He scored the cantata for four vocal soloists, a four-part choir and a Baroque instrumental ensemble of two horns, two oboes d'amore, strings and continuo.

Bach scholars agree that the brass instruments, normally reserved for Feast days, could come from an earlier chorale fantasia of the same melody with the text of the German Gloria.

[4] The hymn is sung to the melody of "Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr", the German Gloria, by Nikolaus Decius (1522).

Bach scored the work for four vocal soloists (soprano, alto, tenor, bass), a four-part choir and a Baroque instrumental ensemble of two horns (Co), two oboes d'amore (Oa), two violins (Vl), viola (Va) and basso continuo.

In the opening chorus, a chorale fantasia, the melody of the German Gloria "Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr" is embedded in an orchestral concerto.

The movement opens with calls derived from the chorale tune played on the two horns, leading to a free concerto with the strings and oboes.

[9] John Eliot Gardiner compares the movement to the openings of the two former cantatas for the same occasion: "The presence of two horns ... reveals a much more regal portrait of the Good Shepherd than we have previously met.

"[7] Both Alfred Dürr and Klaus Hofmann assume that the music was not originally composed for this pastoral text, but previously, for the Gloria.

[3][6] Bach had composed a different chorale fantasia on the same melody in Auf Christi Himmelfahrt allein, BWV 128, with similar instrumentation.