Sunday 18th January 2015 – 12pm – Duke’s Hall, Royal Academy of Music
Performed as Part of the Academy/Kohn Foundation Bach Cantata Series
Božidar Smiljanić – Bass-Baritone
Iain Ledingham – director
Madeleine Easton – leader
Performed on modern instruments
One of the most adored solo-voice cantatas, ‘Ich habe genug’ BWV 82 was composed for performance on 2nd February 1727. Indeed, Bach himself clearly expressed a fondness for the work: he performed it repeatedly, reviving it on several occasions over the next twenty years, and changed the scoring for each occasion. As with all the other cantatas written for the Feast of the Purification, Bach focuses on the story of Simeon. Typical Lutheran themes of longing for death (or ‘sleep’) and the departure from worldly goods are beautifully crafted into the writing: lullaby-like figurations, soothing pedal point, and dramatic pauses enhance the rhetorical and emotional gravitas of the text.