Though Bach wrote many wonderful instrumental and choral compositions in nearly every genre of his day, none are as exhaustive and moving as the cantatas. Pieces consisting of recitatives (singing with very little accompament), arias (opera-like songs), choruses, and chorales (Lutheran church hymns), Bach’s cantatas were actually referred to by Bach as “concertos” or “stücke” (pieces). Over 200 survive in some form today; of these, most (about 170) were composed for church services. What of the other 30? These were the secular cantatas—cantatas composed for more earthly concerns such as weddings, funerals, and various holidays in celebration of the nobility or town leaders. They are identical in structure to the sacred cantatas, except there are no chorales.
Bach wrote three kinds of secular cantatas:
Today’s audience, however, so often demands “originality,” snubbing these works because of the composers’ apparent lack of creativity. Thus, Bach’s frequent self-parody is easy to dismiss as second-rate. Yet one must remember the times in which Bach lived: Baroque composers were not tortured geniuses pouring their souls into great Creative Statements; they were hired hands, expected to deliver music on demand. They resembled present-day movie score composers more than “serious” composers. So, if they wanted to lighten the load by drawing on some of their old work, what's the big deal?
Furthermore, many of the original, commissioned works would be played once and never heard again; often, composers would parody these occasional works to get more play time out of good music. While today's music groups can record a song and play the recording over and over again, Baroque composers would only hear their music live: parody, in this context, is no worse than playing a song over and over again on the radio—at least with parody, something is different the second time!
What particularly disturbs many listeners is that a number of Bach's sacred works began as secular works. This has drawn great criticism—how could a work show true religious sentiment if it was originally composed for, say, the coronation of a king? First, in many cases Bach may have originally intended the music to fit a religious text. Second, Bach (like Martin Luther) saw all music as a way of glorifying God. All of Bach's music—from his instrumental pieces to sacred motets to his most baudy secular cantatas—exudes his deep Lutheran spirituality; indeed, Bach wrote "JJ" (Jesu Java???=Jesus help) and "SDG" (soli deo gloria) on many of this secular works.
(more to come later)