Since the serious discussion seems to have migrated to OVPP Part 2, I'll just reply briefly to Ian, if I may. Quite happy to move this if the mods think appropriate, but I don't really want a whole new thread to get started on this argument.


... which is precisely a good reason for not rushing to stereotype anyone who does become interested in that music, isn't it? And also for welcoming and encouraging any urge they might have to discuss and debate it, even if that sometimes means taking a bit more of a 'gently gently' approach than you'd ideally like.

But that was my point: who's dismissing it?

Er, would that be the Beethoven many of whose premieres were in the palaces of his aristocratic patrons?

But I've quite often criticised aspects of British musical culture, and am on record as doing so in a number of published writings, as well as having taken an intentional stance against other aspects of that culture by refusing to write on the work of heavily promoted composers I have no time for such as Mark Turnage. Although I also think it's sometimes best to try to take people's existing culture as a starting point and attempt to lead them in a certain direction from that, rather than risk casting oneself out as a stranded revolutionary monad. I hope that by the time I've published a few more substantial articles and books you won't be able to sustain the claim that I 'refuse to entertain anything critical of British musical culture'.

I don't regard messageboard contributions as the main body of my work (which is why I adopt a 'pseudonym', as you called it: not to hide my identity, which anyone can see easily enough by clicking on my email address), but it's hardly as if I spend most of my time on here agreeing with everything everyone else says, either.

I don't think not engaging with contrary viewpoints is quite the same thing as easily dismissing them. A number of the contributors to this thread have been at pains to point out that they wouldn't presume sufficient expertise to pass comment on the issues in a more scholarly context. That's all.

I'm not going to mod this thread for reasons which should be obvious. But the idea was that the new thread be for discussions concerning one-voice-per-part recordings of Bach's vocal works. Evidence for and against the hypothesis that that was indeed Bach's underlying assumption still belongs here as far as I understand it.

And I would much appreciate it if, even if certain other themes appear to be of burning concern to some members, we were to make an effort to confine future discussion on this thread to its purported and erstwhile topic.

OK - let's try something more positive!

A CASE STUDY - Magnificat

Scored for the following voices: Sop. 1, Sop. 2, Alto, Tenore and Basso, how many singers should there be per part?

Et exultavit (movt 2) uses a single vocal line called "Soprano II" (i.e. identical with the chorus specification at the beginning), while Quia respexit (movt 3) employs another single soprano line, this time called "Soprano I" (also identical with that specified at the beginning of the work).

Moreover, Quia respexit flows straight into the following "chorus" (Omnes generationes - Movt 4) without a break, and it is clear that whatever has been singing the former must be identical with what now sings the latter - as shown here:



But how many singers?! The natural assumption would be that Quia respexit - being an Aria with obbliggato - uses a solo voice. The presumption would perhaps be, therefore, that so does Omnes generationes (and consequently, therefore, all the remaining "chorus" movements). BUT.........!

...Movt 5 (Quia fecit mihi magna) actually specifies the voice as being "Basso solo", as can be seen in Bach's own hand!.......



Now if there is, from the beginning, only one person singing the Basso part, WHY does Bach need to specify "Basso solo" for this movement?

Furthermore, Movt 8 (Deposuit potentes) specifies in the score a Solo Tenore. Why would Bach have done this if there had only ever been a single person singing the tenor part?

The remaining "aria" movements do NOT specify the use of soloists however. And - by a curious twist or change of the goalposts (!) - I now find myself, through sheer logic, questioning the assumption that the "aria" movements here should be at all sung WITH only ONE voice per part - unless specifically asked to do so.

This may  (although I don't know) say something positive about the soloistic qualities of the Tenors and Basses at Bach's disposal, as opposed to the Altos and Sopranos. Bach was, above all, an extraordinarily intelligent and practical composer.

But I am - on the whole - sceptical about the proposition (here) that a quintet of solo voices (including children - however well-trained) would have been intended by Bach to balance with an array of instruments including 3 trumpets, timps, strings and a continuo specifically including organ, bassoon(s) and bass strings. And I say this in full awareness of the fact that Baroque instruments were less weighty than later ones.

Baz

A few points perhaps relevant to the Magnificat:

Of the Bach works where he provided ripieno parts, the majority have at least one trumpet. So it's not unlikely that an extra quintet would have joined in for the choruses of a piece such as this. On the other hand he did also envisage performances of works with trumpet which did without ripieno singers - Gott ist mein König BWV 71 (also with three trumpets) is marked "âb 18. è se piace 22", for example.

Is it perhaps not entirely out of the question that the Basso solo and such might simply imply bass and no choir? I'm going to display my ignorance - is there an obbligato instrument in the tenor solo? That might be another explanation...

Parrott of course lists a range of iconographic and other sources. Stölzel wrote a report of a Leipzig performance in the early years of the eighteenth century directed by Melchior Hoffmann. He mentions 4 singers, all students, as comprising the choir - and 40 instrumentalists.

At Telemann's Petrikirche in Hamburg there seem to have been 7 singers and 21 instrumentalists including trumpets and timpani. Mattheson in 1728 dismisses a Kapelle directed by Johann Beer as inadequate: it had 4 singers, 2 violins and organ. He recommends an ensemble of 23, also including trumpets and timpani - and leaves the singers at 4.

Strina, even though Bach only had four singers most of the time he seems to have had 11 strings. So there's no need to worry too much.

Let's get away from this idea of one voice per part as being a British phenomenon though. Rifkin, Kuijken and Junghänel all have non-Britishness in common.

Baz, it was just a thought... In any case I'm not too uncomfortable with the idea of Bach having been unmethodical to the degree of omitting to specify solo at a couple of spots. On the other hand even Parrott performs that piece with a ripieno quintet. And it's also not Magnificats that he performed most weeks...