52: Different Choral Writing Styles in Baroque Sacred Music-- an Overview

 

Cantatas, oratorios (effectively, enormous cantatas), and opera have three basic types of movements, categorized by who is singing, about what. The most straightforward out of the material we’ve looked at so far is the “Chor/Chorus” movement—the chorus sings all together in four-part harmony. A fabulous example of this type of writing is the sixth (and far more famous tenth) movement of BWV 147, the cantata movement made wildly popular by pianist Myra Hess’s transcription as “Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring.” Notice how the voices move together (there’s a term for this, and we’ll cover it very soon), and it’s relatively easy for anyone to sing (in this particular case, though not always), so it’s theoretically possible for the congregation to join in if they have the lyrics and/or the melody. These “chorus” movements are generally prayers—movement 6 begins (translated into English) “What joy for me that I have Jesus, oh how firmly I hold on to him,” and movement 10 (the more famous one) begins “Jesus remains my joy, the comfort and life's blood of my heart.”

Then, separate from the chorales/chorus movements, we have those written for a subset of the voices available—one or more (almost always just one or two), but not all, or this would be a chorale, from above—arias and recitatives. Arias are those that communicate the words spoken directly by a character. Recitatives, meanwhile, serve mostly to set up the arias by giving us information an omniscient narrator has.

For example, the text in the St. Matthew Passion quoting from Matthew 26, that tells us that Jesus went to Gethsemane, where this is told in a narrative (“Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane…”), is a recitative. The “Evangelist” singer sings it, for the most part—the “Jesus” singer has a few measures to sing, but most of the singing is done by the Evangelist narrator—to give us information about who is where, doing what, and why. “The narrator tells us who Jesus is taking, where, why, and when” is an accurate 30,000-foot-view of this recitative, and, this overview, like most recitatives, starts with “The narrator tells us…” These typically follow the rhythmic patterns of human speech, are written syllabically most of the time, have limited accompaniment, and don’t repeat text very often.

In contrast, we have arias. Now, let’s turn not to a Passion, but to the Easter Oratorio, where we’ll find “Saget, saget mir gesschwinde,” sung by Mary Magdalene, the first to have found Jesus (and mistaken him for a gardener) on Easter morning. “Saget” actually tells us her firsthand perspective—relying heavily on imagery from Song of Songs—of what it’s like to discover the empty tomb, not have answers, and go searching frantically for Jesus (who, again, she’ll encounter shortly and, at first, assume Jesus is the gardener), without whom Mary Magdalene feels orphaned. Arias typically do not follow the rhythmic patterns of human speech, are much more melismatic, have much more involved accompaniments, and they do repeat text very often, compared to recitatives. For an example of this kind of writing for more than one voice (remember, “Saget” was only for one singer), look to the “Et in unum Dominum,” from the Mass in B minor, where about half of the section of the Creed that deals with God the Son is given to both the soprano and alto in this style.

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