Johann Sebastian Bach: “Aria” for Viola, Violoncello, and Harpsichord, from Cantata 156 • 4K

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Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750): “Aria” for Viola, Violoncello, and Harpsichord, from BWV 156

0:00 Opening
0:18 Aria
6:15 Credits

Yvonne Smith, viola • Gretchen Claassen, violoncello • Gabriel Benton, harpsichord
Tatiana Chulochnikova, violin • Tomà Iliev, violin • Rachell Ellen Wong, violin

Eddie Frank, video • Chris Landen, audio
American Bach Soloists • Jeffrey Thomas, Artistic Director

Filmed in April 2021 in the Gold Ballroom of the Palace Hotel (San Francisco, California).
How we made the video: https://americanbach.org/Videos-Backs...

Many texts from Bach's cantatas can seem overly drenched in lugubrious rhetoric, especially when we forget that verses about a soul's readiness to pass to a happier existence in heaven served to give much-needed hope to a populace that often struggled to survive amidst extremely difficult and common situations of poverty, illness, and hunger. The barbarous Thirty Years War (ended in 1648) had left in its wake destitute repercussions that would continue to affect generations of German culture for nearly a century. Certainly, the dour tone of religious texts that were written during that period would be utilized by composers and worked well to magnify some of the most important precepts and dogma of German Lutheranism at the time. This aria's text and title — "Ich steh mit einem Fuß im Grabe" ("I am standing with one foot in the grave") — belies its intended message of comfort and positive outlook. In the cantata score, unison violins and violas play figurations of notes that, although descending, contribute a lightness to the melody. Beneath is a bass line that begins hesitantly, again with descending notes representing stepping down into a final resting place, with each note change sounding "off the beat" and depicting an initial reluctance. But soon the tenor voice enters and, as an eighteenth-century congregation would have recognized, the message is one of hope, a longing for better days that is confirmed by sopranos intermittently singing a chorale that is best summed up by its final line: "Everything is good, when the end is good." In our arrangement for the musicians in this concert, the unison strings part is given to solo viola, the tenor part is given to solo 'cello, and the chorale melody is intoned by violins.

© 2021, American Bach Soloists

American Bach Soloists (ABS) are leading performers in the field of Baroque music, dedicated to historically informed performances of Bach and his contemporaries. ABS provides meaningful, memorable, and valuable musical experiences for our audiences through inspiring performances and recordings, and it supports the preservation of early music through educational programs for students and emerging professionals. Under the leadership of co-founder and Music Director Jeffrey Thomas, the ensemble has achieved its vision of assembling the world’s finest vocalists and period-instrument performers to bring this brilliant music to life.

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