whelming evidence to prove the fact, it would be impossible to believe that both works were by the same Composer. These were followed, in 1705, by Mattheson's 'Das heilsame Gebet, und die Menschwerdung Christ!'; and some years later by Brockes's Poem, 'Der für die Sünde der Welt gemartete und sterbende Jesus,' set to music by Keiser in 1714, by Handel and Telemann in 1716, and by Mattheson in 1718. The general tone of German Music was more elevated by these great works than by anything that had preceded them. That their style should be diametrically opposed to that exhibited in the Italian Oratorios of the period was only to be expected; for, though the Germans were not averse from cultivating the Monodic Style, they never abetted their Italian contemporaries in their mad rebellion against the laws of Counterpoint. The ingenious devices of Polyphony were respected in Germany, even during the first three decades of the 17th century, when Italian dramatic Composers affected to deride them as follies too childish for serious consideration; and they were not without their effect upon the national style. It is true, they had not long had an opportunity of leavening it; yet the influence of the Venetian School upon that of Nuremberg, consecrated by the life-long friendship of Giovanni Gabrieli and Hans Leo Hasler, was as lasting as it was beneficial, and. strengthened by the examples of Orlando di Lasso at Munich, and Leonard Paminger at Passau, it communicated to German Art no small portion of that solidity for which it has ever since been so deservedly famous, and which even now forms one of its most prominent characteristics. Had this influence been transmitted a century earlier, it might very well have had the effect of fusing the German and Italian Schools into one. It came too late for that. Germany could accept the Counterpoint, but felt herself independent of the Plain Chaunt Canto fermo. In place of that she substituted that form of Song which, before the close of the 16th century, had already become part of her inmost life—the national Chorale, which, absorbing into itself the still more venerable Volkslied, spoke straight to the hearts of the people throughout the length and breadth of the land. When the idea of the 'Passion Oratorio' was first conceived, the Chorale entered freely into its construction. At first it was treated with extreme simplicity—accompanied with homophonic harmonies so plain that they could only be distinguished from those intended for congregational use by the fact that the Melody was assigned to the Soprano Voice instead of to the Tenor. Its clauses were afterwards used as Fugal Subjects, or Points of Imitation, sometimes very learnedly constructed, and always exhibiting an earnestness of manner above all praise. But, however treated, the subject of the Chorale was always noble, and always introduced with a greatness of purpose far above the pettiness of national pride or bigotry. It would seem as if its cultivators had sent it into the world, in those troublous times, as a message of peace—a sort of common ground on which Catholic and Protestant might meet to contemplate the events of that awful Passion which, equally dear to both, is invested for both with exactly the same doctrinal significance. And the tradition was faithfully transmitted to another generation.
The works we have described, and many others by contemporary Musicians of good reputation, gave place in process of time to the still grander creations of the Sixth Period—creations so sublime that two Composers only can claim to be mentioned in connection with them: but those two Composers—Karl Heinrich Graun and Johann Seb. Bach—cherished the Chorale even more tenderly than their predecessors had done, and interwove it so closely into the construction of their Passion Music that it became its most prominent feature, the key-stone of the entire fabric. While still a pupil of the Kreuzschule at Dresden, and, if tradition may be trusted, before he had completed his fifteenth year, Graun wrote a 'Grosse Passions-Oratorium,' in which he introduced the melody of 'Ach wie hungert mein Gemüthe' with extraordinary effect, and in a way which no other Composer had ever previously attempted, in connection with the Institution of the Lord's Supper. His greatest work, 'Der Tod Jesu,' first produced in the Cathedral at Berlin in 1755, begins with an exquisite setting of 'O Haupt voll Blut und [1]Wunden' in homophonic harmony, and afterwards introduces five other Melodies, mostly treated in the same quiet manner, though one is skilfully combined with a Bass Solo. The Poem, by Rammler, is epic in structure, but is so arranged as to present an effective alternation of Recitatives, Airs, and Choruses. The fugal treatment of the latter is marked by a clearness of design and breadth of form which have rarely been exceeded by Composers of any age; and the whole work hangs together with a logical sequence for which one may search in vain among the Scores of ordinary writers, or indeed among the Scores of any German writers of the period, excepting Bach himself. Bach wrote three grand Oratorios, besides many of smaller dimensions which are usually classed as Cantatas. These three were 'Die Johannis-Passion' (1720); 'Die grosse Passion nach Matthäus,' first produced in the Thomas Kirche at Leipzig on Good Friday, 1729; and 'Das Weihnachts Oratorium' (1734). The Passion according to S. John is composed on a scale so much smaller than that employed for the later work according to S. Matthew, that we think it scarcely necessary to speak of both. The Text of S. Matthew's version was prepared by Christian Freidrich Henrici (under the pseudonym of Picander), and is written partly in the dramatic and partly in the epic form, with an Evangelist—the principal Tenor—who relates the various events in the wondrous History, but leaves our Lord, S. Peter, and the rest of the Dramatis personæ to use their own words, whenever the Sacred Text makes them speak in their own
- ↑ Originally a Volkslied, beginning 'Mein G'müth ist mir verwirret.'
