This second special single-CD release for Christmas in the award-winning series of recordings from the Bach Cantata Pilgrimage, incudes BWV 151, one of his most intimate cantatas. Opening with a hauntingly beautiful and consoling soprano aria, it has pre-echoes of both Gluck and Brahms. First heard on Boxing Day 1725, BWV 57 provides us with another opportunity to enjoy Bach, who never wrote an opera, as the best writer of dramatic declamation since Monteverdi. His response to the text is highly personalized, and sparing in its modest forces although strongly expressive. A movement of infectious rhythmic élan, the opening chorus of BWV 133 conveys the exuberance and sheer exhilaration of Christmas. The Monteverdi Choir and The English Baroque Soloists give their customary brilliant performances, making this release the must-have issue of the year's Christmas season.

SDG is delighted to release Volume 12 - Cantatas for the twenty-second and twenty-third Sundays after trinity.

John Eliot Gardiner, The Monteverdi Choir and The English Baroque Soloists performed both of these programmes in England: at All Saints church in Tooting and at Winchester Cathedral, in November 2000.

The soloists include James Gilchrist, Peter Harvey and Joanne Lunn.

The highlight of this album is Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme (“Sleepers, wake”) - one of Bach’s best known cantatas, and one that has long been part of the Monteverdi Choir’s repertoire. It is described as “a cantata without weaknesses, without a dull bar, technically, emotionally and spiritually of the highest order”.

Ich armer Mensch, ich Sündenknecht (“I, wretched man, I slave to sin”) is Bach’s only cantata for solo tenor still in existence. It is sung movingly by James Gilchrist.

Of three cantatas on the parable of the unjust steward (BWV 55, 89, 115), Mache dich, mein Geist, bereit (“Prepare yourself, my soul”) is considered to stand out for its subtle instrumental writing and spellbinding arias, which evoke the yearning of the soul for divine mercy.

The recording in Tooting (CD1) is the only one in the whole series that wasn’t recorded live: the original concert took place in Eton chapel, right under the Heathrow airport flight path, so we had to try and recreate the same conditions in a quieter place.

This album is packaged with a separate index sheet of the Cantata series.

Volume 10 of the Cantata Pilgrimage series features the programs given in Potsdam and Wittenberg on the 29th and 31st of October, respectively. The first disc is devoted to three cantatas for the 19th Sunday after Trinity with BWV 90 (for Trinity 25) tossed in for good measure, while the second appropriately contains Bach’s two great Reformation Day cantatas (Nos. 79 and 80), separated by the brief, lively, and possibly incomplete No. 192. The three Trinity 19 cantatas are altogether more solemn, or at least begin that way. Coming a third of the year after the last major festival, these cantatas are concerned more with reassurance than exultation, and each concludes with a positive affirmation, and in the case of BWV 5, a triumphant one. Best known of the three, by far, is Cantata 56, for bass. Here divorced from its customarily joined-at-the-hip partner, BWV 82, it confirms its status as one of the elite cantatas. The inclusion of No. 92 is a happy solution to a number of dilemmas. The year of the Pilgrimage did not have enough Sundays after Trinity to accommodate it; it fills out what might otherwise have been a short program, and it is a vigorous and effective foil for its more introspective discmates.

Again, the performances are superb. Personnel for the two concerts are consistent, apart from the addition of flutes, horns, timpani, and a bass sackbut for the second evening. The choir is made up of seven (count them) sopranos, one female and three male altos, four tenors, and three basses, without detectable loss of responsiveness and flexibility, and the solo quartet acquits itself admirably. Harvey’s BWV 56 is outstanding. Lunn and Towers, incidentally, pull double duty, singing in the choir as well as offering their solos.

As expected, Gardiner uses the original scoring––without Wilhelm Friedemann’s high trumpets––in Ein feste Burg (Cantata 80). Obviously it’s an (perhaps the) appropriate choice, but it set me to wondering about what seems to be an obsession among the period-practice set with composers’ first thoughts––their need to find the earliest version of any score, as if the original inspiration is automatically diminished by any subsequent modifications. We know that Bach’s music was nearly always created under the most intense pressure, and that he was constantly tinkering with it, usually out of necessity, but, who knows, perhaps out of conviction. I know that I, operating at a much lower level of inspiration, am continually tweaking whatever I happen to be working on. Recording artists, especially in the classical field, if they are successful enough, revisit music that they have already committed to disc. First thoughts are not invariably best. That’s why there are erasers on pencils and an Undo button on the Word toolbar. We’ll never know, of course, but isn’t it possible that Bach might have mentioned casually to his son that he wished he’d put some trumpets in that music he wrote for Reformation Sunday? Well, no matter. In fact, Gardiner does have a sonic surprise for us in Cantata 80, an unexpectedly prominent bass sackbut. And why not? The production is, as anticipated, exemplary. Most enthusiastically recommended.

FANFARE: George Chien

English Baroque Soloists/John Eliot Gardiner. (Originally released on Erato 4509-91800-2 [2 CDs] recorded January, 1983)

The English Baroque Soloists are a virtuoso period band, wonderfully well recorded here, and Gardiner elicits readings from them that are masterfully shaped and inflected, full of resilience, energy, and life. These are foot-tapping performances, as earthy as they are courtly, and unmatched in their richness and piquancy of sound. What is notable, in addition to the wonderful pointing of rhythm, is the real expressiveness of the playing. - Ted Libbey

Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem is presented along pieces by Heinrich Schütz (1585-1672) which might have inspired its composition, giving the listener a new insight into the composer’s mind and music making. Deeply moving, profound, and powerful, the Requiem is central to our understanding of Brahms’ compositional personality and inner spiritual life. Behind its dramatic gestures and 19th century grandeur, it reveals Brahms’ obsessions with folk-songs and the music of the past. The libretto, assembled by Brahms himself based on the Lutheran Bible, makes it a definitive personal statement of his position in matters of religion. The booklet includes a note by composer Hugh Wood, explaining how the pieces relate to each other and giving a moving account of Brahms as a composer and as a man.

BEETHOVEN Missa Solemnis • John Eliot Gardiner, cond; Lucy Crowe (s); Jennifer Johnson (mez); James Gilchrist (t); Matthew Rose (bs); Monteverdi Ch; O Révolutionnaire et Romantique • SOLI DEO GLORIA 718 (69:58 Text and Translation) Live: London 10/17/2012


When I first opened the foldout CD packaging and noted that Gardiner’s performance of the Missa Solemnis runs only 70 minutes, I immediately became crestfallen. That timing seemed to me ridiculously brief for this massive work. True, William Steinberg produced a beautifully phrased and well chiseled performance in 74:31, but that is four and a half minutes longer, just as Toscanini’s last (1953) version is around 73 minutes. Yet that last Toscanini performance always sounded a bit short-breathed to me, especially when compared to his two greatest versions, the 1935 one with the New York Philharmonic (a performance that clocked in around 86 minutes) and the 1940 NBC broadcast (which came in a few seconds under 80 minutes). Both of those had a breadth and spaciousness that almost sounded unearthly, so spectacular was his phrasing, and both had quartets of soloists that one could only dream of in one’s wildest imagination. In 1935 they were Elisabeth Rethberg, Marion Telva, Giovanni Martinelli, and Ezio Pinza, and in 1940 they were Zinka Milanov, Bruna Castagna, Jussi Björling, and Alexander Kipnis.


Imagine my surprise and delight, then, to start listening to this performance and be absolutely charmed and seduced by Gardiner’s tempos and phrasing. It turns out that the fairly quick timing of this performance is caused by his accelerating the fast sections of the work, particularly the Finale and part of the Sanctus, neither of which I have ever heard played so fast in my life, but in those particular sections the music can take it. Otherwise, this is a surprisingly fluid and flexible reading, not only leisurely where you like to hear it so but also with innumerable rubato touches and other little niceties that make the score sound more elastic and bring the phrasing to vivid life.


As for the soloists, all are fine, although tenor Gilchrist was not in good voice at the outset. He sounds rather wobbly throughout the Kyrie and the beginning of the Gloria, only bringing his voice into focus halfway through the latter; from that point on, he is fine. The other soloists are excellent from their very first notes, and the Monteverdi Choir sounds transcendent. I was also a bit uneasy about hearing the Missa played by a historically informed orchestra. Even though the music is mostly at a slow tempo and only occasionally explosive, I just couldn’t wrap my head around hearing this piece played by no-vibrato strings, but there, too, I was in for a pleasant surprise. The strings of the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique do not whine and drone like a MIDI, but rather play with a lovely sheen and at times even with warmth, something I wouldn’t have thought possible prior to hearing this release.


Moreover, by using what is almost a chamber orchestra (66 musicians plus the organ, played here by James Johnstone) and most certainly a chamber choir (45 voices, 25 of which are women), one hears “through” the textures in a way that only a master of orchestral transparency like Toscanini was able to bring out using conventional symphonic forces. In toto, then, I found this an extraordinarily fine performance and moving experience, certainly one of the jewels of Gardiner’s catalog of recordings.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

This stunning new live recording of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion (Matthauspassion BWV 244) was recorded in Pisa Cathedral during the Anima Mundi Festival as part of the Monteverdi Choir and Orchestra’s 2016 tour. Conducted by Sir John Eliot Gardiner, the brilliant cast includes James Gilchrist as the Evangelist and Stephan Loges as Jesus. The Trinity Boys Choir adds an exciting color to this recording as well. The Monteverdi Choir was founded by Sir John Eliot Gardner in 1964. The ensemble’s first performance was the Monteverdi Vespers in King’s College Chapel, Cambridge. The group has become known worldwide for their stylistic conviction and their ability to perform an extensive repertoire, from Renaissance motets to Classical music of the Twentieth Century.

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REVIEW:

Musically this is a very fine performance. The choir are excellent, of course, with a solid but clear and intimate sound even in the larger choruses, no end of expressive means in the chorales, and a thrilling quickness in the crowd choruses. Gardiner asks for a lot of quiet singing from them and they execute it with a superbly controlled beauty.

The orchestra is as skilled and musical as you like in their obbligatos, and exquisitely responsive in Gardiner's subtle shapings.

The experienced Evangelist of James Gilchrist and Christus of Stephan Loges are not to be faulted, and none of the nine young aria soloists is a weak link; each one lives up to their moment in the drama.

All of these things you will find in many other Matthews, but you will rarely find the same careful relishing of the German text. What really makes this one special, however, is its emotional integrity, coming not from affected theatricality but from a pervading sense of profound sadness. This recording is one of Gardiner's finest achievements.

– Gramophone

The Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists celebrate Christmas with a mixed programme of J.S. Bach’s sacred choral works. As we approach the 500th Anniversary of the Lutheran Church, these works transport listeners to 18th-century Leipzig for a traditional Christmas celebration. The programme moves from the intimacy of “Süßer Trost” to the vast celebration of joy that is Bach's Magnificat. The Bach at Christmas project is dedicated to the memory of philanthropist and patron of the Monteverdi choir, Sir Ralph Kohn. The concerts from which these recordings were taken took place at the Alte Oper, Frankfurt, in December of 2016.

The Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists are renowned of their spectacular performances of Bach's epic masterpiece, which they have toured extensively. During their last tour (in Munich, Frankfurt, Lucerne, Aix-en-Provence and Paris) there was a stampede for tickets and they performed every night in full houses, to spellbound audiences. This album is the culmination of the tour: it was recorded in an open session in London, and captures the special atmosphere of the concerts. It is presented in a 2-CD casebook and contains a booklet featuring original notes by John Eliot Gardiner translated in English, German and French.

The quality of the performance is superb, and the booklet notes, extracted from Mr. Gardiner’s excellent recent book “Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven,” are exemplary.

– New York Times

From the outset here, Gardiner’s meticulous grasp of the detail and architecture in tandem is almost terrifyingly auspicious. His admiration for this work is palpable in every bar. In the grip of its conceits and its virtuoso executancy, captured in the strikingly immediate recorded sound of LSO St Luke’s, this High Mass joins a distinguished discography at high table.

– Gramophone

Following their acclaimed release of Bach's Ascension Oratorio, the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists have recorded the Easter Oratorio BWV 249, one of Bach's less-performed choral works. The Easter Oratorio was composed originally as a simple cantata, and was later revised into a more polished piece, with a meditative emphasis and underlying narrative flavor. The work is paired with Bach's Actus tragicus BWV 106.

"One of the most ambitious musical projects of all time" - Gramophone

For the first time on one label, the complete live recordings from the Bach Cantata Pilgrimage in an elegant, limited edition box set. The CDs in the box are packed in individual sleeves with Steve McCurry's evocative portrait photos from the existing series, so the "feel" of the collection is much the same as the individual releases.

The set contains:

56 audio CDs All 28 existing volumes from our Bach Cantatas series

+ 4 additional CDs previously released by Deutsche Grammophon. Featuring Magdalena Kozena/ Paul Agnew/ Mark Padmore/ Sara Mingardo/ James Gilchrist/ Peter Harvey 3rd Sunday after Epiphany (BWV 72/ 73/ 111/ 156) Feast of the Purification of Mary (BWV 83/ 82/ 125/ 200) 9th Sunday after Trinity (BWV 94/ 168/ 105) 11th Sunday after Trinity (BWV179/ 199/ 113)

+ 1 bonus CD-R Index of the cantatas by CD and by cantata number Sung texts with English translations Original sleeve notes in English and German (French notes available online)