What type of choir did Bach have in mind as he created his cantatas, Passions and Masses? How many singers were at his disposal in Leipzig, and in what ways did he deploy them in his own music?Seeking to understand the very medium of Bach's incomparable choral output, Andrew Parrott investigates a wide range of sources: Bach's own writings, and the scores and parts he used in performance, but also a variety of theoretical, pictorial and archival documents, together with the musical testimony of the composer's forerunners and contemporaries.Many of the findings shed a surprising, even disturbing, light on conventions we have long taken for granted. A whole world away from, say, the typical oratorio choir of Handel's London with which we are reasonably familiar, the essential Bach choir was in fact an expert vocal quartet (or quintet), whose members were also responsible for all solos and duets. (In a mere handful of Bach's works, this solo team was selectively supported by a second rank of singers - also one per part - whose contribution was all but optional). Parrott shows that this use of a one-per-part choir was mainstream practice in the Lutheran Germany of Bach's time: Bach chose to use single voices not because a larger group was unavailable, but because they were the natural vehicle of elaborate concerted music.As one of several valuable appendices, this book includes the text of Joshua Rifkin's explosive 1981 lecture, never before published, which first set out this line of thinking and launched a controversy that is long overdue for resolution.
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Playing baroque music on instruments of the period may be a solidly established practice in the year 2000, but in the 1970s and early 1980s it seemed quixotic, subversive, and even ridiculous to many people, and occasioned a great deal of dispute. Yet no argument seemed so off-the-wall as the one Joshua Rifkin made in 1981 with a paper and a performance of the Mass in B Minor: that Johann Sebastian Bach actually composed his great choral works for only one singer on each part. After an initial reaction of incredulous scorn ("B-Minor Madrigal" was an often-repeated barb), most Bach scholars and performers dismissed Rifkin's thesis as unworthy of serious attention and ignored it in the hope that it would fade away. It didn't: in fact, through the 1990s the one-singer-per-part idea slowly gained adherents, among whom we now find such highly respected musicians as Paul McCreesh and Sigiswald Kuijken.
Probably no scholar or performer has done more than Andrew Parrott (who is both) to keep Rifkin's idea alive. Over the years Parrott has argued eloquently for both the historical and the artistic legitimacy of performing Bach with one singer per part--and has produced some impressive recordings to back himself up. Several prominent Bach scholars have professed to be "waiting for the book" before giving their assessments of the Rifkin thesis; in time for the "Bach Year" 2000, Parrott has produced "the book"--and a very fine effort it is.
The Essential Bach Choir's virtues as a presentation and discussion of evidence may make it a bit difficult (though by no means incomprehensible) for lay people: the text is heavily footnoted, there are many musical examples, illustrations, and quotations (always given in the original as well as in translation); except in the prologue and epilogue, there is little discussion of the artistic merits of the one-singer-per-part approach (something for which The New York Times criticized Parrott). But this book isn't a critical essay on how good single-voice Bach sounds to our ears, it's a work of musicology intended to lay out the evidence and reasoning behind a thesis which has been dismissed, argued over, and viciously mocked for nearly two decades.
Parrott includes evidence commonly cited by the opposing camp; where warranted, he acknowledges their arguments, but more commonly he shows that the interpretation his opponents have given to the evidence is based on largely unexamined--and unfounded--assumptions. (Parrott quotes one esteemed Bach scholar who actually wrote, "Bach would have wanted..."--the sort of statement that academics in many disciplines would rip to shreds.)
What are these assumptions? That Bach's sacred works were quite naturally written for the medium of chorus-and-orchestra, like the oratorios of Handel, Haydn, and Mendelssohn (who revived Bach's vocal music in the mid-19th century). That those works are both the foundation and the summit of the entire choral-orchestral literature. That to posit such towering masterpieces as the St. Matthew Passion as originally meant for a little consort of soloists was literally unthinkable.
Parrott, following Rifkin's lead, argues that Bach's autograph scores and performing parts provide indications only for soloists. A very few works (all of which Parrott examines in detail) explicitly call for extra "choral" singers; for those works that do not, Rifkin and Parrott point out, it may not make sense to assume out of hand that Bach had or wanted such extra singers.
But isn't a choir by definition made up of several singers on each part? Not always--and Parrott presents much convincing material about the conventions governing vocal music in 17th- and 18th-century Germany that indicates otherwise. He also includes the complete text of Bach's much-argued-over Draft for a Well-Appointed Church Music, a memorandum the composer wrote to the Leipzig Town Council setting forth (depending on whom you ask) either the forces he wanted to perform his own music or the way he wanted the music program at the St. Thomas School and the church choirs for which he was responsible structured.
Since we have no rosters of performers--of the sort we have for some of Handel's operas and oratorios--for individual Bach works, this dispute may never be entirely settled. Also, as Parrott points out, modern-day performers and listeners are free to choose whatever medium for Bach's music satisfies them most--and musicians from Wanda Landowska to Angela Hewitt to Wendy Carlos have done so. But understanding Bach's sacred music surely requires understanding the medium for which he wrote it, just as understanding Beethoven's string quartets requires understanding that they weren't written for, say, a string orchestra. This book contributes immensely to our understanding of Bach's medium and milieu--and should be read by anyone who cares about Bach's music. --Matthew Westphal
Review
This utterly fascinating and ultimately convincing book can only do his cause good in the best of all possible years. --International Record Review
As restated here (...with additional material and with admirable clarity), the arguments are utterly convincing... The book is a pleasure to read, fluently written and clearly set out with many illustrations and musical examples. --Early Music Review
I was gripped by this book; it is compulsive reading. If you profess the faith of Bach you simply cannot afford to be without it. --Classical Music
As restated here (...with additional material and with admirable clarity), the arguments are utterly convincing... The book is a pleasure to read, fluently written and clearly set out with many illustrations and musical examples. --Early Music Review
I was gripped by this book; it is compulsive reading. If you profess the faith of Bach you simply cannot afford to be without it. --Classical Music
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15 of 18 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
Andrew Parrott's wonderful volume is the culmination of many years study and practical application of J. S. Bach performance practice. Many of the conclusions are not new, but follow from the work of Josua Rifkin, made more compelling with easily grasped, definitive scholarship. It is past time for the modern choirmaster and music director to seriously reconsider those grand scale performances, and hear Bach anew, intimate, expressive, and no less powerful.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Joshua Rifkin's revolutionary thesis about one voice per part performances of Baroque choral works actually began from his studies of 17th century German music, notably Henrich (sic) Schütz. But it was only when he began to argue that the principle may also apply to the immortal JSB, that he provoked the ire of musicians and musicologists. Essays on the subject by Rifkin and his opponents, including Robert Marshall and Christoph Wolff, have been tossed backwards and forwards in various scholarly journals for over twenty years now. Thus Andrew Parrott does Bach lovers a great service by mustering all the relevant evidence into one handsome and well-written book.
That Bach's normal practice was to employ solo voices in his cantatas, passions and oratorios should now be considered beyond serious scholarly dispute. Of course, it is perfectly legitimate for conductors to say, as does Philippe Herreweghe, that they simply like the sound of a full choir in Bach, without pretending that this conforms to Bach's own practice. What is less attractive is the efforts of others, such as Ton Koopman, to defend what is merely a personal preference by belittling the Rifkin/Parrott discoveries.
Among Bach conductors, Rifkin and Parrott themselves were the first to put the theory into practice in concerts and recordings. Lately they have been joined by Jeffrey Thomas (Koch), Sigiswald Kuijken (DHM), Konrad Junghänel (Harmonia Mundi), Daniel Taylor (Atma) and, most recently, Paul McCreesh, whose single voice recording of the St Matthew Passsion (DGG Archiv) is a revelation. Parrott's book is intellectually convincing; these recordings are aesthetically and emotionally compelling.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent presentation of evidence and practical/historical argument
January 25, 2008
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
This book is essential reading for anyone who cares about the practical and historical matters of the singing assignments in Bach's vocal music. Parrott presents a cogent argument, very well backed up with evidence.
The appendices are worth the price of the book, too. Among other things, they include a new and annotated translation of Bach's "Entwurff", other relevant contemporary documents, a reference table of the surviving vocal parts in Bach's music, plus a reprint of Joshua Rifkin's 1981 paper that sparked this revolution in Bach performance practice.
Advanced readers in this topic should continue by finding a copy of Dr Rifkin's 2002 book "Bach's Choral Ideal", already out of print but available through libraries. That book presents another 66 pages of argument and citations, further developing and updating his thesis over the 21 intervening years of discussion.
The appendices are worth the price of the book, too. Among other things, they include a new and annotated translation of Bach's "Entwurff", other relevant contemporary documents, a reference table of the surviving vocal parts in Bach's music, plus a reprint of Joshua Rifkin's 1981 paper that sparked this revolution in Bach performance practice.
Advanced readers in this topic should continue by finding a copy of Dr Rifkin's 2002 book "Bach's Choral Ideal", already out of print but available through libraries. That book presents another 66 pages of argument and citations, further developing and updating his thesis over the 21 intervening years of discussion.
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