Bach Cantata No 140 Wachet Auf Sleepers Awake Nos 1 College Review
Published April two, 2020 at v:03 PM EDT
Morning the Gorn / Wikimedia Commons
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In the depths of a fearsome epidemic that ravaged his community, a small-town German language pastor wrote a hymn to bring his congregation hope. More than 400 years subsequently, "Sleepers Awake" however comforts and inspires us, perchance now more than ever before.
The Slice
At that place's a short slice with a gorgeous, unforgettable tune that nosotros play on the radio sometimes, calledSleepers Awake. While yous're listening to information technology, even simply for those few minutes, there's peace; everything is at-home and beautiful, the music speaking to us as clearly today is it did when it was written.
That's no coincidence.Sleepers Awake has its roots in some other epidemic, 1 that cast a shadow over a minor German language town. It comes from a meditation on promise in an uncertain time, and took a long and surprising journey to reach our ears yet again with its message of condolement.
The Backstory
When nosotros denote this lovely piece on WCRB, we ordinarily say something like "Sleepers Awake, by Bach." This is much, much easier to say than the full story, which sounds more like an academic bibliography: "an arrangement of the 2d chorale from Bach'southward cantata Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme (BWV 140), based on the hymn of the same proper noun by Philip Nicolai."
Bach based his cantata Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme on a popular Lutheran hymn. The melody of the hymn is woven throughout the cantata, and the 3 verses of the hymn are used as the text of the cantata's three chorales. It'due south a joyous hymn, focused on Jesus Christ'southward return to his faithful followers. Even so sung past Christians today, it was written by an otherwise obscure 16th century Lutheran pastor named Philipp Nicolai.
Nicolai was the pastor of a town chosen Unna, near the German city of Dortmund. He had just taken the chore when the town was hitting with a terrible plague. By the end, almost half of Unna had succumbed. For Nicolai, whose parsonage overlooked the cemetery and who had to perform countless funerals, it must accept felt like the apocalypse. He consoled himself past writing a collection of meditations to, in his words, "comfort other sufferers whom [God] should also visit with the pestilence." He called this collection his "Mirror of Joy," a hopeful light shining in the midst of terrible darkness. And to round information technology off, he included two original hymns, one of which was Wachet Auf.
https://www.youtube.com/lookout?5=sntJWiFoyZ8
The Bulletin
Wachet Auf shows how deeply Nicolai was afflicted by what was happening to his town. In a touching tribute, he hid the initials of a former educatee who passed away in the plague in the first letter of each poetry. The words of the hymn speak of a bright light coming in the middle of the night, and the start verse tells believers to wake up from their slumber and hold up their lamps. Rather than preparing for some new awful thing, the hymn is saying to be prepared for joy by sharing your low-cal. Nicolai's lamp was his faith and his hope for a brighter futurity, and Wachet Auf was his manner of shining that lamp for his congregation.
That bulletin of promise and joy, written in the middle of profound tragedy, madeWachet Auf a popular hymn among Lutherans. Over a century later, Bach decided to use it in a cantata for his church. While about of the music in the cantata is his own, he based the chorales around the tune of Nicolai's hymn. The second chorale is the slice that we at present know as Sleepers Awake, and features an original melody that Bach pairs with Nicolai's:
https://www.youtube.com/spotter?v=DqZE54i-muE
The whole cantata is actually worth listening to, but the movement we're talking nigh starts at fifteen:20.
Bach starts his own melody starting time, dancing over the bassline. Then, he brings in Nicolai's hymn as a deadening, insistent counterpoint. The 2 melodies intertwine in a cantankerous-century collaboration betwixt an almost unknown pastor and one of the greatest composers of all time.
The next fourth dimension you hear Sleepers Awake on WCRB, you can think about the long journeying it took to get from 16th century Unna to 21st century Boston. Yet even after all of that, its message remains universal. Nosotros don't know what volition happen side by side, just we practice know that we can and will get through it. What we can do now is be prepared, hold up our lamps, and bring light to each other's lives. To everybody helping in any way they tin through all of this, thanks. Nosotros'll keep our lamp shining the best way we know how: past bringing you beautiful music like Sleepers Awake.
Source: https://www.classicalwcrb.org/blog/2020-04-02/sleepers-awake-from-crisis-to-cantata
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