In addition to his symphonies, Anton Bruckner is best known for his sacred works: his stirring masses and his deeply moving a cappella motets. On this new BR-KLASSIK CD, to mark the Bruckner Year 2024, the Bavarian Radio Chorus and the Münchner Rundfunkorchester conducted by Peter Dijkstra present his Mass No. 2 together with five well-known motets and the two short Aequali for three trombones from 1847. The new studio recordings were made in connection with the opening concert of the 2023/24 season on October 28, 2023. On a second CD, "Bruckner's World" by Markus Vanhoefer offers not only an introduction to the recorded works but also a detailed description of the life and work of this important Late Romantic composer.

After Bruckner's uncommissioned Mass (No. 1) in D minor had brought him to the attention of a wider public – following its premiere on November 20, 1864 in the Old Cathedral in Linz and a repeat performance in the city’s Redoutensaal – Bishop Franz Joseph Rudigier commissioned a second mass from the composer. Bruckner wrote the work between August and November 1866, and it was to be premiered at the consecration of the Votive Chapel of the New Cathedral; due to delays in the construction work, however, the performance could not take place until September 29, 1869. The premiere of the Mass (No. 2) in E minor for eight-part mixed choir and wind ensemble was also a great success, and Bruckner described it as “the most glorious day” of his life. The unusual instrumentation was due to the occasion and the open-air performance venue on the cathedral building site (the new chapel had proven too small for the choir). The work derives its particular tension from the sharp contrasts between archaic, psalm-like monophony and a strictly polyphonic movement structure modeled on Palestrina, combined with the "modern" wind accompaniment in sweeping, romantic harmony.

Bruckner thoroughly revised the Mass (No. 2) between 1876 and 1882, and the premiere of the second version in the Old Cathedral on October 4, 1885, as part of the Diocesan Jubilee in Linz, was once again an outstanding success. The composer "stood at the organ during the performance and gazed rapturously at the vault of the cathedral, his lips moving in silent prayer."

Bruckner's sacred motets are characterized by Catholic worship and the church spaces that were Bruckner's home from childhood. In 1837, at the age of 13, he was admitted as a choirboy to the Augustinian canons' monastery of Sankt Florian near Linz, where he worked as an organist from 1848 to 1855. His religious devotion and early influence meant that he initially saw himself as a church musician, before broadening his scope to include symphonic music - in whose sound architecture the organ also found an audible echo.

You don't have to like every composer - but there's no getting around J. S. Bach. The successful series of BR-KLASSIK audio biographies is now devoted to this central star of the musical firmament. His sparsely documented life leaves plenty of room for the imagination in works of fiction, but the authentic sources – well narrated – are just as captivating in every way. "If ever a tone artist brought the hidden secrets of harmony into the most artistic execution, it was undoubtedly our Bach.” (from the Necrology published by C.P.E. Bach in 1754). Son of a town piper, organist, concertmaster, Kapellmeister, then Thomaskantor in Leipzig for 27 years. Married twice, 20 children. Active in Thuringia and Saxony. When compared with the spectacular biography of Handel (BR-KLASSIK 900911), this one seems rather short on excitement – yet Bach's biography also provides a fascinating insight into an age that is very distant and foreign to us today. An age of proud, aspiring cities, magnificent courts, simple-minded town councillors, music-loving but unpredictable princes, church music that was already somewhat antiquated, and fashionable instrumental music from France and Italy. Bach moves confidently in the field of tension created by these opposing worlds – while creating music that surpasses that of all his contemporaries in terms of its artistry, depth and expressiveness. In Leipzig, Bach intends to raise church music to a completely new level and place it on a par with theology; he wants it to be multi-layered and speak directly to the faithful. Only a few years later, however, this initial enthusiasm wanes. Headstrong and uncompromising by nature, he now becomes restless and dissatisfied due to his frustrating battles with the petty town authorities. He composes a lot of secular music once again, seeks contact with the Dresden court, and finally retreats into his very own world to fathom the final "secrets of harmony". For all its modesty, therefore, the story of Bach's life is nevertheless magnificent, moving, and sometimes even shocking. This audio biography gets as close to the protagonist as the sources allow, also bringing his environment to life – the princes, churchmen and town councillors, and his friends and adversaries. In addition, we are introduced to the frequently bizarre everyday world of the 18th century: not always edifying church services, terrible transportation, lavish dining and drinking, or the horrors of an eye operation. At the centre of it all, however, is the music. "He should not be called brook (in German: Bach) but sea," Beethoven once apparently said, "because of his infinite inexhaustible wealth of tone combinations and harmonies." The numerous musical examples in this audio biography are densely interwoven with the narrative, and literally immerse the listener in this boundless abundance. Famed as an actor in the popular German detective series “Tatort”, Udo Wachtveitl is also a music lover and long-time narrator of the BR audio biographies. He regards the "structure behind music" as highly important, so Bach's life and work are a special source of inspiration to him. The Jena-born and currently highly regarded actor Albrecht Schuch ("All Quiet on the Western Front” plays the role of Johann Sebastian Bach, and several other outstanding BR narrators also shine in a wide variety of roles – making this audio biography a real treat!

BR-KLASSIK is dedicating a second portrait edition to the eminent Dutch conductor Bernard Haitink, containing a total of 9 CDs. Bernard Haitink died in October 2021; he would have turned 95 in March 2024.

These exceptional live recordings document the long-standing and intensive collaboration between Bernard Haitink, the Bavarian Radio Chorus, and the BRSO. Since Haitink conducted a subscription concert for the first time in 1958, he repeatedly led the BRSO for over six decades—sometimes in the Herkulessaal of the Residenz, sometimes in the Philharmonie im Gasteig. The orchestras’ musicians and singers were just as happy to work with him as the Bayerischer Rundfunk’s sound engineers.

The box set includes complete recordings of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 (CD 1) from 2019, Bruckner‘s Symphonies No. 4 (CD 2) from 2012, No. 7 (CD 3) from 1981, and No. 8 (CD 4 / CD 5) from 1993, as well as his Te Deum (CD 4) from 2010. Also featured are Dvořák‘s Symphony No. 7 from 1981 and his Scherzo Capriccioso (CD 6) from 1981, Mahler‘s Symphony No. 7 (CD 7) from 2011, and Shostakovich's Symphonies No. 8 (CD 8) from 2006 and No. 15 (CD 9) from 2015.

In the Revelation of James, an apocryphal gospel that was not included in the Bible, events and details surrounding the birth of Christ are reported that do not appear in the better-known versions of the Christmas story from the gospels of Matthew and Luke. The Christmas story is presented by James in a vivid, dramatic, and almost theatrical manner.

Howard Arman's Christmas Story follows the tradition of works such as Bach's "Christmas Oratorio", where newly-composed settings of the Gospel alternate with chorales. Here, Gregorian and polyphonic chorales as well as several motets from the 17th century are woven into Arman's composition and form a second narrative level. They frame the episodes of the Christmas story and can also be understood as musical reactions to the narrated events.

This new BR-KLASSIK CD is complemented by the chorales from Peter Maxwell Davies' Christmas cantata "O magnum mysterium". Arman contrasts the powerful language and mysticism of James’ gospel by reducing musical means to their essentials: monophonic singing, syllabically conceived solo passages and, as the only accompanying instrument, a hurdy-gurdy, which with its monotonous, archaic sound represents a certain timelessness. All of this results in maximum text comprehensibility, whereby the emotional declamatory singing style almost makes the figures resemble characters in a stage play. A key moment is Joseph's vision shortly before the birth of Christ: time seems to stand still, and the mystical and sublime aspect of this scene is intensified by poetic words full of linguistic contrasts and contradictions. – The chorales and motets integrated into Arman’s Christmas Story gradually develop ever greater polyphony. Thus, three settings by Nicolaus Zangius, Hieronymus Praetorius and Hans Leo Hassler, scored for ever greater numbers of voices, lead to a fourth, ten-part composition by Melchior Vulpius, which concludes with the words "Peace on earth". In its formal layout, Arman's Christmas Story bears similarities to Peter Maxwell Davies' cantata "O magnum mysterium". This work, written in 1960 for the choirmaster of Manchester Cathedral, also consists of chorales and instrumental sonatas, although the order is not compulsory. The four a cappella chorales in particular constitute a self-contained unit in terms of both content and music.

The mass that Mozart composed in 1779 for the Easter service in Salzburg Cathedral is shrouded in legend. From the very first bar onwards, it exudes the stately tone that would, much later on, earn it the sobriquet "Coronation Mass". Soon after Mozart's death, it became the Viennese court orchestra’s favorite mass for coronation ceremonies.

This new release from BR-KLASSIK is a live recording of a concert, performed on May 21, 2022 in the Herkulessaal of the Munich Residenz. That concert of sacred music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart included three other, lesser-known compositions that were also written during his time in Salzburg. Here they are woven in between the short movements of the Coronation Mass, and thus connected to the Mass in a way that might have been required by the practical performance conditions of a Salzburg church service.

In his "Vesperae solennes de Dominica", composed during the same year as the Mass, Mozart fulfilled the Salzburg prince-archbishop's demands for the greatest possible brevity in a tongue-in-cheek manner, by means of various compositional tricks as well as a particularly sonorous score. The album is rounded off by the "Epistle Sonata" for orchestra with obbligato organ in C major, K 329, written to accompany the "Coronation Mass", as well as by the solemn offertory "Alma Dei creatoris" for soloists, choir and orchestra in F major, K 277.

The first-rate cast of soloists consists of Katharina Konradi (soprano), Sophie Harmsen (mezzo-soprano), Steve Davislim (tenor) and Krešimir Stražanac (bass). The soloists and the excellent Bavarian Radio Chorus are accompanied by the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, one of the most renowned orchestras in the field of historical and historically informed performance practice. The conductor is Howard Arman.

Le miroir de Jésus (The Mirror of Jesus) for mezzo-soprano, women's choir, strings and harp, the last major work composed by the French composer André Caplet in the spring and summer of 1923 and based on fifteen poems by the French writer Henri Ghéon, was subtitled "Mystères du rosaire" (Mysteries of the Rosary). The mystical work, whose form and genre defy the usual categorizations, revolves around the most important stations in the life of Jesus, told from the perspective of the Virgin Mary and mirrored, as it were, in her gaze. Each of the three parts consists of an extended instrumental prelude and five episodes. The first begins with the Annunciation, recounts the Visitation of Mary, the birth of Christ and his time in the Temple of Jerusalem. The second part turns to the mysteries of pain: Jesus' scourging, the crown of thorns, the way of the cross and the agony, and finally his death. The last part reflects on the "Glorious Mysteries": Jesus's Resurrection, the Ascension, Pentecost and finally Assumption and Coronation.

A mezzo-soprano takes on the perspective of Mary. Occasionally the voice changes to recitation or even recitative, but the singing always serves the text, guaranteeing its comprehensibility and at the same time interpreting the words through musical means. Later, the choir introduces the respective poem titles and also emerges at a few points that are all the more significant: at the end of the first rosary, it reinforces the message of Ghéon's text with a Latin biblical quotation, and later on with eulogies such as "Sanctus" and "Alleluia". In "Le miroir de Jésus", Caplet found a musical form for the mysteries of the ancient passion story that brings together past and present into a peaceful synthesis.

REVIEWS:

Le Miroir de Jésus was André Caplet’s last major completed work, composed two years before his early death at the age of 46.

Caplet’s writing is precise and considered, and his accomplished use of melancholic presentiment – as in the Nativité of the First Part – possesses a simplicity, and yet a directness, that proves consistently compelling. His handling of what are deliberately reduced orchestral forces of strings and a harp reveals a master orchestrator. Incidents such as the rippling water evocations in the Présentation simply reinforce his command of impressionist-derived devices put to his own use.

Arman and the Munich Radio Orchestra catch the spare unisons in Part Two’s Prélude and they expand density over the final bars the better to explore the Gregorian implications of the succeeding Agonie au Jardin. Over this section one encounters reflective lyricism and much beauty as well as terse, jagged writing in the scene where Christ is crowned with thorns.

The richness and variety of his imagination is palpable throughout and in the Prélude to Part Three Arman ensures that Caplet’s presaging of elements of minimalism is clear even as Caplet generates a halo-like subtlety after the Resurrection scene. The spiritual intensity reaches a transcendence and moving intensity, the women of the choir of Bavarian Radio exuding exultant echo effects as the work draws to a close, Vondung both speaking and then singing rapturously with choral support.

The performance is beautifully balanced and is taken from a live performance in the Herz-Jesu-Kirche, Munich – not that one would know it’s live, as there’s no audience noise audible. Vondung is a splendid exponent, as she has proved in Baroque Passions and cantatas on disc, whose mezzo provides a sympathetic and rich-voiced conduit both for Ghéon’s texts and for Caplet’s richly varied, spiritually charged music.

Arman paces the work perfectly drawing out its radiance as well as its ethereal beauties, and – occasionally – its more harmonically astringent elements.

There’s a good booklet and full texts are provided in French with German and English translations.

-- MusicWeb International

This new release features poignant soul music for moments of contemplation. Stabat Mater is a 13th-century Catholic hymn to Mary's suffering as Jesus Christ's mother at his crucifixion and has been set to music by many Western composers. This 4 album box presents timeless interpretations of the most important compositions of Stabat Mater. Soloists featured on the release include Margot Guilleaume, Ingeborg Danz, Marta Benackova, Elisabeth Höngen, James Taylor, Thomas Quasthoff and many more.