When he left his position as Kapellmeister at Cthen to become Kantor

of the Thomasschule at Leipzig in1723, J.S. Bach was a recently remarried

thirty-eight year old father of four children. With this move to Leipzig, he gave
up a lofty position in a secular court for a post that was a step down socially and
almost exclusively limited to the realm of sacred music. Bach, however, was
ready for a change. His first wife, Maria Barbara, who bore him seven children
and to whom he was deeply devoted, died in Cthen three years earlier in July of
1720. A year and a half later he married fellow musician Anna Magdalena. In
her, fortune smiled upon Bach a second time, for she was a kind mother to his
children, bore him several more, and became his loyal companion for the
remainder of his days. Still, it appears that Cthen brought back painful
memories. During this same period, his music-loving patron and friend, the
Prince of Anhalt-Cthen also married, but unfortunately, the princes new wife
was not as enthusiastic about maintaining a lavish musical establishment as he
was. In light of this new development, Bach became uneasy about relying on
the whims of the court for his growing familys sustenance and began to search
for a new position, reasoning that job security was more valuable to him than the
greater immediate financial rewards and prestige of court employment.
Despite the overwhelming responsibilities associated with the
kantorship at Leipzig, it offered Bach several advantages. The appointment
appeared to guarantee financial stability, his childrens tuition was included in
the compensation package, and it was the most important Lutheran church job
in central Germany. At that time Leipzig was a cosmopolitan commercial
center; two hundred years earlier it had been the home of Martin Luther, which
must have particularly appealed to Bach, a Lutheran who considered himself a
composer of Lutheran church music above all.
Bachs relationship with his new employers was contentious from the
beginning. As inconceivable as it may sound today, Bach was the town
councils last choice after being turned down by Georg Philipp Telemann and
Christoph Graupner, who were thought to be more progressive and Italianate
than Bach, famous primarily as an organ virtuoso. The oft-quoted statement by
a Leipzig councilmember that since the best musicians are not available we
must select a mediocre one did not auger well for the long-term relationship
between Bach and his superiors. Bach clearly felt he had much to prove.
From St. Lukes Gospel, the Magnificat was Marys joyful hymn of
praise to God on her impending motherhood. Contrary to current Lutheran and
Protestant theology, Martin Luther advocated the veneration of the Blessed
Virgin Mary. The only caveat was that she not be placed higher than her Son,
Our Savior: [She is]...the highest woman and the noblest gem in Christianity
after Christ . . . She is nobility, wisdom, and holiness personified. We can never

honor her enough. Still honor and praise must be given to her in such a way as to
injure neither Christ nor the Scriptures (Martin Luthers Christmas Sermon,
1531). This directive was entirely consistent with contemporaneous Catholic
doctrine even though it may not have been universally followed. The
Magnificat is performed during Vespers, the evening canonical hour. In the
Lutheran church it was sung in German at every Sunday evening Vespers, but in
Latin on Christmas and the Feast of the Visitation, celebrations that invite
polyphonic settings. The Magnificat traditionally concludes with the addition of
the Lesser Doxology, a standardized shortened version of the Gloria. Aside
from the Mass, the customary rite of passage for Renaissance composers, the
Magnificat is the text most frequently set in polyphony by Renaissance and
Baroque composers Palestrina composed more than 30 and Lassus over 100,
not to mention the countless Magnificats that functioned as a movement within a
larger Vespers setting such as Monteverdis glorious Vespers of 1610.
Bachs first major opportunity to prove his mettle to his new employers
presented itself in the composition of a polyphonic Magnificat for Christmas
Vespers in 1723, soon after his debut as Kantor of St. Thomas. Several years
later, some time between 1728 and 1733, Bach revised the work, most notably
by adding flutes and lowering it a half step from Eb to D Major, a much more
comfortable key for trumpets and timpani. To adhere to a Leipzig tradition, in
the 1723 version, Bach had interspersed four Christmas Lauds throughout the
Magnificat; by the time of his revision, however, he felt secure enough in his
position to eliminate them, favoring his own artistic sense over the pleasure of
his employers. 480/578 original bars contain some kind of alteration, although
many of them are small and may have been occasioned by the circumstances of
a particular performance. The revised Magnificat replaces the boldness of the
first version with the eloquence born of the greater sophistication Bach had
acquired in the intervening years. Both editions are decidedly Italianate and
feature the very careful and precise text declamation that today we associate
more with Handel than Bach, suggesting that Bach was well aware of one of the
main reasons he was not the first choice for the Leipzig position. In addition to
SSATB, trumpets, timpani, flutes, strings, and organ continuo, the score also
specifies oboes doubling on oboe damore, a transposing alto oboe pitched a
minor third below the standard oboe, whose darker sound Bach found
particularly appropriate for sacred music.
The arias are vocal/instrumental dialogues with obbligato instruments
that usually provide ritornelli at the beginning, middle, and end as well as
continuous commentary. Each aria is also based on a pre-existing instrumental
genre, mostly dances, such as Et exsultavit (gigue), Quia respexit
(allemande), and Et misercordia (siciliana). The Magnificats overall structure

is driven by the text in character and organization. For instance, omnes

generations, the final two words of the third movements lovely soprano aria
Quia respexit are set as a separate fourth choral movement immediately
following Quia respexit without pause to represent every generation. While
setting this specific verse in such a fashion became somewhat of a convention,
no one did it better or more completely than Bach. For the eleventh movement,
which refers to our forefathers, Abraham and his seed, Bach adopts the archaic
Renaissance a cappella style with minimal continuo support, alluding to his
compositional forefathers. Bach distinguishes that important phrase, Abraham,
Abraham et semini eius, from the surrounding polyphonic web by setting it in a
homophonic homorhythmic style.
Slightly older than Bach, Antonio Vivaldi was known as the Red Priest,
a nickname that forever linked the flaming color of his mane to his ostensible
profession as a cleric. Bach so admired Antonio Vivaldi, the story goes, that he
ruined his eyesight copying Vivaldis concerti by candlelight in the waning
hours of many a cold winter evening. Although today he is primarily known for
his 500+ concerti, Vivaldi once stated that he hoped to be remembered as an
opera composer. He may not have yet achieved that goal, but performances of
his sacred vocal music will surely alert audiences to the fact that he was more
than the composer who wrote the same concerto five hundred times, an
ignorant invective by a third-rate twentieth-century composer whose name does
not bear repeating, but whose initials are LD.
Like the Magnificat, Psalm 109/110 Dixit Dominus is a standard
component of Vespers. It is, in fact, the first Vespers psalm and as such is
usually placed in the celebratory key of D Major, particularly in Italian settings
because, as we have seen, it is a good key for trumpets as well as strings, which
sound bright and resonant in that tonality. Vivaldis Dixit Dominus RV 595 (c.
1715) in D Major is scored for five solo voices, chorus, trumpet, two oboes, two
cellos, strings and continuo. Its eleven movements, one per stanza except for the
first and last, which constitute two and three movements respectively, are short
and direct with active instrumental participation in driving, dynamic rhythms.
Vivaldi composed several settings of this rather martial text. Dixit Dominus RV
594 (c. 1730) is for double chorus, and the movements are expansive compared
to the less familiar RV 595 that we will enjoy this evening. RV 807, recently
discovered in the Saxon State Library in Dresden, has many similarities to RV
594 and 595, and whether it represents a new discovery or simply a revision of a
combination of the two earlier versions is a matter of current debate.
RV 595 is the perfect complement to Bachs Magnificat: both are
settings of Vespers texts, both are in D Major, and both highlight instrumental
obbligati. Each of these works juxtaposes ravishing solos and duos note in

particular the Magnificats Et exsultavit and Dixit Dominus Gloria Patri

against communal choral expression in all the appropriate places according to
the sentiment of the text. In both cases choral movements frame the work and
provide interior architectonic pillars between sets of arias. Note how Vivaldi sets
De torrente in the key of E Minor. All three of his extant settings of this text
are in E Minor, a key that has come to be associated with flowing water; the best
known example of this relationship can be heard in the much later Moldau
from Bedrich Smetanas M Vlast (1874-9). And neither composer could resist
the temptation to repeat the works opening measures at the words Sicut erat in
principio, i.e., As it was in the beginning in the concluding Lesser Doxology.
Vivaldis work, however, relies almost exclusively on the soothing regularity of
sequences rather than chromatic alteration to modulate, and ostinato rhythmic
figures take precedence over dense counterpoint. And while Bach provides the
listener with the full explanation, Vivaldi gets to the point immediately. After
all, every speech needs its summation and every acclamation its exclamation
point!
David Dolata
Florida International University