Response to Brett's Journal: St. Matthew’s Passion by Johann Sebastian Bach

I was immediately drawn to Brett’s journal on Bach’s St. Matthew Passion because it is presented in such a personal way that I couldn’t help but be taken in. I especially appreciated his discussion of the arias of the work. Brett’s descriptions of these movements made me eager to listen to them and discover each character’s personal voice.

The first aria is sung by the alto, immediately after the story of the woman anointing Jesus with precious ointment. This story foreshadows the anointing of Jesus’ body for His burial. The alto’s recitative and aria are a prayer to Jesus, offering her own tears as ointment, in repentance for her sins. Bach uses word painting in this recitative during the text, “To pour upon thy head an ointment.” The voice and accompanying winds both make a descent through this line portraying the outpouring of tears. The opening lines of this aria, “guilt and pain” can truly be felt throughout. It is filled with appoggiaturas that represent the weeping and pleading of the soloist.

When the alto sings again later in the piece, it is another cry for mercy. This time, the alto sings her recitative and aria right after the scourging of Jesus. There is much more urgency in the music of this recitative, as she pleads for the tormenters to cease and for God to have mercy. This aria, just as the aria she sang in the beginning, speaks of her tears being offered as a sacrifice. The phrases in this movement move in downward patterns, reminding us of her flowing tears and her begging for mercy.

Unlike the alto, whose character is primarily repentant, the soprano’s role is to comment on the meaning of Jesus’ actions in a very personal way. In the recitative that she sings, directly after the last supper, she sings of the beauty of Jesus’ sacrifice with the words “…His testament makes me glad. His flesh and blood, o preciousness, He bequeaths into my hands.” The aria that directly follows is one of the most joyful movements of the work in which she pledges “I will give my heart to thee; sink myself in it, my Salvation.” This is a beautiful love song, in which the soprano remarks on the power of Jesus’ sacrifice and makes it truly personal for her. In this aria, you can really see a deep relationship between her and her savior.

Just after Jesus has been praying the words, “My Father, if possible, allow this cup to pass from me; but not as I will, rather as thou wilt…” in the garden of Gethsemane, the bass sings a recitative and aria in which he comments on the roles of Jesus’ followers to take up their own crosses and follow in His steps. Bach uses word painting in the very opening lines of the recitative with the lines, “The Savior falls down before His father; thereby He raises me and all people from our fall” incorporating appropriate descent and ascent in the vocal line. The aria that follows is very heavy, in the lower range of both the voice and the accompaniment, to portray the weight of the decision he makes saying, “I will gladly submit myself to take up my cross and cup…”

Like the bass, the tenor serves as a commenter on the meaning of Christ’s passion for the Christian. After the High Priest has accused Jesus of blasphemy and Jesus does not speak to defend himself, the tenor sings a recitative and aria about how Jesus’ actions translate to his followers. The text of the recitative reads, “We should be like Him and hold our peace in time of persecution,” and the aria speaks of how if he acts like Jesus, God will give his heart its vengeance in the end. The viola de gamba often is playing a dotted eighth-sixteenth rhythm throughout this aria. This rhythm creates a sense of anxiety, that the singer is eager for the day when holding his tongue in the face of insult will pay off and God will give him his retribution.

In his journal, Brett wrote, “…the main soloists…all have an array of arias that serve to show the emotions and depth of the story.” My investigation of the text lead me to uncover an array of characters portrayed by the soloists that make the work personal for the listener. Bach has created a work that is not only musically moving, he has made Christ’s passion relevant and meaningful for Christians of his time and today.

Monteverdi: L'Incronazione di Poppea

The first public opera house, Teatro San Cassiano, was opened in Venice in 1637. With this new facility, opera became more accessible and wildly popular. Claudio Monteverdi’s opera,L’Incoronazione Di Poppea , was composed in 1642 to be performed in a public opera house like this one, during the carnival season in Venice. It was premiered in 1643 with Anna Renzi, a famous singer of the time, singing the role of Octavia (Fabbri, 269).

Unlike Monteverdi’s popular opera, L’Orfeo, which was composed in 1607 under the patronage system, L’Incoronazione Di Poppea calls for a small performing force. InL’Orfeo, Monteverdi denotes a very (omit very) specific instrumentation, including a great number and variety of instruments. L’Incoronazione Di Poppea was written with a much smaller budget(a smaller budget in comparison to what? I would put an example in here), and therefore uses fewer instruments (Beat, 277-281). Basso continuo is used to accompany dialogue and a very small instrumental ensemble plays the ritornellos. The low budget is only one reason for this light instrumental scoring.(This sentence about the budget being the only reason seems a little redundant) The 17^th Century Venetian opera focused on the singers and the storytelling, and Monteverdi’s orchestration allows the instruments to be subordinate and supportive.

L’Incoronazione Di Poppea was one of the first operas in which the plot is not based on Greek mythology, but rather historical events and people. Librettist Gian Francesco Busenello based much of his libretto on Suetonius’ biographies of Roman emperors. The opera tells the story of the Roman emperor Nero’s mistress, Poppea (illustrated above), and her quest to be crowned empress. Mythology does play its part in the production, with Fortune, Virtue and Cupid as main characters (Carter, 263-264).

The opera begins with a very short instrumental prelude. This introduction is in two sections. The first is slow, and uses only strings. One violin plays the role of soloist, playing a more virtuosic line with fast runs and embellishments, accompanied by two other treble stringed instruments, viola de gamba, and of course, harpsichord. The second part of the introduction is fast and dancelike, and a flute doubles the top violin voice. This type of instrumental interlude, or ritornello, appears in short segments throughout the opera.

I was surprised to hear flutes and violins accompanying the dialogue on this recording. In reading the liner notes, I found an interesting discussion on the topic by the conductor, René Jacobs. It is his opinion that the performance practice of the time would have been for instrumentalists to improvise over the basso continuo, as musicians of the time were well-versed in improvisation. He also argues that with only about ten minutes of ritornello for the entire show, it would not make sense to pay instrumentalist to sit and relax during the remaining three hours of the opera, especially on this kind of a tight budget (Jacobs 34-35). I found his argument compelling, and the addition of instrumentalists to the dialogue enhancing to the text rather than distracting.

This opera displays several of Monteverdi’s compositional characteristics. He demonstrates the effectiveness of dissonance in service to certain texts. In Act I, during a farewell scene between Poppea and Nero, Poppea says, “It is such a bitter word that from one hint of it, ah, dying, I feel my soul expiring.” Monteverdi composes at minor second between the voice and continuo to portray the “bitter word” and allows the line to descend slowly to illustrate the feeling of her soul expiring. Occasionally, he alters the libretto slightly to enhance the drama, allowing texts to overlap and interrupt one another, and sometimes repeating lines for emphasis (Burkholder, 444).

I very much enjoyed listening to this recording of Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione Di Poppea. I found it particularly interesting to uncover some of the details of performance practice. Listening to and researching this opera helped me gain a better perspective on the context within which Baroque opera composers were working, and provided me with a better foundation for understanding all opera.

Works Cited

Beat, Janet E. The Monteverdi Companion. New York, New York: W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 1972.

Burkholder, J. Peter, and Claude V. Palisca. Norton Anthology of Western Music: Volume 1: Ancient to Baroque; Sixth Edition. New York, New York: W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 2010

Carter, Tim. Monteverdi's Musical Theatre. London: Yale University Press, 2002.

Fabbri, Paolo. Monteverdi. Translated by Tim Carter. New York, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

Jacobs, René. Liner Notes from Monteverdi: L’Incoronazione Di Poppea. Harmonia Mundi. 901330.32, 1990. CD.