Böcker av Hendrik Slegtenhorst

Hypocrisy, spiritual weakness, and helping the distressed are among the manifestations of the human condition this book, on the 28 cantatas for Trinity VIII-XVI, the second book of the series on all the cantatas, considers. In addition, there are chapters on the Actus Tragicus and the five cantatas for the annual installation of the Leipzig city council. Bach practices adherence, but a pragmatic one, to his employers, the Lutheran church and the municipal and aristocratic authorities. In liberating actuality from the confines of theology, Bach's cantatas give an extensive presentation and interpretation of this freedom of thought. Considered by many the greatest composer of Western music, Bach, like many of us, contends with fundamental human concerns such as self-worth, the courage of trust, satisfaction with life, the hope found in joy, suffering amidst the essential beauty of the world, the misery of loss, and the majesty of redemption.

In his more than 200 cantatas Bach interprets the human condition through musical assertion and examination of the relevance of the gospels and epistles of the Christian Bible. Every cantata is discussed in my six book series On the Cantatas of J.S. Bach. The epistle, which is essentially didactic, is from the Apostolic letters retained in Scripture. The gospel, which is concerned with the life and teachings of Christ, is effectively an exposition of His adherence to principles and the application of action. Guided by this context, Bach consistently propounds surpassing interpretations of the nature and spirit of life. Though the over-reaching principles are philosophical and ethical, how they apply is determined, ultimately, by the individual. Book Five of this series examines the 40 surviving cantatas for the Sundays and feast days from Epiphany to Lent, and includes three sacred and two secular wedding cantatas, a cantata for the installation of a town council, and three secular congratulatory cantatas. The religious cantatas are grouped into the period for Epiphany (fourteen cantatas), Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary (four cantatas), the ten cantatas for the pre-Lenten Sundays (Septuagesima, Sexagesima, Quinquagesima), Annunciation (one cantata), and Lent (two cantatas). Bach, in these, affirms and explains such fundamental aspects as mortal death and immortal re-birth, the manifestation of divinity in human form, and self-assessment and penitential preparation. It is a personal exploration, both his and mine.

This sixth book in the Bach Cantatas series is concerned with the thirty-nine sacred cantatas for Easter to Pentecost, plus one secular cantata. They are grouped into the period for Easter proper (including the Easter Oratorio), the five Sundays after Easter, Ascension (including the Ascension Oratorio), Exaudi, Pentecost, and Trinity Sunday. Easter proper begins after the Passion, with Christ dead in the tomb, through to His resurrection and the events that proceed from it. Ascension concerns Christ's depar-ture from the world. Exaudi centres on the promise of the arrival of the Holy Ghost to the church of Christ, and Pentecost is its realization. Trinity Sunday is then the feast of the Trinitarian actuality, and the completes the liturgical, and Bach's, cycles.

Understanding Bach and how his illuminations of daily life, especially in his 219 cantatas, relate to today's world can be difficult. All these cantatas and what they offer are discussed in my six book series On the Cantatas of J.S. Bach; and, in doing so, also demonstrate that the enduring purpose of art is to bring before us the awareness that the earthly reality we have come into is almost too beautiful to bear, and too beautiful not to lose. Book Three of this six part series examines the 36 cantatas Bach composed to affirm the fundamental aspects of the Sundays and feast days of Trinity XVII to XXVII, such as the dualities of belief and unbelief, mercy given and not, good and evil, and friendship and falsity. Bach interprets the human condition through the assertion and musical examination of the relevance of the gospels and epistles of the Christian Bible. The Baroque cantata and, still now, the contemporary liturgy are based upon these prescriptive texts. The epistle, which is essentially didactic, is from the Apostolic letters retained in Scripture. The gospel is concerned with the life and teachings of Christ, and is essentially expository of an individual application of action. It is in his cantatas that Bach consistently propounds many surpassing interpretations of the nature and spirit of life. Though the over-reaching principles are philosophical and ethical, but how they apply is determined, ultimately, by the individual. It is a personal exploration. It is written for those who seek the same. Whether you are religious or irreligious, musician or not, to participate in this exploration, buy this book now.

Within the music of Bach flows an intense awareness of our human condition, of our heart as the sibling of the soul. These commentaries are concerned with Bach's enabling artistry, its elemental contemplations, and the persistence of their relevance. It is a personal exploration. It is written for those who seek the same. In the cantatas for Trinity I through VII, the five aspects of the human condition that Bach dwells upon are first, the relationship of money to morality; second, the linkage between compassion and individual salvation; third, the influence of condemnation upon the sense of redemption; fourth, the correlation of identity and the need to understand otherness; and fifth, how the sacred is invested in the secular and are, thus, identical.

This fourth book is the first of three concerned with the life of Christ, beginning with the nativity of Christ, from its advent through to the new year after. The fifth book examines the cantatas for Epiphany to Lent, and the sixth book the cantatas for Easter to Pentecost. This fourth book of the Bach cantatas series discusses the twenty-four cantatas for Advent, Christmas, New Year, and Epiphany, the six cantatas of the Christmas Oratorio, and one secular cantata. There are individual chapters on Advent, Christmas, the Feast of St. Stephen, and the Feast of John the Evangelist. I also include a chapter describing the life of Christ, as primarily found in the canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and a chapter on the Christian Bible. As Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) represents the finest ecclesiastical composer in the Western musical tradition, his religious works remain one of the tradition's most illuminating interpretations of sacred text and theology. Although the ritual and context within which Bach composed have changed or disappeared, the substance upon which they were based has not.