The fact that Bach composed the Cantata BWV 211 (Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht – the “coffee cantata”) is arguably more amusing than the cantata itself. Written in 1734 in the context of the Collegium Musicum, a musical society founded by Telemann that used the Café Zimmermann in Leipzig as a concert venue, it feels today rather as a dad joke set to exquisite music. This alone makes it challenging for any musician: those who try to make something hilarious of it usually ruin the good part of the experience (the music) and those who try to ignore the comedy make it even odder, a misguided episode of silly “sacred” music.
It will always seem astonishing to me that Gustav Leonhardt – whom I tend to regard as rather austere – is the conductor who got it just right in his recording with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and a lovely Barbara Bonney. There charm comes first, in warm orchestral playing, catchy rhythms and a subtly characterful conducting that finds every musical gag in the score – and nobody comes close to Lina Beznosiuk in playing the flute solos with a musical wink. But the keyword here is “subtly”.
This evening Rudolf Lutz and the J.S. Bach-Stiftung reduced to one per part never lost from sight the comedy element – and never overdid it – yet rather than Leonhardt’s refined charm they offered something on the rustic sound, with strongly marked dance rhythms and hearty, almost folk-like strings. The harpsichord continuo felt a bit overbusy to my taste, clashing a bit with the slightly unsophisticated atmosphere.
There is nothing easy in the vocal parts in the BWV 211. As usual with Bach, it is hard to sing although it must always sound spontaneous. The soprano takes the lion share here. Although everyone tends to focus on her first aria, the second one has a very awkward tessitura that usually involves some inaudible low notes and some high notes below true pitch in the end of phrases. Nobody sings them better than Carolyne Sampson in the recording with the Bach Collegium Japan (an impressively full-toned Dorothea Röschmann in Bernard Labadie’s recording is also hard to overlook). Not only is she ideally bright toned, even in her low register but also she sounds entirely unfazed by the difficult intervals and the long phrases. And she makes it clear that this cantata is not about coffee (it’s about you-know-what). Although Miriam Feuersinger was no exception in the perilous spots in the second aria, she sang with irresistible smoothness of tone and clarity of diction. She didn’t seem to try to make any point and embraced coyness without looking back.
As Schlendrian, the ill-humored father, Dominik Wörner delivered the text with savoir-faire and never tried to be too funny. A darker voice and ampler in the lower end would have helped the characterization (and given him a little bit more leeway). The tenor part is short but not sweet – it is uncomfortable to sing and only a few tenors really make something of it. Sören Richter found in it the right “gossipy” note.
I HEAR VOICES 
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