Behold and see | Oxford Bach Soloists

Recycling was very much a part of the 18th century composer’s armory, and Bach’s efforts were the most inventive. Cantata 186, which started life in Weimar 1716, is presented in its later, expanded version.

Cantata 136 opens with one of the most confident choruses ever written. Rushing semiquaver scales skirl about the horn heralding the main tune. Bach later recycled this chorus as the ‘Cum sancto spiritu’ of the Lutheran Mass in A (BWV 234).

Cantata 105 holds us in breathless suspense with the most beautiful plaintive soprano aria. Cantata 46 stands unique among the two hundred cantatas for grim power and tense drama, and its opening section came to be re-used in the B minor Mass.