J.S. Bach: Barmherziges Herze der ewigen Liebe, BWV 185 - The Church Cantatas, Vol. 118

The Weimar Cantata 185 ‘Barmherziges Herze der ewigen Liebe’, to a text by Salomo Franck, was written ten years earlier for the fourth Sunday after Trinity 14 July 1715. The work survives in different versions, since Bach repeated it several times in Weimar and Leipzig, adapting it to new insights. The cantata is scored for four soloists, choir, oboe and basso continuo. It opens with a chorale-based movement in the form of a duet for soprano and tenor, the oboe playing the melody ‘Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ’. The alto recitative No.2 leads to a slow aria (No.3) in which two striking imitations of the voice are heard in the basso continuo at the words ‘Sei bemüht in dieser Zeit, Seele, reichlich auszustreuen’ (note particularly the coloratura at ‘ausstreuen’). A particular moment in the bass aria No.5 is when the word ‘Christenkunst’ is sculptured by staccato notes. The work ends with a four-part chorale employing the same melody as the opening duet, to which Bach adds a freely composed part for the