florida state university college of music performance practice

CHAPTER 4
ORIGINS AND VERSIONS OF THE ST. JOHN PASSION
Approaching the St. John Passion for performance presents a daunting task for a
conductor. Its complex history, changes, corrections and deletions of four known versions
leave the conductor sorting through an abundance of performance considerations and
issues. Rather than lamenting the fact there can never be one “definitive version” of the
St. John Passion, there is room to acknowledge, appreciate and celebrate various
interpretations. These interpretations can be documented using sound recordings as
evidence. In addition, it is possible to theorize that by examining choices that conductors
in the past quarter-of-a-century have made concerning the St. John Passion points to
trends or currents in the larger arena of performance and culture. Investigation into the
compositional history of the St. John Passion is merited to fully appreciate its complex
history and choices that conductors make regarding the work.
Origins of the Passion Genre
Proleptical attempts to reenact the Passion story in the Christian church can be traced
as far back as the Fourth Century. It is believed that until the Thirteenth Century, a single
presenter recounted the events surrounding the crucifixion, but during time, this
developed into division of parts, including a turba chorus, which added to the dramatic
nature of the monophonic passion. 225 Gradually around the Fifteenth Century, polyphony
was introduced into the Passion genre out of which two forms developed and emerged,
known as responsorial and through-composed. 226 These two forms served as archetypes
well into the Seventeenth Century. The responsorial passion, also known as choral
Passion or dramatic Passion, was composed in a style that presented the Evangelist‟s role
monophonically while the words of Christ and the crowd (turba) sections were set
225 Kurt von Fischer, “Monophonic Passion,” Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed 11 February
2008),
226 Kurt von Fischer, “Beginnings of the polyphonic Passion,” Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed
11 February 2008),
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