Herz the Elder, Johann Daniel

Ich lasse dich nicht, du segnest mich denn (I will not let you go unless you bless me), BWV 1164 (renumbered from BWV Anh. 159), is a motet for SATB double choir which was attributed to Johann Sebastian Bach when it was first published in 1802. Around 1823 the motet was published as a composition by Johann Christoph Bach, Johann Sebastian's father's cousin, after which its attribution became a matter of discussion among scholars. The motet consists of two movements: the oldest extant manuscript of its first movement was partly written by Johann Sebastian, in 1712, or early 1713 at the latest. Its second movement is without doubt a chorale harmonisation by Johann Sebastian composed before c. 1735, when a version of this setting was copied in the Dietel manuscript, but it is uncertain when, and by whom, it was added to the first movement. Notwithstanding an 18th-century catalogue entry apparently describing the motet as a work for four voices with basso continuo, it is transmitted as an a cappella composition for eight voices without any form of instrumental accompaniment. The text of its first movement consists of a dictum, Genesis 32:27 (which is Genesis 32:26 in most English Bibles...