We have a particularly fascinating piece for our Music of the Week; both the composition and its delivery are unique and, leading up to Easter week, a profoundly fitting choice.

The aria “Erbarme Dich” (Have mercy, my God) is one of the highlights of J.S. Bach’s sacred oratorio St. Matthew Passion (BWV 244).

It was first performed in Leipzig on Good Friday almost 300 years ago (in 1727), its libretto being mainly based on chapters 26 and 27 of Matthew’s Gospel with some interpolated verses written by Bach’s librettist Picander (Christian Friedrich Henrici). The “Erbarme Dich” belongs to these interpolations.

Even if you do not understand the words at first and even before the contralto begins the aria, Bach’s introductory violin solo powerfully conveys the extraordinary air of desperation and guilt felt by the apostle Peter, who had just denied Christ three times, as well as the realization by the listener of our own need for redemption from our human limitations.

The violin is in such beautiful and sensitive dialogue with the contralto voice, and while this piece has been performed innumerable times since its inception, this superior version—by Nathalie Stutzmann as both solo vocalist and conductor, and the sublimely gifted violinist Satomi Watanabe—is in a class by itself.

Nathalie Stutzmann became famous as a contralto singer but also as a conductor who founded the French chamber orchestra Orfeo 55, which she headed until 2019. Stutzmann is now the Music Director of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and counts among the foremost conductors of our day.

Erbarme dich, mein Gott,
Um meiner Zähren willen;
Schaue hier, Herz und Auge
Weint vor dir bitterlich.
Erbarme dich!

Have mercy, my God,
for the sake of my tears!
Look here, heart and eyes
weep bitterly before you.
Have mercy!

Related:

Nathatlie Stutzmann (homepage)

Portrait of singer Nathalie Stutzmann on The Bach Cantatas website

Nathalie Stutzmann (Wikipedia)

On the passing of violinist Satomi Watanabe

Erbarme Dich: The Temptation of Peter in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion (Earth & Altar Magazine)

If you would like to hear the complete Passion according to Saint Matthew by Johann Sebastian Bach during this Easter week, we recommend this wonderful performance by Netherlands Bach Society.

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