Wachet Auf (Sleepers Wake) Choral Prelude

JS Bach’s Choral prelude for Organ, Wachet Auf, has become a favourite of wedding couples for processional or recessional music because of its joyous liveliness and beauty. The cantata Wachet Auf BWV 140 contains a Biblical warning to be alert for the arrival of salvation, but Bach seems to have chosen to wake his sleepers with delightful sounds.The arranger, Charles Macpherson, was an Organist at St Paul’s Cathedral in London and a professor of composition at the Royal Academy of Music. He has made his interpolations clear by the use of brackets.