Utwory na płycie:

• Cantata BWV 46 'Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei' Johann Sebastian Bach: 1. Coro 'Schauet doch und sehet'
• Cantata BWV 46 'Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei' Johann Sebastian Bach: 2. Recitativo Tenore 'So klage du, zerstörte Gottesstadt'
• Cantata BWV 46 'Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei' Johann Sebastian Bach: 3. Aria Basso 'Dein Wetter zog sich auf von weiten'
• Cantata BWV 46 'Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei' Johann Sebastian Bach: 4. Recitativo Alto 'Doch bildet euch, o Sünder'
• Cantata BWV 46 'Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei' Johann Sebastian Bach: 5. Aria Alto 'Doch Jesus will auch bei der Strafe'
• Cantata BWV 46 'Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei' Johann Sebastian Bach: 6. Chorale 'O grosser Gott von Treu'
• Lamentatione I pro die mercuri sancto - Jan Dismas Zelenka
• Lamentatione II pro die veneris sancto - Jan Dismas Zelenka
• Cantata BWV 102 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben !' Johann Sebastian Bach: 1. Coro 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben!'
• Cantata BWV 102 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben !' Johann Sebastian Bach: 2. Recitativo 'Wo ist das Ebenbild, das Gott uns eingepräget'
• Cantata BWV 102 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben !' Johann Sebastian Bach: 3. Aria 'Weh der Seele, die den Schaden'
• Cantata BWV 102 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben !' Johann Sebastian Bach: 4. Arioso 'Verachtest du den Reichtum seiner Gnade'
• Cantata BWV 102 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben !' Johann Sebastian Bach: 5. Aria 'Erschrecke doch'
• Cantata BWV 102 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben !' Johann Sebastian Bach: 6. Recitativo 'Beim Warten ist Gefahr'
• Cantata BWV 102 'Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben !' Johann Sebastian Bach: 7. Chorale 'Heut lebst du, heut bekehre dich'

Bach:
Cantate BWV 46 Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei
BWV 102 Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben!

Zelenka:
Lamentatione I pro die mercuri sancto for bass, 2 oboes, bassoon, strings and Basso Continuo
Lamentatione II pro die veneris sancto for altus, violin, oboe, bassoon and Basso Continuo

The two Bach cantatas presented here were written three years apart (1723 and 1726) for the same Sunday of the liturgical year, the tenth Sunday after Trinity. The Gospel for the day reports Jesus weeping over Jerusalem, and announcing its destruction. Marcel Ponseele thought it was very interesting to juxtapose these cantatatas against 2 lamentations composed by Zelenka in 1722. In a span of 4 years and geographically closely connected we have three musical settings of the same subjects. One lamentation is for bariton solo and the other for alto voice – performed in this recording by the french countertenor Damien Guillon.

We know of Bach’s admiration for his colleague Zelenka, whom he had the opportunity of meeting in Dresden, where the latter worked. Born in Bohemia, Jan Dismas Zelenka was six years older than Bach. He went to Dresden in 1710, where he was engaged as a double bass player in the famous court orchestra, at the time regarded as the best in the world. Indulged by the Prince-Elector Augustus the Strong, he completed his studies in Vienna, then in Italy, Naples, Venice, and returned to Vienna, where he had the opportunity of giving lessons to Quantz. He settled permanently in Dresden in 1719. This was for him an intense period of composition. For the royal chapel, he composed Masses, Requiems, Magnificats, hymns, Lamentations, music for Holy Week and for vespers, psalms. So, in 1722, Zelenka had composed the six Lamentations for the three Saint’s Days. The first Lamentation, for Maundy Thursday, sets the first five verses of the first Lamentation of Jeremiah, in Latin of course; a mosaic structure of juxtaposed elements, very different, linked by the Hebrew letters of the verses, generously illuminated. Tension, gravity, desolation, throbbing from the beginning. The declamation of the solo bass alternates a simple recitative with continuo, perfectly intelligible, and some arioso episodes, with instrumental comments, where the painful affekts generated by the text are released in chromatic movements, vocalises and dissonances.