St. Matthew Passion: BWV 244 Category: Passions and Oratorios Johann Sebastian Bach set it to music in Leipzig, where it was premiered at St. Thomas church on Good Friday, 1727. (A passion service was traditionally played at that church every Easter). Orchestration: Double chorus + secondary choir (children's choir) Many soloists Double orchestra Two organs The text is made up from several sources: - The Gospel of Matthew, chapters 26 and 27, in the recitatives; - chorale texts - poetry from Bach's librettist, Christian Friedrich Henrici (a.k.a. Picander), in the added recitatives and arias. It is divided into two large sections: the period leading up to and including Christ's arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane and the period thereafter up to and including the placing of his body in the tomb. After its first performance, the piece was not heard again for over a century, until March 11, 1829, when Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy led the work in a Berlin concert which triggered the rediscovery of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and of early music in general. Leipzig's St. Thomas church played an important role in the history of the work, not only as the venue of its first performance. For when Mendelssohn was appointed music director of the Gewandhaus Orchestra in Leipzig in 1835, he began to cultivate Bach's music with the same ardor he had shown in the 1820s when he organized the Berlin performance of the passion. Thus it was once again Leipzig's St. Thomas church which, on Palm Sunday 1841, hosted the first performance of the St. Matthew Passion in Leipzig in over a century. And again, it was the church's celebrated choir, the "Thomanerchor", which sang the text based on the words of St. Matthew. Musical comments: 1. This piece is a Lutheran church cantata: i.e., with large concerted choral movements, Lutheran chorales, recitatives (both simple and accompanied), solo arias, a duet, and dramatic turba (or crowd) choruses. Very frequent use of chorale harmonization. 2. Some portions were derived from non-religious sources (e.g. a Trauermusik for Leopold von Anhalt-Kothen) 3. The narration alternates between tenor solo recitative and choruses. 4. The choruses either a) comment on the action (in the great choral fantasias and chorales) or b) play the parts of the crowds, including the disciples (in the turba choruses). When they are commenting on the action they are referred to as a "Greek" chorus. 5. The action, presented using scripture, takes place in the recitatives and is sung by characters such as the Evangelist (Matthew), Jesus, Judas, Pilate, etc. (These characters are all sung as solo). 6. The soloists comment on the action in the arias and some of the recitatives preceding arias, using poetic texts written by Picander. 7. Jesus's voice is surrounded by a "halo" of string instruments, whenever he speaks (i.e., his words are always found in accompanied recitatives). 8. The use of chorale tunes incorporated in the choral fantasias: for example, "O Lamm Gottes unschuldig" sung by a special group of sopranos in the opening movement. 9. The contemplative stations of the Passion story are underscored by 13 chorales and 13 arias. 10. The multiple use of the "Passion Chorale". This chorale appears five times in different keys with four different four-part harmonizations Relative importance: - Ranked in importance with the B Minor Mass. - Much more introspective and emotional than the St. John passion. (There was also a St. Mark passion, but only the text has survived). Bach is said to have written two other passions, but no trace of them survives today.