First performance The court at Köthen and St James' church in Bach's time were
Calvinist and therefore not usually a venue for elaborate music. On 23 March 1729 the prince's body was transferred from the court chapel to the crypt of St James' church where the ornate casket rests to this day. There is documentary evidence that the cantata was performed at a memorial service the following day, but it has been suggested by
Andrew Parrott that part of the cantata would have been appropriate for the burial service. There is also documentary evidence regarding the performers, which throws light on the scoring. The composer's wife,
Anna Magdalena Bach, was the
soprano soloist and
Christian Ferdinand Abel was probably a soloist on
viola da gamba.
Reconstructions The possibility of a reconstruction arose when the nineteenth-century scholar
Wilhelm Rust discovered that Bach in part built the '''' with movements from two other works: • the ''
for the Electress of Saxony Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl'', BWV 198 • the
St Matthew Passion Bach sometimes reused an earlier composition, typically revising and improving it in a process called
parody. Exactly how Bach recycled his music in this case is open to interpretation. However, Bach may have simply given his musicians music sheets from the existing works to save copying another set. The close relationship between the Passion and the for Prince Leopold is reflected in their sharing a number in the
Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis (BWV), the standard catalogue of Bach's works. However, the relationship is complicated by the fact that, although the first performance of the Passion appears to predate the , the Passion was revised by Bach for later performances. Several reconstructions exist: • Polish musicologist Władysław Gnat reconstructed in 1999 all parts except recitatives, which were to be performed by a speaker. The performance took place on 24 March 1999 (the 270th anniversary of original performance) in the Franciscan Church in
Poznań, Poland with the baroque orchestra, led by Marcin Sompoliński. • The German musicologist
Hans Grüß reconstructed in 2000 all
arias and most of the choruses. In this version the text of the
recitatives has to be performed by a speaker. • The first complete reconstruction was made by Andrew Parrott and first performed under his direction by the
New York Collegium in 2004. Six years later Parrott made a recording of this edition with the UK-based
Taverner Consort and Players (see recording section below). • The German
harpsichordist
Alexander Ferdinand Grychtolik made an edition of another full reconstruction of the '
in 2010. In this version most of the recitatives of the ' are adapted from
accompagnato recitatives of the St Matthew Passion. This reconstruction is based on the assumption of German musicologist that there is a
parody connection not only between arias and choruses, but also between the accompagnato recitatives of both works. Grychtolik made a recording of his version with his
ensemble in 2015, published by
Deutsche Harmonia Mundi (
Sony). == Recordings ==