The year 2023 marks the 300th anniversary of what was probably the most momentous change of office in the history of the Thomaskantorat. When Johann Kuhnau died on June 5, 1722, the city council had to replace the most important municipal music directorship in central Germany. The historic importance of this decision can hardly be overestimated. After Georg Philipp Telemann, Johann Friedrich Fasch and Christoph Graupner withdrew their applications for various reasons, the way was open for Johann Sebastian Bach, whose artistic work continues to influence significantly the definition of the Thomaskantorat to this day. The processes of filling the vacancie have been repeatedly analyzed and interpreted from different perspectives. Nevertheless, many questions remain unanswered. Moreover, the change of assignment is paradigmatic for an important caesura in the history of the Protestant church cantata that has hardly been reflected so far. Johann Sebastian Bach decided at the beginning of his activities to perform almost exclusively his own newly composed works; the compsitions of his predecessor were thus marginalized. Similar decisions were made by Georg Philipp Telemann when he started his activities as music director in Hamburg, and by Johann Friedrich Fasch and Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel when they took up their positions as „Kapellmeister“ in Zerbst and Gotha. With this development, the genre of the so-called „madrigal church cantata“ entered a new phase.
The conference (Leipzig, June 15–17, 2023) is organized by the Bach Archive Leipzig together with the Department of Musicology of the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg and the Musicology Department of the Institute for Art History and Musicology of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. It will take a closer look at the briefly outlined range of topics. It takes place in Leipzig during the Bach Festival and in close coordination with its artistic program and is part of the festival year „1723–2023“.
15–17 June 2023
Admission is free.
You can participate digitally at the following link:
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82854694836?pwd=WGltbGtsRmUxVHpLbFVPQ0ZEVkh4Zz09
Webinar-ID: 828 5469 4836 // Key: 101242
Sponsored by the Mitteldeutsche Barockmusik e.V. and by the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung.
