Matthieu Schweyer direction
Clémence Tilquin soprano
Juliette Galstian mezzo-soprano
Valerio Contaldo ténor
Raphaël Hardmeyer basse

Johann Sebastian Bach
Magnificat, BWV 243
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
Magnificat, H. 772

The Magnificat in D major (BWV 243) is a major vocal work by JS Bach. Its charm, its colors and its interior life have made it one of its most endearing pages. He wrote it for the feast of the Visitation of the Virgin. It requires a five-part choir, five vocal soloists and an orchestra. It is one of the composer’s musical pieces based on a Latin text.
Today in the shadow of his father Johann Sebastian, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was during his lifetime more famous and appreciated than the latter, considered too complex and “old fashioned”. Modernist and fanciful, romantic before its time, CPE Bach’s music (as it is often abbreviated) is of unparalleled beauty and singularity.
Epic and flamboyant
The Magnificat was composed by Carl Philipp Emanuel in 1749, hoping to secure a job as a cantor at St. Thomas’s Church in Leipzig (which would have allowed him to succeed his father). Sumptuous, this business card-shaped Magnificat was a manifesto of his talent and a modernist, epic and flamboyant style.
The work, magnificent and richly orchestrated (with its three trumpets and timpani) was not enough to spare him precariousness, but Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was nevertheless appointed (almost ten years later) Director Musices in Hamburg.