Birthday love for this world

Like BWV 184, this cantata is also a parody of a Cöthen piece – in this case a birthday cantata for Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, catalogued as BWV 173a and possibly written in 1717 (after Bach was released from 4 weeks in prison!). Unlike 184, however, the original secular cantata has survived. What is lost […]

WTC Book II, second stop

Let’s take the second leg of our journey through Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavichord Book II. This time, we’ll hear Christophe Rousset, playing on another Johannes Ruckers harpsichord. This one is kept at the Château de Versailles. It was built in 1628 and restored in 2009 by Alain Anselm to undo several undesirable alterations performed over the […]

Arms of two champions

This is another Whit Tuesday cantata, composed originally in 1724 as part of Bach’s first Leipzig cycle, and performed for the second time in 1727 and later on for a third time in 1731. It is based on a secular cantata from the Cöthen period, probably for a New Year’s Day celebration, which is unfortunately […]