more closely to Speratus’s source text; its ninth strophe begins with the verses:
Es wird die Sünd durchs G’setz erkannt
Und schlägt das G’wissen nieder;
Das Evangelium kömmt zur Hand
Und stärkt den Sünder wieder.
Sin is recognized through the law
And strikes our conscience down;
The Gospel comes to our aid
And strengthens the sinner again.
From this, the cantata poet derived the following:
Wenn wir die Sünd aus dem Gesetz erkennen,
So schlägt es das Gewissen nieder;
Doch ist das unser Trost zu nennen,
Das wir im Evangelio
Gleich wieder froh
Und freudig werden:
Dies stärket unser Glauben wieder.
When, from the law, we know sin,
Then it strikes our conscience down;
Yet that is to be called our consolation,
That we, in the Gospel,
Immediately become glad
And joyful again:
This strengthens our faith again.
The closing strophe of the chorale, unchanged, serves as the cantata’s conclusion:
Ob sichs abließ, als wollt er nicht,
Laß dich es nicht erschrecken;
Denn wo er ist am besten mit,
Da will er’s nicht entdecken.
Sein Wort laß dir gewisser sein,
Und ob dein Herz spräch lauter Nein,
So laß doch dir nicht grauen.
If it seemed as if he was not willing,
Do not let it alarm you;
For where he is most present,
There he will not reveal it.
Let his word be more certain to you,
And though your heart should say loudly no,
Do not let yourself shudder.
One is immediately impressed by the high artistic aims evident in Bach’s composition of this source text. In view of the opening movement and its expected dominant role, it bears mentioning that in the years between his premature cessation of work on the chorale cantata cycle and his composition of this cantata, Bach had already composed a chorale cantata on this same melody (BWV 117), however, using the text Sei Lob und Ehr dem höchsten Gut (May there be praise and honor for the highest good). He thus needed to avoid relying on what was already on hand or even outright repetition. The result of these efforts is an overwhelming complexity of compositional method in the first movement of Es ist das Heil uns kommen her, together with a filigree that seems to honor that principle of the visual arts, “drawing is omission” (Zeichnen ist Weglassen). This pertains in particular to the instrumental part, which, as is common in the chorale cantatas, has the task of unifying the movement and making it cohere in the face of the chorale melody changing line by line and the counterpoint in the other voices subordinated to it.
The fundamental element here is a trio texture that includes the transverse flute, oboe d’amore, and basso continuo. This trio, present throughout the first movement and with an unending wealth of combinations and variations, enters into a relationship of productive tension with the ensemble of string instruments. The strings are handled in a quasi-concertante fashion, sometimes providing harmonic support, sometimes tracing the lines of the woodwinds, sometimes inserting counterthematic material and thereby enlivening the movement’s course and enriching more than one dimension. The duplicate flute part, rediscovered in New York City as described earlier, bears witness to how much importance Bach attached to timbral balance in this delicate structure.4 When the work was first reperformed, the duplicate allowed the flute part to be doubled, thus ensuring in all cases the sonic prominence this important part deserves.
The first aria, “Wir waren schon zu tief gesunken,” shows the cantor of St. Thomas in conflict between his own compositional ambitions and his consideration of what was achievable in terms of performance technique. He envisioned an obbligato instrumental part that, with its fluid and fleeting passages in
16 meter and jagged syncopations, symbolizes an unrestrained staggering on the edge of the abyss. On the other hand, it could not be too difficult both to preserve its intended forcefulness and to hold its own against the voice and the basso continuo. Thus Bach writes “Violini unisoni” in his composing score but corrects it to “Violino solo” probably in consideration of the limited abilities of his musicians. Ultimately, it must have gone better than feared, for the obbligato part is found in both first violin parts, in accordance with the composer’s original intent.
In contrast to the instability depicted here, the second aria movement is focused on representing strength of faith. This steadfast world, at peace with itself, is represented by a quintet texture of soprano, alto, the two woodwinds, and basso continuo, whereby imitation and canonic constructions underscore the gravity of what is intended and clarify the immutability of what is said. From the bright A major of this duet it is but a small step to the brilliant E major of the closing chorale, forging a connection to the key and character of the opening movement.
Footnotes
- On the basis of watermark evidence and handwriting analysis, Peter Wollny established that BWV 9 was performed on August 1, 1734, the sixth Sunday after Trinity. See Wollny (2016, 67–73).—Trans.↵
- However, it is now clear that Bach presented an annual cycle of cantatas by Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel between the first Sunday after Trinity 1735 and Trinity 1736. Wollny therefore associates the duplicate flute part with a reperformance of BWV 9 on July 8, 1736. Please see the addendum to Schulze’s essay on BWV 200 in this digital edition.—Trans.↵
- Herz (1984, 18, 152 ff.).↵
- Grüß (1987).↵