Stuttgart Guide

Bohemian composer Jan Zelenka (1679-1745) spent the last 35 years of his life in Dresden, first as a double bass player and then as composer for the court, writing primarily for the church. This monumental Mass (“in honor of God the Father”) is one of several he composed in the last years of his life, and its structure–the main parts of the mass are subdivided into smaller sections–allows for a wide variety of scoring, including different configurations of soloists, solo arias, chorus alone, and chorus with solo singers.

It is an album devoted to excerpts from the Schemelli-Liederbuch. This song book was a mammoth collection of hymns or chorales put together by Georg Christian Schemelli, a choirmaster in Zeitz, Germany, in the first half of the 18th century. (His son studied with Bach.) For the hymnal, Bach contributed figured basses (to guide in the harmonization by the performer) for 69 chorale melodies. He also was responsible for a few melodies themselves and some complete harmonizations.