The Bach Cantatas - Using this Website
There are three principal ways of using this site
If you wish to access the essay on any particular cantata, enter its BWV number in the "Quick Search" box, top right of every page. NB use upper case letters.
If you want to read more about the background of this project, click onto the general Introduction under 'about the project'. Additionally, each of the volumes has its own specific introduction.
If you prefer to read the essays in sequence, click on the ‘volume’ icons on the home page and bring up the essay you require from the contents list.
Notes
Most CD recordings provide full translated texts. In these essays paraphrases are inserted into the essays in order to maintain all the information on the one page. A convention of four dashes is used throughout where translation is necessary e.g. Clues may be found in the isolated cries for help----hilf----appearing in the lower voices.
Music examples have now been included, about 800 in all. Obviously they cannot be used to illustrate every movement or theme and have consequently been selected so as to be as useful as possible to the general reader. Bar numbers are provided to enable the more serious student to locate quickly the relevant sections of scores (see point 5 below).
Cantatas in the text are referred to as 'C' numbers rather than 'BWV' to avoid the search engine displaying all references when a particular essay is sought. The numbers remain the same.
References have been kept to a minimum in order not to disrupt the flow of ideas. However, quoted opinion and relevent factual information not readily available in the public domain have been acknowledged; refer to the bibliography at the end of each volume.
This web site is linked to www.bach-cantatas.com and by clicking on the link at the end of each essay readers may access scores, full texts (and translations), recording lists, discussions and much additional information. Readers are warned, however, that editions of scores may differ in the bar layouts: see, for example, the opening chorus of BWV 80.
Between them, these websites make up the biggest single, readily accessable source of information, analysis and opinion in English currently available on the cantatas.
NB Sections may be downloaded for study purposes but all material is copyrighted and normal academic referencing citation should be used. Prior permission must be sought for the use of any material for, say, programme notes or any commercial usage.
