"Jesu, meine Freude" ("Jesus, My Joy") is a motet
composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. The work, which
takes its title from the chorale by Johann Franck on
which it is based, is also known as Motet No. 3 in E
minor, BWV 227. The stanzas of the chorale are
interspersed with passages from the Epistle to the
Romans.
Bach's organ piece, chorale prelude BWV 610, bears the
same title. This work, which is earlier and shorter
than the motet, is based on the same chorale melody by
Johann Crüger....(+)
"Jesu, meine Freude" ("Jesus, My Joy") is a motet
composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. The work, which
takes its title from the chorale by Johann Franck on
which it is based, is also known as Motet No. 3 in E
minor, BWV 227. The stanzas of the chorale are
interspersed with passages from the Epistle to the
Romans.
Bach's organ piece, chorale prelude BWV 610, bears the
same title. This work, which is earlier and shorter
than the motet, is based on the same chorale melody by
Johann Crüger. There are six authenticated funeral
motets (BWV 225--230) written for St Thomas's Church,
Leipzig, between 1723 and 1727.
To Bach's contemporaries "motet" meant a simple vocal
work without independent instrumental parts (though
instruments sometimes doubled the voices). Motets often
began the Sunday service, and were typically sung by
inexperienced singers. In a 1730 memo to the Leipzig
town council, Bach mentioned boys in his school who
were "motet singers, who need further training in order
to be used eventually for figured music," by which he
meant the more elaborate and demanding music of the
cantatas. But Bach's own motets, like all his music,
are quite demanding, and he likely did not use them in
church services. It is not clear exactly what their
purpose was. One of them is known to have been sung at
a prominent person's funeral, but theories about
specific occasions for his other motets, including
Jesu, meine Freude, have not held up over the
years.
Most 18th-century Lutheran church music is based on
hymns, called "chorales," that dated from the previous
two centuries and were familiar to everyone. In Jesu,
meine Freude, the odd-numbered movements are settings
of verses of Johann Franck's 1653 chorale of the same
name, while the even-numbered movements set excerpts of
Paul's Epistle to the Romans. The eleven movements have
an overarching symmetry, much of it not apparent, or
important, to the listener, though it's worth noting
that the first and last movements are identical
harmonizations of the chorale, the second and tenth
movements work with the same musical material, the
central sixth movement is an elaborate fugue, and Bach
reduces the texture to three voices in the fourth and
eighth movements.
Although "Gute Nacht, o Wesen" ("Good night,
existence") was originally written for Chorus (SATB), I
created this arrangement for Double-Reed Quartet (2
Oboes, English Horn & Bassoon).
