J.S. Bach composed the Cantata, Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis, BWV 21 (“I had much grief”) in 1713 during his tenure as director of music at the court of Weimar. It was first performed a year later on the third Sunday after Trinity.
Themes of suffering, grief, and mourning dominate the opening section of the Cantata, which, as conductor John Eliot Gardiner observes, is “set almost obsessively in C minor.” It is a key that 19th century musicologist Franz Pauer associated with “longing, sadness, solemnity…the portraiture of the supernatural.”
In the brief Sinfonia which opens the Cantata, a lamenting duet unfolds between the violin and oboe. Preceding the first word of text, this music, with its weeping lines, anguished dissonances, and desolate pauses, reflects both sensuous beauty and the ultimate universal sadness.
This performance, recorded in December of 2019 by the Netherlands Bach Society, features Shunske Sato (violin) and Emma Black (oboe):
Featured Image: Mary Magdalene Grieving- a closeup detail of “The Death of the Virgin” (1606), Caravaggio