Wikipedia:Today's featured article/June 8, 2014

Erschallet, ihr Lieder, erklinget, ihr Saiten!, BWV 172, is a 1714 church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach, composed in Weimar for Pentecost Sunday. The title translates as "Ring out, you songs; sound, you strings!" It is an early work in a genre to which Bach later contributed complete cantata cycles for all occasions of the liturgical year. Appointed Konzertmeister in the spring of 1714, he composed monthly church cantatas, most to texts by court poet Salomon Franck. The librettist reflects different aspects of the Holy Spirit, including a quotation from the prescribed Gospel reading and a stanza from Philipp Nicolai's 1599 hymn "Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern" as the closing chorale. The work is in six movements, and scored for four vocal parts, three trumpets, timpani, oboe d'amore and a string orchestra. Bach specified an unusual repeat of the opening chorus after the sixth movement. He led the first performance in the court chapel (pictured in 1660) of the Weimar palace. Bach performed the cantata again several times during his tenure as Thomaskantor – director of church music – in Leipzig, indicating that he particularly valued this cantata. (Full article...)

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