Cantatas

Cantatas for use in the liturgy of church services are called church cantata or sacred cantata, other cantatas can be indicated as secular cantata.

We can see a parallel with cantatas by composers such as Handel, where the subjects tend to be either pastoral or a protagonist (usually female) under great emotional stress.

Aside from his many sonatas, Scarlatti composed a number of operas and cantatas, symphonias, and liturgical pieces.

For Bach's larger vocal works (cantatas, Passions,.

Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel wrote cantatas such as Werdet voll Geistes (Get full of spirit) in 1737.

I (music lost); see also List of Bach cantatas * BWV Anh. 200 – Fragment of a chorale prelude O Traurigkeit, o herzeleid, added to Anh.

I; see also List of Bach cantatas * BWV Anh. 213 – Lost arrangement for organ of an unidentified Telemann concerto, added to Anh.

Recent decades have revived his secular cantatas and what one might call 'secular oratorios' or 'concert operas'.

Some composers wrote sacred cantatas to be performed in the church services of these days.

They were so similar in form to the sacred ones that many of them were parodied (in parts or completely) to sacred cantatas, for example in Bach's Christmas Oratorio.

Vivaldi wrote concertos, cantatas and sacred vocal music for them.