Talk:Sehet, wir gehn hinauf gen Jerusalem, BWV 159/GA1

GA Review

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

Reviewer: Aza24 (talk · contribs) 09:01, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

Will get to this in the next few days. Aza24 (talk) 09:01, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

• Many thanks for your patience Gerda, comments below: Aza24 (talk) 03:11, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Prose

• I will note that based on your insistence in previous reviews, I've gone ahead and fixed minor things myself; please feel free to revert, though most (in my mind at least) seem to be standard adjustments. Aza24 (talk) 03:11, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
• Bach's music foreshadows the Passion. & who also wrote the text for Bach's St Matthew Passion—2 things:
  • Saying "Bach's music foreshadows [piece of music]", makes it sound like the piece of music in question is not by Bach.

    I don't know how to say best that I don't mean any other piece by Bach but firstly the Passion of Jesus, secondly - per text common - both passions by Bach, not only Matthew. In German, the word for Lent is Passionszeit - time of Passion, but this was performed before that time, no more concertante music during that "silent" time, then a performance of a Passion (music) on Good Friday, - in this case - 1729 - Matthew. --GA

    A bit confused, we should be using this link then, right? I don't know which passions you're reffering to, but it would be clearer (and perhaps more informative) if they are written out in the text Aza24 (talk) 01:44, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

    I tried to be a bit more precise, but think at the beginning, it's really not yet a Bach Passion, but the fact that before Lent even begins and the prescribed gospel only announces, the cantata text and thus Bach's music deal with the Passion of Jesus as something already done. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:50, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

  • This may work better if switched around, e.g. "foreshadows Bach's St Matthew Passion" and then "who also wrote the text for Bach's Passion",

    depending on what we do above --GA

• Jesus who quotes from the Gospel, and the Soul.—three things below, possibly as the result of my reoccurring misunderstandings of Christianity :)
  • If we're quoting from multiple Gosepls then we need an "s", otherwise, it might be worth specifying in the gospel in question

    not sure I understand the question, the quote is from one. I use capital for a specific one, lower case when general, compare string quartet to Schubert's String Quartet. --GA

    I'm wondering if we can specify which Gospel in ("Jesus who quotes from the Gospel"), rather than being vague with the reader? And if Jesus is quoting from multiple Gospels, we need an "s". I'm also not convinced that the lowercase vs uppercase is used effectively, The first movement is a dialogue of the bass as the vox Christi who sings a quotation from the gospel—this sounds like it's reffering to a specific Gospel, so why lowercase? Likewise with The gospel for the Sunday

    I'll try, later today (still reading the watchlist). In German, when we just say Evangelium (Gospel), we can mean the sum of the four books, - is there a term for it in English?(the whole section, vs. Epistles, Prophets ...) - Of course Gospel can also be short for the last one just mentioned, where the reading was from. I'll try to clarify. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:35, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

    I changed to mentioning and linking both specific gospels --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:50, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

  • I also wonder about capitalizing Gospel irregularly in the lead, is there a reason for this?

    will check, but one reason is explained above --GA

  • Is "the Soul" a religious book of some kind (the capitalization seems to imply this)? Or are we talking about him quoting from his literal soul?

    none of those, but like a character in an allegorical play or opera, Musica in L'Orfeo comes to mind --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:09, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

    I think we need to make this clearer for the reader, otherwise, it's likely that they will take as Jesus quoting from "his soul"—maybe put something in parentheses?

    I dropped the term Soul, and say the voice represents his followers, how is that? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:52, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

• I see in the article text you have Estomihi (Quinquagesima) vs just Estomihi for the lead and infobox; do we want to go one of these routes for all three occurrences?

  not really, because they add different information, the second actually much more regarding musical settings, but first a reader unfamiliar with the term should get the simple one --GA

• no cantatas music was permitted–just double checking, is it specifically cantatas prohibited, or all music (or maybe all church music)?

  They sang hymns, and the organ played. The German term for what is forbidden is Figurative Musik, but I'm afraid that it's not easy to translate. The German article just says "umfangreiche Musik" which would be extended music. The idea was a spiritual fasting/simplicity, - the more glorious BWV 1 must have been interrupting it.

  The Tempus clausum article gives some information to this which might help clarify the situation (e.g. that "figural or florid church music" was prohibited)

  Do you think "figural or florid music" will be understood? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:35, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

• Is this the right Jahrgang? Perhaps link here if so

  well, we had it in the other cantata, where the translation is simply "cycle", - it's one year of texts (or music), meaning often a church year, or - for Bach - a year beginning in the middle of the church year, because that's when he took office --GA

  I dropped the German word and instead give title and translation of the collection. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:21, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

• Completely optional, but if you're so inclined, you could link the mentioning of the movements in History and words to their respective sections

  I don't know - these links are there from the table, and in History, I'd rather not invite to scroll back and forth --GA

• Bach first performed the cantata on 27 February 1729—in the lead you say "probably" but no "doubt" is expressed here

  unfortunately, sources differ, so depending on where you look you'll get this or that, Dürr "probably", Bach Digital "just the date", - it looks to me as if they now agreed it was that date, - what should we do? --GA

  If some sources have uncertainty and others don't, I'd stick with the uncertainty; I suspect—as a database—Bach Digital doesn't make an effort to specify the certainty of the situation. Aza24 (talk) 01:44, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

  adopted --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:23, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

• Movements section(s) looked good as far as I can tell. Aza24 (talk) 03:50, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

  Thank you, and food for thought as always from you! Much appreciated. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:09, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

  Sorry, today I was busy elsewhere, hoping for tomorrow. Gerda Arendt (talk) 23:27, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

  Some progress, please check. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:23, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

MOS

• "History and words" seems a little informal, what would you think about "History and text"? This isn't a huge deal for me, just thought I'd bring it up Aza24 (talk) 03:11, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

  Interesting that you think informal. It was discussed in 2010, when the efforts on the cantatas began, "words" regarded as better suited to sacred text than "texts". Perhaps that's a Germanism. The German term for text from the Bible would be Bibelwort, compare "wise words" to "wise texts". Around 200 articles have that header. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:39, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

• When you have translations of things in paranetheses, you're a bit inconsistent on using double quotes vs single quotes vs neither
  • Still wondering about the above, most of the issues with the latter seems to be in the movements section Aza24 (talk) 01:30, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
    • I've addressed this I think Aza24 (talk) 07:53, 18 March 2021 (UTC)

Sources

• Will look closer at the sources later, putting this on hold for now. Aza24 (talk) 03:50, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

A few thoughts

Picking in on one of the topics above (I had a similar discussion in my last GAC) – according OED minidictionary:

• "Gospel" (capitalised) refers to the (complete set of) books of the New Testament, so not only the first four books by the Evangelists, but also, for instance, the Acts, epistles, etc.
• "gospel" (not capitalised) refers to Christ's teachings (or in a broader meaning: anything that can be safely believed, or a set of principles believed in)

--Francis Schonken (talk) 07:52, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

And another topic: "Figurative Musik" is not, afaik, the correct expression. In the second paragraph of BWV 227#History I wrote: "... figural music ..." – this may be enough of a hint to get this sorted for this article. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:52, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

Thank you, that helps.

1. So, Gospel means the same thing as New Testament? That's different from German, and why have nothing - or what would it be? - for the four books "Gospel of ..."?
2. I'd use "figural music" then, but is there any link here? I'm afraid that's not a term a general reader would understand, and that reader might not be helped by German. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:13, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

   (edit conflict)Re.

   1. Wikipdia's Canonical Gospels link at least goes to the right place for that, but don't know whether that is useful in the context.
   2. Sure, there is a link "here" ... a red link, which means that the article explaining the concept still has to be written. Thus far I haven't been able to locate a (section in a) English Wikipedia article where the expression could logically redirect to... maybe someone has better luck in finding such existing place.

   --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:55, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

3. Having looked at the German article, that isn't even what a Bach cantata would be, - rather the specific way of elaborate polyphony that many choirs that focus on that (older) style of music would carry in their names, such as Figuralchor Frankfurt. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:57, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

   Don't see any of "that (older) style of music" in the repertoire of this Figuralchor... So anyway there's room for improvement at German Wikipedia: both for expanding the description of Figuralmusik (... extending its description to what it meant in the Baroque, and specifically also German High Baroque, era) and of the Frankfurt choir (... extending the description of their repertoire beyond the "late baroque to early modern" repertoire currently mentioned in the article, if that is indeed the case). But that's of little relevance here, except if someone would start a figural music article here as a blunt translation of the equivalent on German Wikipedia (not knowing that the article there is a bit problematic for its failing scope). --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:06, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

   Trying to give a short overview:

   • Before Protestantism there was polyphony and Gregorian, but I don't know whether polyphony would already be distinguished as calling it "figural";
   • In the 16th century (or maybe even earlier, with e.g. the Bohemian Brethren) Protestantism started to promote the idea that church music should be sung by the people, instead of being sung by a (Gregorian) choir of clerics or a (polyphonic) choir of professional singers. Whether Luther said it in so much words I don't know, but I have no doubt that in his mind figural music was anathema. That was, afaik, the situation till around the end of the 16th century: Catholics did "figural music", while Protestants, rejecting both "figural music" and (Latin) Gregorian, did community singing. Note that such Protestant community singing was not limited to monophonic chorale tunes, but included as well (homophonic) chorales in multiple voices (e.g., Walter's 1524 Eyn geystlich Gesangk Buchleyn).
   • Come the 17th century, when German Protestants started to look beyond their boundaries, fancying Italian early Baroque genres, and producing music along these lines, which after an early start with music for two or three voices and a modest accompaniment (e.g. Johann Hermann Schein's earliest publications), soon became something that was totally unsuitable for community singing: that was afaik the origin of the "figural music" distinction in Protestantism, with genres such as geistliches Konzert etc performed by professional musicians (or at least: choristers from a school) as opposed to all attendants of a church service singing together. But, within Protestantism, such figural music was far from generally accepted, be it by remembering Luther's principal aversion for it, or by offshoots such as Pietism seeing singing at home, or as a community, as the only place sacred music could occupy. Another example is for instance Buxtehude, who was disallowed to write church music in sacred concerto format (hence, motets, or for outside church services).
   • Come the 18th century, this tension between the two types of Protestant church music remained, and the two types grew further apart: community singing became exclusively monophonic (be it with some instrumental accompaniment), thus "Cantional" type of hymnals (containing community hymns for multiple voices) were abandoned (the 1682 Neu Leipziger Gesangbuch being one of the last ones in that format), the new hymnals generally having only hymn texts, and at most hymn tunes if music was included. (the 1736 Schemellis Gesangbuch, which also included continuo accompaniment for the hymn tunes, remained a completely inconsequential hymnal, following from that evolution); on the other hand, the figural church music became more and more complex, so further and further from community singing, and the exclusive domain of professionals (or at least nothing less than trained students like those of the Thomanerchor). No surprise then that in Leipzig, at the "strictly Lutheran" end of the spectrum, the figural music was reined in, and forbidden during the tempus clausum of Advent and Lent: at least in those periods community singing was king, as Luther intended.

   All of the above just from memory, and would take quite a lot of work to convert to well-referenced article text, so that's all for now. --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:33, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

Passing

I'm not exactly sure what the remaining issue above is (or if there is one, I think it was resolved?), but this article progressed nicely, and I don't think the above would prevent the article from meeting the GA criteria. Passing now. Aza24 (talk) 07:58, 18 March 2021 (UTC)