Bach wrote cantatas for many secular occasions, including civic ceremonies, official celebrations of the Thomasschule and the University of Leipzig, the birthdays, namedays, family festivals, and funerals of bourgeois and noble patrons, and even coffehouse gatherings. Not surprisingly, he drew on many different musical genres, including the serenade, the ode (in German or Latin), the solo cantata (in German or Italian), and the "Dramma per musica," in which allegorical characters enacted a dramatic scene.
- Kevin Bazzana