The works of Schütz, therefore, in spite of their sweetness and dignity and an occasional glimpse of picturesque detail, are not to be considered as steps in the direct line of progress which led from the early Italian cantata and oratorio to the final achievements of Bach and Händel. These two giants of the culminating period apparently owed nothing to Schütz. It is not probable that they had any acquaintance with his works at all. The methods and the ideals of these three were altogether different. Considering how common and apparently necessary in art is the reciprocal influence of great men, it is remarkable that in the instance of the greatest German musician of the seventeenth century and the two greatest of the eighteenth, all working in the field of religious dramatic music, not one was affected in the slightest degree by the labors of either of the others. Here we have the individualism of modern art exhibited in the most positive degree upon its very threshold.
In the Passions of Schütz we find only the characters of the Bible story, together with the evangelist’s narrative taken literally from the Gospel,—that is to say, the original frame-work of the Passion music with the chorus element elaborated. In the latter part of the seventeenth century the dramatic scheme of the Passion was enlarged by the addition of the Christian congregation, singing appropriate chorals, and the ideal company of believers, expressing suitable sentiments in recitatives, arias, and choruses. The insertion of church hymns was of the highest importance in view of the relation of the Passion music to the liturgy, for the more stress was laid upon this feature, the more the Passion, in spite of its semi-dramatic character, became fitted as a constituent into the order of service. The choral played here the same part as in the cantata, assimilating to the prescribed order of worship what would otherwise be an extraneous if not a disturbing feature. This was especially the case when, as in the beginning of the adoption of the choral in the Passion, the hymn verses were sung by the congregation itself. In Bach’s time this custom had fallen into abeyance, and the choral stanzas were sung by the choir; but this change involved no alteration in the form or the conception of the Passion performance as a liturgic act.