The final concert of this year’s Toronto Bach Festival took place at Eastminster United Church yesterday afternoon.  It offered two of the cantatas Bach wrote in Leipzig in 1723; Die Elenden sollen essen and Die Himmel erzählen die Ehre Gottes  Each is written in two parts which, originally would have bookended a sermon (mercifully absent yesterday).  Each begins with a choral setting of a biblical verse and proceeds via recits on arias on related texts.  The second half of each starts with a Sinfonia and finishes with a chorale based on a Lutheran hymn.

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