Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen

The unknown librettist of Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen (I would gladly carry the Cross-staff) compares life to a sea voyage. It seems likely that the cantata, one of three by Bach for solo bass, was written for a rising-star singer, perhaps the law student Johann Christoph Samuel Lipsius. Bach provided him with two magnificent arias, each rich in musical as well as textual imagery, and a sublime shorter recitative and aria, “Ich stehe fertig und bereit” (“I stand ready and prepared”). The work, first performed at Leipzig in 1726 on the 19th Sunday after Trinity, opens with a play on the word “Kreuzstab”, an object familiar to Bach’s contemporaries both as the forerunner of the sextant and as the universal symbol of Christ’s crucifixion. “Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen” begins with a yearning orchestral ritornello (refrain) for two oboes, oboe da caccia and strings. The tripartite aria’s uplifting final section welcomes the eternal comfort that awaits in God’s promised land. The following recitative, complete with undulating cello part, evokes the spirit of life’s journey through troubles towards “das Himmelreich” (“the Kingdom of Heaven”). About J.S. Bach’s Cantatas Although Bach seldom used the word, “cantata” has become the accepted term for the multi-movement church pieces and celebratory secular works composed in large numbers by Bach and his contemporaries. Bach himself wrote more cantatas than anything else, mostly during two bursts of creativity between 1713 and 1716 in Weimar, and 1723 and 1729 in Leipzig. Around 200 works survive in a wide range of styles but usually including a chorus, solo arias, linking (speech-like) recitatives and a hymn (chorale). Bach probably completed five annual cycles of church cantatas for regular Sunday worship, festivals and celebrations. Because they were occasional pieces for court and public entertainment, fewer secular cantatas survive, though some were later revised for church use.