Continuing my journey through Bach’s sacred cantatas. You can find more of my favorites in this YouTube Music playlist.

BWV 10/2

This cantata was written for the Feast of the Visitation, commemorating Mary’s visit to her relative Elizabeth while both were expecting their extraordinary sons—Jesus and John the Baptist. The soprano aria in the second movement is wonderfully light and buoyant.

BWV 30/5

A long instrumental introduction followed by a beautiful alto aria.

(Translated from the Chinese version with the help of ChatGPT.)

Picking up from the previous post, this time we’ll begin with Bach’s first major category of works—his sacred cantatas (YouTube Music playlist).¹ I’ll be exploring some of my favorite pieces by following the BWV catalog numbers.

Before we begin, a disclaimer: I’m just an amateur music lover sharing what I enjoy. My opinions are certainly subjective, and probably not always musicologically rigorous. My philosophy is simple: the music has to sound beautiful first. Once I’m captivated, I’ll naturally want to learn about its historical background, theological meaning, and everything else behind it.

(Translated from the Chinese version with the help of ChatGPT.)

I recently learned a new Chinese idiom from one of Li Tianhao’s videos: 曲突徙薪 (qū tū xǐ xīn).

Here’s what it means.

Literally, 曲 means “bend,” 突 means “chimney,” 徙 means “move,” and 薪 means “firewood.” The idiom describes bending a straight chimney and moving the firewood away from the stove. Figuratively, it means eliminating the causes of a disaster before it happens—taking preventive action rather than dealing with the consequences.

(Translated from the Chinese version with the help of ChatGPT. The Chinese version also contains the OCR English label texts for exibition objects.)

Why I Went

Earlier this year, I started seeing promotional material from the Met about a major Raphael exhibition, which started in late March. I finally decided to go on Sunday, May 3rd. That gave me about a week to cram for it, so I spent my evenings reading articles and watching videos¹ about Raphael and the Renaissance.

(Translated from the Chinese version with the help of ChatGPT.)

Why This Book

My surname is Feng—a pretty rare one. Outside of relatives, I don’t think I’ve ever met another Feng in real life¹.

A few days ago I was watching a video that mentioned a Tang dynasty miscellany called Fengshi Wenjian Ji (“What the Feng Clan Saw and Heard”). That immediately caught my attention. Not only does it share my surname, it also sounds exactly like something I’d name this site.

(Translated from the Chinese version with the help of ChatGPT.)

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) was the great synthesizer of Baroque music and a perennial candidate for the GOAT of classical composers. His works span an enormous range of genres and are remarkable both in quantity and quality.

My earliest impressions of Bach came from two places. First was the video game Civilization IV: when your civilization advances from the Middle Ages into the Renaissance, the background music suddenly evolves from slow Gregorian-style chant into rich Baroque music—it feels fantastic. When I looked it up, I discovered that most of those tracks were written by Bach. The second was Douglas Hofstadter’s Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid (GEB).