The Band's "The Weight"

Yester-day, I listened to The Best of the Band, and this morning, I was thinking about "The Weight."  After the line "And you put the load right on me," there's a descending line in the piano part (A, G#, F#, E, D, I think), which seems to represent the oppressive weight of the load.

Bach: Herr Gott, dich loben wir, BWV 16

This is a very small point, but I just listened to Bach's Herr Gott, dich loben wir, BWV 16 and noticed a significant grammatical inversion in the first movement (also in the title).  It's "Herr Gott, dich loben wir," not "Herr Gott, wir loben dich."  Translated, "Herr Gott, dich loben wir" is "Lord, you praise we," which sounds odd because English doesn't really have different forms for different cases.  In a smoother translation, it's "Lord, you we praise."  Through that inversion, the focus is placed on God because He comes first in that phrase.*

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*"Phrase" in a loose grammatical sense because "Herr Gott, dich loben wir" has a subject and a verb.  Technically, a grammatical phrase has - at most - only one of those.

Bach: Es ist Heil uns kommen her, BWV 9

This morning I listened to an-other Bach cantata (I've been listening to one a day since 1 February, and I'll be doing that until early August).  This time it was Es ist Heil uns kommen her, BWV 9.  In the second movement, I heard the word "Spiegel," which is German for mirror.  Because of that, I thought I knew the Biblical text used, but first I lookt up the notation so I could see the rest of the text for that section:

(notation found here)

It's not the best translation, but I translated

Wir sollten in Gesetze geh'n
Und dort als wie in einem Spiegel seh'n
Wie unsere Natur unartig sei
Und dennoch bleiben wir dabei

as

We were supposed to go into the laws
And there as in a mirror see
How our nature be ill-behaved
And nevertheless we stay with it

This wasn't the text I was expecting after I heard that "mirror."  I'd thought I would find the text from 1 Corinthians 13:12 - "For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face.  Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known."

To some degree, both texts have the same contrasting ideas of seeing perfectly and seeing imperfectly.  In the cantata, there's the perfect seeing of sinful nature through the law (what "We were supposed to... see") and the imperfect seeing involved with "nevertheless we stay with it."  It's the same notion as turning a blind eye.  In the 1 Corinthians text, there's perfect seeing in knowing God "face to face" and imperfect seeing of knowing Him only partly.

So while this Bach cantata doesn't use that 1 Corinthians text, by using the same image of a mirror, it seems to hint at it.

The Beatles' "Don't Pass Me By"

I'm listening to The Beatles' eponymous album, and the bass part for "Don't Pass Me By" caught my ear.  It's more elaborate than just the root and the fifth of whatever chord it's played beneath, but the root and the fifth are the most prominent notes.  It provides an alternating figure that seems to portray the footsteps that are mentioned in the first verse:

I listen for your footsteps comin' up the drive
Listen for your footsteps, but they don't arrive

I also noticed that there's a bit of a pause within the last line of the first two verses, so there's a separation between " I don't hear it" and "does it mean you don't love me anymore?" and between "I don't see you" and "does it mean you don't love me anymore?"  That pause emphasizes the not hearing and not seeing that are in the lyrics themselves.

Bach: Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben?, BWV 8

This morning I listened to Bach's Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben?, BWV 8, and I noticed something in the second movement.  There's a section of the text that recurs a few times; here it is in measures 60-69:

(notation found here)

I translated "Mein Leib neigt täglich sich zur Erden" as "My body daily bends to the earth."  To musically demonstrate this bending to the earth, the melody is descending.

The Beatles' "Ticket to Ride"

I'm listening to the Beatles' The Beatles 1 and working on my transcriptions of their songs for my Beatle-specific project.  I noticed something about the chorus of "Ticket to Ride."  Two of the four lines are "She oughta think twice; she oughta do right by me."  It's very similar to the last line of each verse (and also the title) of Bob Dylan's "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright," except that where Dylan says not to think twice, the Beatles say "she oughta think twice."  The "think twice" and "(al)right" are the two similar elements.

Apparently, "Ticket to Ride" is more of a John Lennon song than a Paul McCartney song, and since he mentioned that "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away" from Help! (the same album that "Ticket to Ride" appears on) is from his "Dylan period," it seems a bit more likely that "Ticket to Ride" had some of that Dylan influence too.

The Who's "The Seeker"

I'm listening to the Who's The BBC Sessions, and I noticed something in "The Seeker" that should have been obvious but that I'd never really noticed (it's also in the studio version).  In the line "I've been searchin' low and high," there's a rather large interval between the two syllables of "high" (I think it's C# to A).  That interval encapsulates the search not only because of that span of distance (like the "low and high" search) but also because that A seems to be in the higher vocal range.

Bach: Wo soll ich fliehen hin, BWV 5

This morning I listened to Bach's Wo soll ich fliehen hin, BWV 5.  I thought I noticed something in the third movement, but I had to look up the notation and the text to make sure.

Part of the text for the third movement is "Ergieße dich reichlich du göttliche Quelle" ("Flow amply, you divine spring").  There's a leap of almost an octave (Bb to Ab, if I'm reading the notation correctly) for the first part of "Quelle" ("spring"), and a full octave (Ebs) in the bass part:

(notation found here)

That leap sort of musically represents the flowing or springing of the source.

Bach: Christ lag in Todes Banden, BWV 4

This morning I listened to Bach's Christ lag in Todes Banden, BWV 4.  I noticed that at the word "nichts" ("nothing") in the fourth movement, the instruments drop out, but - after this feature seemed familiar - I did some research and discovered that I actually made a note of that when I listened to this cantata last summer.  I still intended to write about it (on a different blog) this afternoon, so I lookt up the notation, but then I found something else.

Leading up to that "nichts," there are double, triple, and quadruple stops in the violin part:

(notation found here)

Purely as a musical feature, those multiple stops set up a contrast with the rests after "nichts," but I think there's also an extra-musical intent.  The text for this movement includes:

Jesus Christus, Gottes Sohn, an unser Statt ist kommen,
Und hat die Sünde weggethan, damit dem Tod genommen
All' sein Recht und sein' Gewalt,
Da bleibet nichts denn Tod'sgestalt,
Den Stach’l hat er verloren.

Which I've translated as:

Jesus Christ, God's Son, has come in our stead
And has put away sin and with it taken death
All its [death's] authority and its power
There remains nothing because death
Has lost its sting.

The Biblical text is from 1 Corinthians 15:

When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:  "Death is swallowed up in victory."  "O death, where is your victory?  O death, where is your sting?"  The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.  But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.  (1 Corinthians 15:54-57)

After "sein' Gewalt" ("its power") the triple and quadruple stops occur, as if to demonstrate that power, and then they're absent once "da bleibet nichts" ("there remains nothing").

"Gewalt" can also be translated as "violence," which those triple and quadruple stops could also represent.

Bach: Ach Gott, vom Himmel sieh darein, BWV 2

This morning I listened to Bach's Ach Gott, vom Himmel sieh darein, BWV 2.  At the beginning of the fourth movement, there's a wrenching accidental on the second syllable of "verstört" and the accompanying violin part:

(notation found here)

I had to look up "verstört" to understand the reason behind that accidental though.  "Die Armen sind verstört" translates to "The poor [people] are distraught."  Those tonally-abrupt accidentals audibly demonstrate that agony.