Although Christian Friedrich Henrici (alias Picander) gave his 1732 libretto the title “Über den Caffe” (About Coffee) and the world knows Bach’s setting as the Kaffee-Kantate (Coffee Cantata, BWV 211), the invigorating beverage itself is only superficially dealt with in the composition. Indeed, coffee – in Bach’s time equally popular and controversial for its purported effects on morality and health – serves here more as a pretext for a veritable conflict of generations and genders. In the clash between the pompous family patriarch, Schlendrian, and his astute, self-confident daughter, Liesgen, the social roles and power dynamics of the time are both brought into humorous focus and subtly undermined.

“Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht” (Be quiet, chatter not) – it is with this well-known opening line that the tenor opens the first recitative and establishes his role as the cantata’s narrator. At the same time, the line illustrates the difficulties faced by the musicians of Bach’s Collegium musicum in making themselves heard above the din of conversation and crockery in Gottfried Zimmermann’s coffee house, whose patrons were by no means there solely for the music.

The narrator’s description of the blustering Schlendrian rumbling “wie ein Zeidelbär” (like a honey bear) is vividly brought to life by Bach in the following aria. Doggedly circling violin semiquavers alternate with abrupt staccato jabs, creating a scene of futile rage; it is easy to imagine the aria being presented in semi-staged form at the premiere, which is thought to have taken place around 1734. The irritable patriarch appeals to his audience for understanding with the pitiful lament “Hat man nicht mit seinen Kindern hunderttausend Hudelei” (Don’t we have with our own children hundred thousand woes to see), but the melodramatic exaggeration results in unintentional comedy, especially as the interrupted cadences in the score suggest that this armchair tyrant is spectacularly misguided.

Schlendrian continues his tirade in the following recitative, describing his “böses Kind” (naughty child) as a “loses Mädchen” (wanton hussy), a remark that also points to the precarious status of 18th century women who, on the rare occasions they were admitted to coffee houses, were often equated with the courtesans known as “Caffee-Menscher” (coffeehouse women). Liesgen, for her part, makes a calm appeal for her father’s composure and candidly admits to her enjoyment of coffee three times a day – a habit that is also proof of her upscale lifestyle, as made clear in the soprano aria “Ei, wie schmeckt der Coffee süße” (Ah! How sweet the coffee’s taste is). The rhyming second line “lieblicher als tausend Küsse” (sweeter than a thousand kisses) seizes on the opportunity for a double entendre, the kind of innuendo for which the young Picander was especially well known throughout Leipzig. In this setting, the ⅜-metre, somewhat reminiscent of a courtly dance, and the elegant figurations of the accompanying transverse flute portray Liesgen as an emancipated and fashion-conscious lady, one who is aptly reflected in the audible sensitivity of the elegiac B-minor key. The fact that Bach reserves the distinctive timbre of the transverse flute in this cantata for Liesgen and the feminine world, while Schlendrian must make do with the usual strings and continuo, demonstrates the Thomascantor’s ability to employ subtle nuance and semantic codes even outside the realm of church music.

Schlendrian, however, is not yet defeated and he reels off an arsenal of prohibitions in the ensuing duet recitative. Yet neither stricter house arrest nor his refusal to pay for clothes and jewellery can sway the staunch coffee devotee. Liesgen, parrying every attack with a stoic mien, has by the end of the movement audibly driven her father to his wits’ end. Next – as if seeking advice from one of the manuals for the paterfamilias popular at the time – he resorts to a supposedly foolproof plan. Here, Bach’s tricky continuo ritornello captures the rumination and downright ridiculous malice of such scheming machinations, while the bass soloist’s constant reiteration of them renders the second aria a masterpiece of compositional craftmanship and character portrayal.

Armed with his new plan, Schlendrian stands before his daughter with renewed dignity and, in the next recitative, plays his final trump: either the coffee goes, or there will be no husband and no permission to marry. This, at last, seems to break Liesgen’s resolve. After a thoroughly theatrical display of submission, she revels in the prospect of future romantic happiness – which appears to consist mainly in liberation from her father’s paternalistic control. Indeed, the lilting six-eight figures and call-and-response exchanges of her aria suggest a soulful intimacy, whereas the continuous low-register arpeggios in the basso continuo hint that there may be more to this story than meets the eye.

This impression is warranted by the fact that Picander’s printed text and the surviving settings by other composers conclude with this aria as a confirmation of the patriarchal order, whereas Bach’s version turns the punchline on its head, lending an entirely new direction to a story that, for all its wordplay, is otherwise rather staid. It is impossible to know whether Bach was guided here more by his sense of formal balance, complete with the tenor’s return, or by his own family experiences with self-confident women. Either way, in his version, a tenor recitative follows that foils the father’s search for a suitor with Liesgen’s declaration that her hand can only be won with a coffee cup in it – which ultimately affords her both pleasure and personal autonomy.

The cantata then comes to a resounding close with the trio “Die Katze lässt das Mausen nicht” (A cat its mousing never quits). Its relaxed rondo form unites all voices including the transverse flute in a mood of smiling reconciliation and acknowledgement that human foibles are to be forgiven. In Bach’s hands, Picander’s cliché-laden dialogue is thus transformed into a sympathetic lesson in peaceful coexistence. Although often dismissed as second-rate by publicists and critics, the Coffee Cantata is for its time an extraordinarily progressive masterpiece.