1. Ich steh mit einem Fuß im Grabe, BWV 156 (18:07)
    Sinfonia (2:44)
  2. Aria and Chorale:
    Ich steh mit einem Fuß im Grabe (6:26)
  3. Recitative:
    Mein Angst und Not (1:43)
  4. Aria:
    Herr, was du willt, soll mir gefallen (4:42)
  5. Recitative:
    Und willst du, daß ich nicht soll kranken (1:12)
  6. Chorale:
    Herr, wie du willt, so schick’s mit mir (1:20)
  7. Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl, BWV 198 (32:43)
    Chorus: Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl (5:34)
  8. Recitative:
    Dein Sachsen, dein bestürztes Meißen (1:14)
  9. Aria:
    Verstummt, verstummt, ihr holden Saiten! (3:16)
  10. Recitative:
    Der Glocken bebendes Getön (0:43)
  11. Aria:
    Wie starb die Heldin so vergnügt! (7:20)
  12. Recitative:
    Ihr Leben ließ die Kunst zu sterben (1:05)
  13. Chorus:
    An dir, du Fürbild großer Frauen (1:58)
  14. Aria:
    Der Ewigkeit saphirnes Haus (4:02)
  15. Recitative:
    Was Wunder ist’s? (2:41)
  16. Chorus:
    Doch, Königin! du stirbest nicht (4:50)
  17. Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben, BWV 8 (17:36)
    Chorus: Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben (5:36)
  18. Aria:
    Was willst du dich, mein Geist, entsetzen (3:53)
  19. Recitative:
    Zwar fühlt mein schwaches Herz (0:56)
  20. Aria:
    Doch weichet, ihr tollen, vergeblichen Sorgen! (5:06)
  21. Recitative:
    Behalte nur, o Welt, das Meine! (0:56)
  22. Chorale:
    Herrscher über Tod und Leben (1:09)

Program Notes

Ich steh mit einem Fuß im Grabe, BWV 156
Cantata for the Third Sunday after Epiphany

Cantata 156, first performed on January 23, 1729, comes from the third cycle of Leipzig cantatas, works which often have a particularly intimate quality with smaller performing forces. The Gospel for the day, Christ’s healing of the sick, is taken as the inspiration for a text on the mortality of man and resignation to the will of God. Of the two arias the first emphasizes the inescapable sickness of the human condition, the halting steps admirably depicted in the syncopated bass line, while the chorale sung by the sopranos restores the rhythmic certainty with its supplication to God. The reliance on God’s will forms the basis of the joyful affect of the second aria. Here the euphonious counterpoint of oboe, violin, alto and basso continuo reflect the confidence of the believer. Only a few musical points show the darker side of suffering (as if to counterbalance the first aria where the chorale shows the brighter side of death): the minor twist just at the end of the fundamental ritornello; the central part of the text “In der Freude, in dem Leide, im Sterben...”

Given the comparative shortness of the cantata text, Bach opened the work with a purely instrumental sinfonia, later to be used in a harpsichord concerto, but almost certainly originating in an oboe concerto which is now lost. Like many of Bach’s slow concerto movements in a major key, the movement has an ambivalent affect: a serene and vocal melodic line, but also gestures which point to a more melancholy message. Despite its “second hand” status, this movement aptly prepares us for the bitter-sweet message of the cantata as a whole.

Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl, BWV 198
Trauerode

When the Electress of Saxony, Christiane Eberhardine, died in 1727, the state mourned no ordinary Queen. For, when in the closing years of the previous century, her husband had converted to Catholicism in order to gain the throne of Poland, she remained true to the indigenous Lutheran faith, something which won her the hearts of all Saxony. An enterprising student, Carl von Kirchbach commissioned two of the most eminent men in Leipzig, the poet, J.C. Gottsched and J.S. Bach the cantor and composer, to write an ode of mourning.

The occasion was not without its problems: the performance was to take place in the University Church (Pauliner-Kirche) and the director of music there, J.G.Görner, complained of the infringement of his prerogative. Kirchbach refused to change the terms of his commission and Bach refused to sign a document stating that his activity in the Pauliner-Kirche was “purely a favor and not to set any precedent.” In the event the performance went smoothly, attended by many important town and university officials: “there was shortly to be heard the mourning music which Kapellmeister Johann Sebastian Bach had composed in Italian style, with harpsichord, which Herr Bach himself played, organ, violas da gamba, lutes, violins, recorders, flutes etc, half sounding before, half after the oration of praise and sorrow.” [from a report, “Das thränende Leipzig,” 1727]

Gottsched was not only a notable poet in the locality of Leipzig, he was one of the greatest reformers of the German language of all time, someone who was of seminal influence in establishing German as a respectable literary language. His ode consisted of nine stanzas each with eight lines, all symmetrically balanced and ordered with an ear to the sounding and sequence of syllables. Bach’s choice of what was observed as “Italian style”—i.e. a sequence of choruses, arias and recitatives—patently ignored the ode-structure of Gottsched; furthermore, the stanzas were spread over the divisions of the musical movements. This, and the fact that Bach apparently changed some of the words themselves to create a more pictorial text, shows clearly that the composer was thinking entirely of the musical potentialities of the text; he shows no respect for the literary style per se, indeed he probably had little conception of Gottsched’s importance as a poet. It is not surprising that a protege of Gottsched, J.A. Scheibe should have written one of the most stinging rebukes of the composer, since by the aesthetic standards of the day his vocal writing was essentially turgid and confused.

As the report on the occasion recorded, Bach employed an unusually extensive instrumentarium for the “Trauerode”: the violas da gamba are typical in Bach’s settings of mournful texts (e.g. the “Actus Tragicus,” Cantata 106, and the two Passions), but it is highly unusual to find him employing two lutes as well. While he ignored much of the structural integrity of Gottsched’s verses, Bach devised his own system in structuring the music: the solo recitatives and arias are set for all four voices, beginning with the soprano and proceeding down to bass; each instrumental family is represented in the scoring of each aria. He includes most of the idioms appropriate to the “Italian style”: the dense concerted texture of the opening movement, the accompanied recitative, the final secco recitative, the astonishingly pictorial recitative depicting the funeral bells, the fugue which appropriately depicts the Queen as the “example for great women,” and the closing dance-like movement for chorus.

It is clear that Bach gave as much care in planning and writing this work as he did in his passion settings. Doubtless the heroic Lutheran queen was a figure who inspired strong sentiments in Bach the man and composer. The opening chorus contains echoes of the final chorus of the St. Matthew Passion which Bach had performed for the first time earlier the same year; indeed he reused this and movement seven in a cantata mourning the death of Leopold I of Köthen in 1729, a piece which is essentially a contrafactum of the St. Matthew Passion. He also took the harmonic outline of the initial vocal lines as the opening for the Kyrie of the Mass in B Minor, which he presented to Christiane’s son, August II of Saxony. Most of the other movements he reused in the now lost St. Mark Passion, something which confirms the passion-like nature of this work, a piece which should perhaps be appreciated on equal terms with the two surviving passions.

Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben, BWV 8
Cantata for the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity

Cantata 8 dates from the chorale-cycle of cantatas and was first performed on September 24, 1724. Taking as its starting point the Gospel for the day (Christ’s resurrection of the young man at Nain), the chorale text centers on the inevitable death of the individual, the sinful state of whom is redeemed by Jesus and God’s truth. Particularly unusual among the corpus of Bach’s chorale cantatas is the chorale melody itself, a relatively recent one written by a Leipzig organist and quite different from the traditional Lutheran chorales which so often betray the vestiges of the modal system. This melody is unequivocally tonal and specifically ‘tuneful,’ thus typical of the large repertory of ‘sacred songs’ engendered by the pietist movement which cultivated personal devotion at the expense of formalized public worship. Although Bach almost certainly disapproved of the pietist attitude to worship, eschewing as it did complex and demanding music, he sometimes entered into the spirit of its devotional songs, such as with his harmonizations for Schmelli’s song book during the 1730s. His setting of the final verse of the chorale in Cantata 8 is certainly unusual, playing on the lightness of the ‘catchy’ melody, yet at the same time curiously elevated stylistically with the frequent imitation of the opening of each line.

The cantata opens with a graphic portrayal of the question of the hour of death, a mesmerizing texture which seems from the first to be itself a question (particularly with the immediate flattened seventh degree of the scale); the imagery of bells may also be perceived in the strings and trembling fear in the high flute. The first aria employs the characteristic leap of a minor sixth (familiar in ‘Erbarme dich’ from the St. Matthew Passion or the opening of Cantata 82, ‘Ich habe genug’) and several further awkward leaps which together point to the fear of the soul at the hour of death. Bach is particularly adept at writing lines which would conventionally be considered unvocal, perhaps just to evoke the agony the individual should experience. There are also often secondary images embedded in the music, such as the striking of the hour of death in a sequence of staccato notes in the vocal part. The alto recitative extends both the questioning nature of the first two movements and the extreme anxiety of the text; this provides a bridge to the second, far more optimistic, section of the cantata. Using the imagery of a new morning succeeding the night, all is saved by the grace of Christ. Interestingly Bach uses secular imagery here: the courtly and fashionable flute in an energetic obbligato; the rhythm and idiom of the gigue, that most lively of secular dances. Bach clearly believed that religious music should take the best of what current idioms could offer, regardless of the origins or conventions of a particular style.

— John Butt

Texts & Translations

Ich steh mit einem Fuß im Grabe , BWV 156
Countertenor, Tenor, Bass, Chorus, Oboe, Strings and Basso Continuo

1. SINFONIA (Oboe, Strings, Bc.)

2. ARIA and CHORALE (Tenor, Sopranos, Strings, Bc.)

Ich steh mit einem Fuß im Grabe,
   Mach’s mit mir, Gott, nach deiner Güt,
Bald fällt der kranke Leib hinein,
   Hilf mir in meinen Leiden,
Komm, lieber Gott, wenn dir’s gefällt,
   Was ich dich bitt, versag mir nicht.
Ich habe schon mein Haus bestellt, 
   Wenn sich mein Seel soll scheiden, 
   So nimm sie, Herr, in deine Händ. 
Nur laß mein Ende selig sein!
   Ist alles gut, wenn gut das End.

I stand with one foot in the grave now,
   deal with me, god, of thy good will,
soon shall my ailing corpse fall in,
   help me in all my suffering,
Come, O my God, whenever thou wilt,
   what i ask now, do not deny me.
I have even now prepared my house,
   whenever my soul departs, receive it, lord, into thy hand.
Just let my end come with blessing!
   for all is good, if good the end.

RECITATIVE (Bass, Bc.)

Mein Angst und Not,
Mein Leben und mein Tod
Steht, liebster Gott, in deinen Händen;
So wirst du auch auf mich
Dein gnädig Auge wenden.
Willst du mich meiner Sünden wegen
Ins Krankenbette legen,
Mein Gott, so bitt ich dich,
Laß deine Güte größer sein als die Gerechtigkeit;
Doch hast du mich darzu versehn,
Daß mich mein Leiden soll verzehren,
Ich bin bereit,
Dein Wille soll an mir geschehn,
Verschone nicht und fahre fort,
Laß meine Not nicht lange währen;
Je länger hier, je später dort.

My fear and need, my life and even my death stand, dearest God, within thy power; thus shalt thou turn as well thy gracious eye upon me. But if for all my sins thou seekest to place me in ill health’s bed, my God, I beg of thee, let thy dear kindness be greater than justice rightly bids; yet if thou dost intend for me that now my suffering should consume me, I am prepared; thy will should be fulfilled in me, so spare me not and have thy way, let my distress not continue long; the longer here, the later there.

4. ARIA (Countertenor, Oboe, Violin, Bc.)

Herr, was du willt, soll mir gefallen,
Weil doch dein Rat am besten gilt.
 In der Freud, In dem Leide,
 Im Sterben,  in Bitten und Flehn
 Laß mir allemal geschehn,
 Herr, wie du willt.

Lord, what thou wilt shall be my pleasure, forsooth thy word is strongest yet. In my gladness, in my sadness, in dying, in weeping and prayer, unto me alway fulfill, Lord, what thou wilt.

5. RECITATIVE (Bass, Bc.)

Und willst du, daß ich nicht soll kranken,
So werd ich dir von Herzen danken;
Doch aber gib mir auch dabei,
Daß auch in meinem frischen Leibe
Die Seele sonder Krankheit sei
Und allezeit gesund verbleibe.
Nimm sie durch Geist und Wort in acht,
Denn dieses ist mein Heil,
Und wenn mir Leib und Seel verschmacht,
So bist du, Gott, mein Trost und meines Herzens Teil!

And if thou wish me not to suffer, to thee I’ll be sincerely thankful; however, grant to me as well that also in my lively body my soul may be free from sickness and evermore continue in health. Tend it with the Holy Ghost and word, for this is my true health, and if my soul and body fail, yet thou art, God, my strength, the portion of my heart!

6. CHORALE (Tutti)

Herr, wie du willt, so schick’s mit mir
Im Leben und im Sterben;
Allein zu dir steht mein Begier,
Herr, laß mich nicht verderben!
Erhalt mich nur in deiner Huld,
Sonst wie du willt, gib mir Geduld,
Dein Will, der ist der beste.

Lord, as thou wilt, so deal with me in living and in dying! For thee alone is my desire, Lord, leave me not to perish! Support me only in thy grace, but as thou wilt, let me forbear, for thy will has no equal.


Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl (Trauerode), BWV 198
Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass, Chorus, 2 Flutes, 2 Oboes d’amore, 2 Violas da gamba, Strings, 2 Lutes, and Basso Continuo

First Part

1. CHORUS (Tutti)

Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl
Aus Salems Sterngewölben schießen.
Und sieh, mit wieviel Tränengüssen
Umringen wir dein Ehrenmal.

Let, Princess, let still one more glance
Shoot forth from Salem’s starry heavens.
And see how many tearful offerings
We pour around thy monument.


2. RECITATIVE (Soprano, Strings, Bc.)

Dein Sachsen, dein bestürztes Meißen
Erstarrt bei deiner Königsgruft;
Das Auge tränt, die Zunge ruft:
Mein Schmerz kann unbeschreiblich heißen!

Hier klagt August und Prinz und Land,
Der Adel ächzt, der Bürger trauert,
Wie hat dich nicht das Volk bedauert,
Sobald es deinen Fall empfand!

Thy Saxons, like thy saddened Meissen,
Stand numb beside thy royal tomb;
The eye doth weep, the tongue cries out:
My pain must be without description!

Here mourn August and Prince and land,
The nobles moan, the commons sorrow,
How much for thee thy folk lamented
As soon as it perceived thy fall!

3, ARIA (Soprano, Strings, Bc.)

Verstummt, verstummt, ihr holden Saiten!
 Kein Ton vermag der Länder Not
 Bei ihrer teuren Mutter Tod,
 O Schmerzenswort! recht anzudeuten.

Be still, be still, ye lovely lyres!
 No sound could to the nations’ woe
 At their dear cherished mother’s death,
 O painful word!, give meet expression.

4. RECITATIVE (Alto, Tutti instruments)

Der Glocken bebendes Getön
Soll unsrer trüben Seelen Schrecken
Durch ihr geschwungnes Erze wecken
Und uns durch Mark und Adern gehn.

O, könte nur dies bange Klingen,
Davon das Ohr uns täglich gellt,
Der ganzen Europäerwelt
Ein Zeugnis unsres Jammers bringen!

The tolling of the trembling bells
Shall our lamenting souls’ great terror
Through their rebounding bronze awaken
And pierce us to the very core.

Oh, would that now this anxious peeling,
Which on our ears each day doth shrill,
To all the European world
A witness of our grief might render!

5. ARIA (Alto, 2 Violas da gamba, Lutes, Bc.)

Wie starb die Heldin so vergnügt!
 Wie mutig hat ihr Geist gerungen,
 Da sie des Todes Arm bezwungen,
 Noch eh er ihre Brust besiegt.

How died our Lady so content!
 How valiantly her spirit struggled,
 For her the arm of death did vanquish
 Before it did her breast subdue.

6. RECITATIVE (Tenor, 2 Oboes d’amore, Bc.)

Ihr Leben ließ die Kunst zu sterben
In unverrückter Übung sehn;
Unmöglich konnt es denn geschehn,
Sich vor dem Tode zu entfärben.

Ach selig! wessen großer Geist
Sich über die Natur erhebet,
Vor Gruft und Särgen nicht erbebet,
Wenn ihn sein Schöpfer scheiden heißt.

Her living let the art of dying
With ever steadfast skill be seen;
It would have been impossible
Before her death that she grow pallid.

Ah, blessed he whose noble soul
Doth raise itself above our nature,
At crypt and coffin doth not tremble,
When him his maker calls to part.

7. CHORUS (Tutti)

An dir, du Fürbild großer Frauen,
An dir, erhabne Königin,
An dir, du Glaubenspflegerin,
War dieser Großmut Bild zu schauen.

In thee, thou model of great women,
In thee, illustrious royal queen,
In thee, thou keeper of the faith,
The form of kindness was to witness.

Second Part

8. ARIA (Tenor, Flute, Oboe d’amore, 2 Violins, Viola da gamba, Lutes, Bc.)

Der Ewigkeit saphirnes Haus
Zieht, Füstin, deine heitern Blicke
Von unsrer Niedrigkeit zurücke
Und tilgt der Erden Dreckbild aus.

Ein starker Glanz von hundert Sonnen,
Der unsern Tag zur Mitternacht
Und unsre Sonne finster macht,
Hat dein verklärtes Haupt umsponnen.

Eternity’s sapphiric house,
O Princess, these thy cheerful glances
From our own low estate now draweth
And blots out earth’s corrupted form.

A brilliant light made by a hundred suns,
Which doth our day to midnight
And doth our sun to darkness turn,
Hath thy transfigured head surrounded.

9. RECITATIVE - ARIOSO - RECITATIVE (Bass, 2 Flutes, 2 Oboes d’amore, Bc.)

Was Wunder ist’s?  Du bist es wert,
Du Fürbild aller Königinnen!
Du mußtest allen Schmuck gewinnen,
Der deine Scheitel itzt verklärt.

Nun trägst du vor des Lammes Throne
Anstatt des Purpurs Eitelkeit
Ein perlenreines Unschuldskleid
Und spottest der verlaßnen Krone.

Soweit der volle Weichselstrand,
Der Niester und die Warthe fließet,
Soweit sich Elb’ und Muld’ ergießet,
Erhebt dich beides Stadt und Land.

Dein Torgau geht im Trauerkleide,
Dein Pretzsch wird kraftlos, starr und matt;
Denn da es dich verloren hat,
Verliert es seiner Augen Weide.

What wonder this? This thou hast earned,
Thou model of all queens forever!
For thou wast meant to win the glory
Which hath transfigured now thy head.

Before the lamb’s own throne thou wearest
Instead of purple’s vanity
A pearl-white robe of purity
And scornest now the crown forsaken.

As far as the brimming Vistula,
The Niester and the Warth are flowing,
As far as the Elb’ und Muld’ are streaming,
Extol thee both the town and land.

The Torgau walketh now in mourning,
The Pretzsch is weary, pale and weak;
For with the loss it hath in thee,
It loseth all its vision’s rapture.

10. CHORUS (Tutti)

Doch, Königin! du stirbest nicht,
Mann weiß, was man an dir besessen;
Die Nachwelt wird dich nicht vergessen,
Bis dieser Weltbau einst zerbricht.

Ihr Dichter, schreibt! wir wollen’s lesen:
Sie ist der Tugend Eigentum,
Der Untertanen Lust und Ruhm,
Der Königinnen Preis gewesen.

No, royal queen! Thou shalt not die;
We see in thee our great possession;
Posterity shall not forget thee,
Till all this universe shall fall.

Ye poets, write! For we would read it:
She hath been virtue’s property,
Her loyal subjects joy and fame
Of royal queens the crown and glory.


Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben BWV 8
Soprano, Countertenor, Tenor, Bass, Chorus, Flute, Cornetto, 2 Oboes d’amore, Strings and Basso-Continuo

1. CHORUS (Tutti)

Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben?
Meine Zeit läuft immer hin,
Und des alten Adams Erben,
Unter denen ich auch bin,
Haben dies zum Vaterteil,
Daß sie eine kleine Weil
Arm und elend sein auf Erden
Und dann selber Erde werden.

Dearest God, when will my death be? Now my days run ever on and the heirs of the old Adam have this for their legacy, that they for a little while, poor and wretched, inhabit earth and then are with earth united.

2. ARIA (Tenor, Oboe d’amore, Bc.)

Was willst du dich, mein Geist, entsetzen,
Wenn meine lezte Stunde schlägt?
Mein Leib neigt täglich sich zur Erden,
Und da muß seine Ruhstatt werden,
Wohin man so viel tausend trägt.

Why would you then, my soul, be frightened if my final hour should strike? My body daily leans toward earth now, and there it must discover its rest where now so many thousands lie.

3. RECITATIVE (Counter-tenor, Strings, Bc.)

Zwar fühlt mein schwaches Herz
Furcht, Sorge, Schmerz:
Wo wird mein Leib die Ruhe finden?
Wer wird die Seele doch
Vom aufgelegten Sündenjoch
Befreien und entbinden?
Das Meine wird zerstreut,
Und wohin werden meine Lieben
In ihrer Traurigkeit
Zertrennt, vertrieben?

Indeed my weak heart feels fear, worry, pain: where will my body discover rest? Who will that day exonerate and loosen my soul from its confining yoke of sin. My goods will be dispersed, and whither will all my loved ones then, in their own wretched grief, be cast and banished?

4. ARIA (Bass, Flute, Strings, Bc.)

Doch weichet, ihr tollen, vergeblichen Sorgen!
Mich rufet mein Jesus: wer sollte nicht gehn?
Nichts, was mir gefällt,
Besitzet die Welt.
Erscheine mir, seliger, fröhlicher Morgen,
Verkläret und herrlich vor Jesu zu stehn.

So yield now, ye foolish and purposeless sorrows! My Jesus doth call me: who would then not go? This world possesses nothing which I desire. Appear to me, blessed, exuberant morning, transfigured in glory to Jesus I’ll come.

5. RECITATIVE (Soprano, Bc.)

Behalte nur, o Welt, das Meine!
Du nimmst ja selbst mein Fleisch und mein Gebeine,
So nimm auch meine Armut hin;
Genug, daß mir aus Gottes Überfluß
Das höchste Gut noch werden muß,
Genug, daß ich dort reich und selig bin.
Was aber ist von mir zu erben,
Als meines Gottes Vatertreu?
Die wird ja alle Morgen neu
Und kann nicht sterben.

Then seize, O world, all my possessions! You take even my flesh and this my body, so take as well my poverty; enough, that there I shall be rich and blest. However, what shall I inherit except God’s paternal love? It is every morning new and cannot perish.

6. CHORALE (Tutti)

Herrscher über Tod und Leben,
Mach einmal mein Ende gut,
Lehre mich den Geist aufgeben
Mit recht wohlgefaßtem Mut.
Hilf, daß ich ein ehrlich Grab
Neben frommen Christen hab
Und auch endlich in der Erde
Nimmermehr zuschanden werde!

Ruler over death and living, let at last my ending be good; teach me how to yield my spirit with a courage firm and sure. Help me earn an honest grave next to godly Christian men, and at last though covered by earth may I never suffer ruin!

The Musicians

AMERICAN BACH SOLOISTS 
performing on period instruments
JEFFREY THOMAS, conductor

Ich steh mit einem Fuß im Grabe , BWV 156

Steven Rickards, countertenor
Jeffrey Thomas, tenor
James Weaver, baritone

Violin I
Elizabeth Blumenstock (leader)
Jörg-Michael Schwarz (solo)
Jolianne von Einem

Violin II
Anthony Martin
Michael Sand
Lisa Weiss

Viola
Katherine Kyme
George Thomson

Violoncello
Elisabeth LeGuin

Violone
Steven Lehning

Oboe
John Abberger

Organ
Jonathan Dimmock

Harpsichord
Phebe Craig

Archlute
Michael Eagan

Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl, BWV 198

Judith Nelson, soprano
Judith Malafronte, alto
Jeffrey Thomas, tenor
William Sharp, baritone

Violin I
Elizabeth Blumenstock (leader)
Jolianne von Einem
Michael Sand

Violin II
Anthony Martin
Sally Butt
Robert Seletsky

Viola
David Miller
Katherine Kyme

Violoncello
Loretta O’Sullivan

Viola da gamba
Mary Springfels
Brent Wissick

Violone
Steven Lehning

Flute
Kathleen Kraft (solo)
Robert Claire

Oboe
John Abberger (solo)
Gonzalo Ruiz

Bassoon
Marilyn Boenau

Organ
Jonathan Dimmock

Harpsichord
Phebe Craig

Lute
Michael Eagan
David Tayler

Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben , BWV 161

Julianne Baird, soprano
Steven Rickards, countertenor
Jeffrey Thomas, tenor
James Weaver, baritone

Violin I
Elizabeth Blumenstock (leader)
Jörg-Michael Schwarz
Jolianne von Einem

Violin II
Anthony Martin
Michael Sand
Lisa Weiss

Viola
Katherine Kyme
George Thomson

Violoncello
Elisabeth LeGuin

Violone
Steven Lehning

Flute
Sandra Miller

Oboe d’amore
John Abberger (solo)
Gonzalo Ruiz

Cornetto
Steven Escher

Bassoon
Andrew Schwartz

Organ
Jonathan Dimmock

Harpsichord
Phebe Craig

Archlute
Michael Eagan

AMERICAN BACH  CHOIR

Soprano
Julianne Baird (8,156)
Christine Earl
Ruth Escher (198)
Claire Kelm (8,156)
Judith Nelson (198)

Alto
Alexandra Ivanoff
Linda Liebschutz (8,156)
Judith Malafronte (198)
Zoila Muñoz (198)
Steven Rickards (8,156)

Tenor
Neal Rogers
John Rouse

Bass
Charles Fidlar
Thomas Hart
William Sharp (198)
James Weaver (8,156)

Choral Preparation
Jonathan Dimmock


Additional Information

Recording Engineer & Editor: Peter Nothnagle

Producer: Joseph Spencer

Cover Art: Detail from Benozzo Gozzoli’s frescoes in the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, Florence.

  Recorded January 10-11, 1992 at St. Stephen’s Church, Belvedere, CA

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