Jesu, meine Freude

Jesu, meine freude (Jesus, my joy), Bach’s longest and arguably finest motet, includes movements scored for five, four and three voices, almost certainly a combination of existing compositions and freshly written music. He builds the work’s six odd-numbered movements from the words of Johann Franck’s Lutheran chorale “Jesu, meine Freude”, first published in 1653, and weaves its hymn tune by Johann Crüger into five of them. “Trotz dem alten Drachen” (Defy the old dragon) treats Franck’s arresting imagery of the devil, and “Todes Rachen” (the Jaws of death) to a freely composed setting complete with light echoes of Crüger’s melody in the first soprano part. The even-numbered movements quote five verses from the Epistle to the Romans, in which St Paul contrasts the burden of earthly sin with the promise of freedom from condemnation for those who believe in Christ. “Gute Nacht, o Wesen” (Goodnight, O being), the most beautiful of its 11 movements, surrounds chorale melody in the alto voice with a duet for two sopranos underpinned by a metronomic tenor countermelody that represents the soul bidding farewell to “Lasterleben”, a “life of iniquity”. About J.S. Bach's Motets Church musicians during Bach’s day were raised on a diet of unaccompanied Lutheran motets, simple polyphonic pieces from the early 1600s among them. Bach gave fresh life to the form throughout his career, sometimes to stretch the vocal skills of his Leipzig choristers with virtuosic test pieces for double choir, sometimes to provide funeral music for prominent citizens, sometimes to reinforce the message of a gospel reading or other biblical text. He created five motets between the early 1710s and late 1740s, while three other motet-like works have also been attributed or misattributed to him.