Vox Seraphim: Magnificat

Conductor Eugene Lavery leads the Vox Seraphim Choir and Baroque Orchestra in a performance of Johann Sebastian Bach's Magnificat (BWV 243.2); Wir danken dir, Gott, wir danken dir (BWV 29); and Dieterich Buxtehude's Magnificat.
Johann Sebastian Bach's Magnificat (BWV 243) is a musical setting of the biblical canticle Magnificat. It is scored for five vocal parts (two sopranos, alto, tenor and bass), and a Baroque orchestra including trumpets and timpani. It is the first major liturgical composition on a Latin text by Bach. In 1723, after taking up his post as Thomaskantor in Leipzig, Bach set the text of the Magnificat in a twelve movement composition in the key of E-flat major. For a performance at Christmas he inserted four hymns related to that feast. This version, including the Christmas interpolations, was given the number 243.1 (previously 243a) in the catalogue of Bach's works. Likely for the feast of Visitation of 1733, or another feast in or around that year, Bach produced a new version of his Latin Magnificat, without the Christmas hymns: instrumentation of some movements was altered or expanded, and the key changed from E-flat major to D major, for performance reasons of the trumpet parts. This version of Bach's Magnificat is known as BWV 243.2. After publication of both versions in the 19th century, the second became the standard for performance. It is one of Bach's most popular vocal works.

Bach composed the sacred cantata Wir danken dir, Gott, wir danken dir - We thank you, God, we thank you - (BWV 29) in Leipzig in 1731 for Ratswechsel, the annual inauguration of a new town council, and first performed it on 27 August of that year. The cantata was part of a festive service in the St. Nicholas Church. The cantata text by an unknown author includes in movement 2 the beginning of Psalm 75, and as the closing chorale the fifth stanza of Johann Gramann's "Nun lob, mein Seel, den Herren". Bach scored the work in eight movements for four vocal parts and a festive Baroque orchestra of three trumpets, timpani, two oboes, strings, an obbligato organ and basso continuo. The organ dominates the first movement Sinfonia which Bach derived from a Partita for violin. The full orchestra accompanies the first choral movement and plays with the voices in the closing chorale, while a sequence of three arias alternating with two recitatives is scored intimately.

For many years, Dietrich Buxtehude (1637 – 1708) held one of the most important church positions in Northern Germany, that of organist at the Marienkirche in Lübeck. He was a stupendous virtuoso and he is still perhaps best known for his compositions for the organ. In 1705 Bach was given leave from his duties in Arnstadt for a month long stay in Lübeck to meet and perhaps study with Dietrich Buxtehude (Bach’s 250-mile pilgrimage on foot to meet him and hear him play is legendary.) The visit was to last four months! The charming Magnificat survives only in a single, manuscript source: a set of parts and a score from the extensive collection of Gustav Düben, who knew Buxtehude, and was Kapellmeister at the German church in Stockholm. The manuscript did not originally bear the name of any composer, although Buxtehude’s name has been added in square brackets on the title page by a later hand. The compositional style, perhaps, is more representative of Carissimi or Lully ~ lilting triple-time melodies, frequent hemiolas, clear sectional structure and simple diatonic harmony largely in thirds. The composer employs alternating florid vocal soli and choral tutti passages, as well as simple, fluid string writing to achieve a direct, yet dynamic effect.

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