Johann Sebastian Bach Rejoice! The passing year is ended

Rejoice! the passing year is ended,
the New Year comes on us apace.
Forget not, O my soul,
his Grace so oft with open hand extended,
and all his gifts throughout the year.
So sing a joyful anthem clear,
that God will ever safe defend us,
and more unsparing favors send us.

Now bless the Lord, O bless him,
my soul bless thou his Holy Name.
The Lord thy God confess him,
his benefits to thee acclaim.
Who all thy sins forgiveth,
all thy diseases cures
through whom thy spirit liveth,
who grace to thee assures;
thy mouth with plenty filleth;
with courage fires thy breast,

...

Gottlob! nun geht das Jahr zu Ende,
das neue rücket schon heran.
Gedenke, meine Seele, dran,
wieviel dir deines Gottes Hände
im alten Jahre Guts getan!
Stimm ihm ein frohes Danklied an.
So wird er ferner dein gedenken
und mehr zum neuen Jahre schenken.

Nun lob, mein Seel, den Herren,
was in mir ist, den Namen sein.
Sein Wohltat tut er mehren.
Vergiss es nicht, o Herze mein!
Hat dir dein Sünd vergeben
und heilt dein Schwachheit groß,
errett' dein armes Leben,
nimmt dich in seinen Schoß.
Mit reichem Trost beschüttet,
verjüngt, dem Adler gleich.

...

Felix Loy
Translation: Elizabeth Robinson<

Johann Sebastian Bach’s cantata Gottlob! nun geht das Jahr zu Ende BWV 28 was written for performance on the last Sunday of 1725 (30 December); it therefore belongs to the third cycle of Leipzig cantatas.1 There is no evidence of any further performances. Bach composed the work to a text from Erdmann Neumeister’s Geistliche Poesien, first published in 1714 in Frankfurt am Main. Of the surviving cantatas, this is the last for which Bach used a text by Neumeister.

Otherwise, Bach chose exclusively texts by the Darmstadt court poet Georg Christian Lehms (1684–1717) for the cantatas from the first day of Christmas 1725 to the second Sunday after Epiphany 1726. However, Lehms’s collection Gottgefälliges Kirchen-Opffer published in 1711 (and compiled for Christoph Graupner) did not cover the Sunday after Christmas, which only occurs in some years. Therefore, the recourse to Neumeister’s poetry in this situation was possibly an alternative solution for Bach.

Neumeister’s text makes no reference to the sermon for the Sunday after Christmas (St. Luke 2:33–40), which tells the story of the meeting of the new-born Jesus and

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