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BWV77 (22 August 1723) opens with one of Bach’s most amazing choruses. It is a sermon on the words from the scripture reading (the parable of the Good Samaritan): you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind, and your neigbour as yourself. Bach connects this verse from Luke with Matthew 22, where Jesus says that on this `great commandment’ hangs all the law and the prophets. He does this by adding the melody of the chorale `Dies sind die heil’gen zehn Gebot’. Not satisfied with just adding the tune, he has it played in canon, a symbol of the law; and by augmentation, the continuo playing at half the speed of the trumpet - does not Matthew say that this is the great commandment? Furthermore he uses (unusual elsewhere) the highest and the lowest instrument: the great commandment encompasses all of the law and the prophets. And to complete the sermon the trumpet enters exactly ten times, once for each of the ten commandments! Amazing as all of this may be, the most amazing th
