Bach composed the cantata in his third year as Thomaskantor on a text which Georg Christian Lehms, a court poet in Darmstadt, had published already in 1711. Lehms derived from the prescribed gospel, the finding in the Temple, a dialogue. Instead of a parent missing a son, as in the gospel, an allegorical Soul (soprano) misses Jesus (bass). The motifs of the story, the loss and anxious search, are placed in a more general situation in which the listener can identify with the Soul. As Lehms did not provide a closing chorale, Bach chose the twelfth and final stanza of Paul Gerhardt's hymn "Weg, mein Herz, mit den Gedanken".
Librettist | Georg Christian Lehms |
Date of composition | 1726 in Leipzig, Germany |
First published | 1857 in Leipzig, Germany |
Type | Cantata |
Tonality | E Minor |
Catalogue | BWV 32 |
Approx. duration | 24 minutes |
Spoken language | German |
Instruments |
Voice (Soprano)
Voice (Bass) Chorus/Choir Oboe Strings Continuo |
Autotranslations beta |
Jean-Sébastien Bach: Liebster Jesu, mein Verlangen en mi mineur, BWV 32 ""Dearest Jesus, my desire"" Johann Sebastian Bach: Liebster Jesu, mein Verlangen in mi minore, BWV 32 ""Dearest Jesus, my desire"" Johann Sebastian Bach: Liebster Jesu, mein Verlangen e-moll, BWV 32 ""Dearest Jesus, my desire"" |