Ich Freue Mich In Dir, BWV 133

(I rejoice in You), 133, is a church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach. He composed the Christmas cantata in Leipzig in 1724 for the Third Day of Christmas and first performed it on 27 December 1724. It is based on the 1697 hymn of the same name by Caspar Ziegler. The cantata is part of Bach's chorale cantata cycle, the second cycle during his tenure as that began in 1723. The hymn is among the most modern that Bach used within the cycle. Instead of dealing with the nativity story it is focused on an intimate relationship of the individual believer and the Christ child.

In the style of the chorale cantata cycle, an unknown poet retained the outer stanzas for framing choral movements and paraphrased the middle stanza into four movements for soloists, alternating arias and recitatives. In this case, two recitatives also end in the exact wording from the chorale.

Bach scored the work for four soloists, a four-part choir and a Baroque instrumental ensemble of a cornetto to reinforce the chorale tune, two oboes d'amore, strings and basso continuo. The choir has only a rather small part, explained by the two demanding new cantatas first performed the two previous days.

History and words

Bach wrote the chorale cantata in his second year as in Leipzig, as part of his second cantata cycle, the chorale cantata cycle, for the Third Day of Christmas. The prescribed readings for the feast day were from the Epistle to the Hebrews, Christ is higher than the angels, () and the prologue of the Gospel of John, also called Hymn to the Word (). The cantata is based on the chorale in four stanzas (1697) by Caspar Ziegler. It is one of the newest of the chorales which served as a base for the cycle, whereas Bach otherwise preferred the beloved hymns of poets such as Martin Luther and Paul Gerhardt. In the format of the cycle, the unknown poet of the cantata text retained the first and the last stanzas for choral movements, and paraphrased the inner stanzas closely to a sequence of arias and recitative. Two movements were formed from the ideas of the second stanza, and the following two movements were derived from the third stanza. The librettist retained several lines as part of the recitatives, and Bach highlighted them by arioso treatment. The text has no reference to the readings nor to the feast of John the Evangelist. It expresses the intimate joy of the individual believer about the presence of God in the Jesus child.

Bach led the Thomanerchor in the first performance of the cantata on 27 December 1724. Bach's successor Gottlob Harrer performed the cantata after Bach's death.

Music

Scoring and structure

Bach structured in six movements. Both the text and the tune of the hymn are retained in the outer movements, a chorale fantasia and a four-part closing chorale. Bach scored the work for four vocal soloists (soprano (S), alto (A), tenor (T) and bass (B)), a four-part choir, and a Baroque instrumental ensemble of a cornett (Ct) to double the chorale melody, two oboes d'amore (Oa), two violin parts (Vl), one viola part (Va), and basso continuo. The duration of the cantata is given as 20 minutes.

In the following table of the movements, the scoring, keys and time signatures are taken from Alfred Dürr's standard work . The continuo, which plays throughout, is not shown.

Movements

The chorale is sung on a variant of a melody of . This melody was probably new to Bach who noted it in the score of the Sanctus, which he also composed for Christmas in 1724 and later made part of his Mass in B minor. The song became part of the Leipzig hymnal only after 1730.

While Bach's Weimar cantata , expressed a communal joy in two choral movements and two duets, a sequence of four movements for a single voice reflects the joy of the individual believer.

1

In the opening chorale fantasia, "" (I rejoice in you and bid you welcome), the cornetto plays the cantus firmus with the soprano, the oboes play in unison with violin II and viola, whereas violin 1 "shines above the rest". The orchestra carries the expression of joyful excitement. The lower voices are set mostly in homophony, with the exception of expressing "" (the great son of God). The voices thus have little work, which can be explained by this cantata being the third new cantata performed on three consecutive days.

John Eliot Gardiner, who conducted the Bach Cantata Pilgrimage in 2000, summarised: "I find it hard to imagine music that conveys more persuasively the essence, the exuberance and the sheer exhilaration of Christmas than the opening chorus of BWV 133".

2

The alto aria, "" (Be comforted! A holy body contains the unfathomable being of the Highest), is accompanied by the two oboes d'amore. Motifs of runs as in the opening still occur in the aria, but it is dominated by a repeated call of the oboes, in "rhythmically accented ascending interval leaps", that the voice sings to the word "Getrost".

3

The tenor recitative, "" (An Adam might well, filled with terror, from God's countenance hide himself in paradise), is marked twice for text quoted from the original chorale, once to stress "" (Almighty God Himself here visits us), and the conclusion, "" (He has become a little child and is called my little Jesus). In these highlighted passages, the music is close to the chorale tune but not an exact quote.

4

The soprano aria, "" (How beautifully it rings in my ears, this word: my Jesus is born), is accompanied by the strings. It begins and ends in an even time in the outer sections; the first violin alone begins with a run. In the middle section the time shifts to a siciliano, the tempo to ''adagio'', and it is unusually played without continuo, just a trio of the soprano, the first violin and the lower strings in unison. It illustrates the beautiful sounds of which the text speaks, and also, by lack of a bass, the denial of Jesus from the inn.

5

The bass recitative, "" (Indeed, my encouraged heart
will not dwell upon the fear and pain of death), expresses no more fear of death. Formally it is similar to the first recitative, quoting from the chorale in the end, highlighted musically as arioso with a melody similar but not identical to the chorale tune.

6

The cantata is closed by a four-part setting of the last chorale stanza, "" (Indeed, thus I will cling to you, O Jesus).

\header
\layout

global =

soprano = \new Voice = "sopvoice" \relative c'

alto = \new Voice \relative c'

tenor = \new Voice \relative c'

bass = \new Voice \relative c

verse = \new Lyrics = "firstVerse" \lyricsto "sopvoice"

\score
\score

Manuscripts and publication

Bach's autograph score of the cantata and the original parts, which he revised himself, are extant. The score and a set of duplicate parts were inherited by his son Wilhelm Friedemann Bach. In 1827, the score was sold at auction in Berlin with several other Bach cantata autographs and manuscripts to Carl Pistor. Pistor invited Mendelssohn to catalog the auction materials, which became the original autographs in the vast Rudorff collection; in return Pistor gifted the autograph of BWV 133 to Mendelssohn. It went finally to the Royal Library in Berlin. The original parts were inherited by Bach's widow Anna Magdalena Bach who quickly sold them to the Thomasschule.

The cantata was first published in 1881 in the first complete edition of Bach's work, the Bach-Gesellschaft Ausgabe. The volume in question was edited by Wilhelm Rust. In the Neue Bach-Ausgabe it was published in 2000, edited by Andreas Glöckner.

Recordings

A list of recordings is provided on the Bach Cantatas Website. Instrumental groups playing period instruments in historically informed performances are marked by green background.

Notes

References

Cited sources

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External links

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"BWV 133 ''Ich freue mich in dir''"
English translation, University of Vermont

"BWV 133 ''Ich freue mich in dir''
text, scoring, University of Alberta
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{{Authority control

Church cantatas by Johann Sebastian Bach
1724 compositions
Christmas cantatas
Chorale cantatas