Passions (Telemann)

Between 1716 and 1767, Georg Philipp Telemann wrote a series of Passions, musical compositions reflecting on Christ's Passion – the physical, spiritual and mental suffering of Jesus from the hours prior to his trial through to his crucifixion. The works were written for performance in German churches in the days before Easter. A prolific composer, Telemann wrote over 40 Passions for the churches of Hamburg alone, of which 22 have survived according to the present state of research. He also wrote several Passion oratorios. Unlike the Passions intended for liturgical performance, they were not closely set to the literal text of the Gospels.

In his dissertation "The Rise of Lyricism and the Decline of Biblical Narration in the Late Liturgical Passions of Georg Philipp Telemann" (University of Pittsburgh, 2005), Jason Benjamin Grant describes the three basic periods of Telemann's Passion composition as follows:

The second group comprises the "middle" works, composed 1737–54. These works use the (mostly) reduced narratio (minus the Vorbereitung and actus sepulcrum). Of the eighteen Passions Telemann composed during this period, sixteen were totally original works, and two were parodies: the 1738 St Matthew was a parody of the 1726 St Matthew (neither is extant), and the 1749 St John is a parody of the 1741 St John. Eight (recte: nine) works are extant from this period (8/18, about 44.4%): the 1737 St John, 1741 St John, 1744 St Luke, 1745 St John, 1746 St Matthew, 1748 St Luke, 1749 St John, and 1750 St Matthew. Outstanding among these are the 1745 St John and the 1748 St Luke. "Typical" works worthy of comment include the 1744 St Luke, 1746 St Matthew, and the two parodies.

During the second period, the narrative structure of the liturgical Passion underwent a significant change. After 1736, the narration of the Last Supper and of the Burial of Jesus (Entombment of Christ) was eliminated, leaving Gethsemane and Golgotha (Calvary) as the narrative bookends, the primary loci of the Passion story. The reduction of narration allowed the expansion of the poetic interpolations (chorales, arias, recitatives, and choruses), especially in the exordium and conclusio. Often these expanded sections contained a meditatio on aspects of the Last Supper, the Burial, and perhaps even allusions to the Resurrection of Jesus, events not recounted in the narratio.

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