Bach Cantata Concert This Sunday: A New Heaven and a New Earth

The next concert in the Bach Cantata Series is this Sunday, November 19, at 5:00 p.m. Admission is free. With a theme of “A New Heaven and a New Earth,” the program presents two cantatas and one of Bach’s great organ works:

• Ich elender Mensch, wer wird mich erlösen (Wretched being, who will restore me)
• Prelude and Fugue in E minor
• Wachet! betet! betet! wachet! (Watch! Pray! Pray! Watch!).

Composed as part of Bach's first cantata cycle of 1723, Cantata 48 combines the Apostle Paul's exhortation to the Romans to live more truthful lives with the story of Jesus's cure of the paralyzed man. Cantata 70 takes the topic of the "Second Advent" and exhorts us to look for a new heaven and a new earth. The Prelude and Fugue in E minor will be played on the Flentrop organ by Organ Scholar Katherine Johnson.

Dr. Zebulon Highben, director of Chapel Music, will give a pre-concert talk at 4:00 p.m. in Duke Divinity School's Goodson Chapel on “Cantatas and Chorales in Context."