Ich bin ein guter Hirt, BWV 85

Ich bin ein guter Hirt, 85, is a church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach. He composed it in Leipzig for the second Sunday after Easter and first performed it on 15 April 1725. He wrote the cantata in the second calendar year of his tenure as that began in May 1723, but he assigned it to his third cantata cycle.
An unknown librettist included a verse from the Gospel reading and stanzas from two hymns, one from "" by Ernst Christoph Homberg and one from "" by Cornelius Becker. The topic is Jesus as the Good Shepherd. Bach structured the cantata in six movements and scored it for four vocal soloists, a four-part choir only in the closing chorale, and a Baroque instrumental ensemble of two oboes, bassoon, strings and basso continuo.

History, hymns and words

Bach composed Ich bin ein guter Hirt for the second Sunday after Easter called which fell on 15 May in 1724. He was then in his second year as, the church music director of Leipzig. In his first twelve months in office, Bach had decided to compose new cantatas for almost all liturgical occasions. These works became known as his first cantata cycle. In his second year in office, Bach composed his chorale cantata cycle, with each cantata for the liturgical occasions based on one Lutheran hymn. Possibly due to the loss of his librettist for the project, Bach ended this series with Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern, BWV 1, for Annunciation, performed on 25 March that year, and turned to other cantata types for the following Easter season. He later assigned Ich bin ein guter Hirt to his third cantata cycle.
The prescribed readings for the second Sunday after Easter were from the First Epistle of Peter, Christ as a model, and from the Gospel of John, the Good Shepherd.
According to John Eliot Gardiner, the librettist is likely the same as for two preceding cantatas, Bleib bei uns, denn es will Abend werden, BWV 6, and Am Abend aber desselbigen Sabbats, BWV 42, before Christiana Mariana von Ziegler became the poet for the following cantatas of the period. The three cantata texts were probably written for Bach's first year in Leipzig but postponed due to the workload of the first performance of the St John Passion that year. The three cantatas form a sequence on themes from the Gospel of John.
The librettist opened the cantata with the beginning of the Gospel, verse 11: Jesus describing himself as the Good Shepherd. The second movement explains that being a Good Shepherd was realised in the Passion. The thought is commented by the first stanza of Cornelius Becker's 1598 hymn "", a paraphrase of Psalm 23. The poet refers in movement 4 to verse 12 of the Gospel, the contrast of the shepherd who is awake to watch over the sheep, whereas the hired servants sleep and neglect them. Movement 5 names love as the shepherd's motivation to care for the sheep and points at the death of Jesus. The cantata ends with the fourth stanza, "", of the 1658 hymn "" for which Ernst Christoph Homberg supplied text and melody. All movements are closely connected to the Gospel theme. The sequence of movements is found also in the two cantatas preceding it and in other Bach cantatas, which may also have been written by the same unknown librettist.
Bach led the Thomanerchor in the first performance on 15 April 1725.

Music

Scoring and structure

Bach structured the cantata in six movements and scored the work for four vocal soloists, alto, tenor and bass ), a four-part choir only in the closing chorale, and a Baroque instrumental ensemble of two oboes, bassoon, two violins, viola, cello piccolo and basso continuo. The duration of the cantata is given as 20 minutes.
In the following table of the movements, the scoring, keys and time signatures are taken from Dürr's standard work Die Kantaten von Johann Sebastian Bach. The continuo, which plays throughout, is not shown.

Movements

1

In the first movement, the bass as the vox Christi sings a line from the Gospel of John, "" in two passages framed by instrumental ritornellos. The motif for the first words appears in the ritornello four times. The movement's form is between aria and arioso, with the oboes as obbligato instruments in "a mood of tranquil seriousness", as Klaus Hofmann described. Hans-Joachim Schulze notes that the obbligato two oboes in unison may have been planned for penetrating sharpness.

2

The alto aria, "", is accompanied by an obbligato violoncello piccolo. The content is a reflection of the preceding Gospel words. Unusually, the alto sings the full text three times, with only minor variations in motifs and harmonies.

3

The chorale stanza, "", is sung by the soprano to the tune of "" by Nikolaus Decius, with a slightly ornamented melody, while the two oboes play a theme in the ritornellos which is derived from the first line of the tune.

4

The cantata's only recitative, "", is sung by the tenor as a miniature sermon, accompanied by the strings that play long notes and accent phrases of the text towards the end.

5

The tenor aria, "", is in pastorale rhythm, the cantata's only movement to relate to the shepherd theme in this way, while the word "shepherd" is not mentioned. The strings, violins and violas, play in unison in low register. Thus the tenor voice frequently appears as the highest part, beginning with "Seht" three times. Gardiner observed the similarity to an alto aria of the St Matthew Passion, "", both in the theme of "pastoral love emanating from the cross", and in the music, described as "rich, flowing melody and gently rocking rhythm".

6

The closing chorale, "", is a four-part setting, repeating that God is the faithful shepherd. The movement is C minor, but Bach ended its seven cadences in a major mode.

Manuscripts and publication

Bach's autograph score of the cantata and a set of parts that Bach had partly revised himself are extant. The cantata was first published in 1872 in the first complete edition of Bach's work, the Bach-Gesellschaft Ausgabe. The volume in question was edited by Wilhelm Rust. In the Neue Bach-Ausgabe, it was published in 1989, edited by Reinmar Emans.

Recordings

The selection is taken from the listing on the Bach Cantatas Website. Instrumental groups playing period instruments in historically informed performances are marked green.

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Conductor / Choir / Orchestra

Soloists

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