The superlative Pygmalion chorus are at the center of this new recording of the St. John Passion. Their striking presence radiates throughout the work, their exemplary articulation and collective energy moulding the drama and carrying it's emotional charge. Raphael Pichon's flexible yet precise direction restores it's original dramatic arc, instilling the peerless team of soloists with the same demandingly high standards of musical narrative and truth. This Passion wins out through it's clarity of gesture and compellingly forceful actualization.
Bach's St. John Passion is the earliest surviving Passion or Oratorio by J.S Bach and was first performed in 1724. This version consists of two sections and retains this structure in the versions and revisions that followed in 1725, 1730, 1736 and 1749. Bach added several numbers in the 1749 version, but several arias from the revisions are found only in the appendices of modern editions. So, there is no 'final' version crafted by the composer as there is for the later St. Matthew Passion, no single manuscript as there is for the Brandenburg Concertos, nor a revised printed edition as exists for the Goldberg Variations. What we do have are Bach's various attempts as he went from performance to performance, to try to grasp what he was aiming for - consciously and unconsciously. There is much that is operatic in the music, and the thought that the St. John Passion is Bach's opera is hardly an original one. This recording uses the new edition by musicologist Malcolm Bruno.
An album dedicated to Johann Sebastian Bach piano solo, follows Alexandre Tharaud's very original Four Hands project. The protean French pianist brings a programme concentrating on Bach on the piano - in this instance mostly in his own transcriptions such as the Lute Suite BWV 996, the Johannes-Passion BWV 245 and many others. The album also features a few Bach HITS: Sicilienne BWV 1031, the famous Bach/Gounod Ave Maria and the Adagio from the Keyboard Concerto BWV 974, after Alessandro Marcello Adagio.
An album dedicated to Johann Sebastian Bach piano solo, follows Alexandre Tharaud's very original Four Hands project. The protean French pianist brings a programme concentrating on Bach on the piano - in this instance mostly in his own transcriptions such as the Lute Suite BWV 996, the Johannes-Passion BWV 245 and many others. The album also features a few Bach HITS: Sicilienne BWV 1031, the famous Bach/Gounod Ave Maria and the Adagio from the Keyboard Concerto BWV 974, after Alessandro Marcello Adagio.
Bach: Johannes-Passion / Herreweghe, Collegium Vocale Gent
PHI
CD
$29.99Feb 14, 2020
Bach’s St John Passion, with its famous opening chorus traversed by shadows and light, is a powerful musical and spiritual reflection. Dramatic, grandiose, complex, resolutely theatrical: there has been no lack of superlatives to describe this supreme masterpiece of western music. Philippe Herreweghe and Collegium Vocale Gent present an accomplished reading that reflects their knowledge of the composer, based on extensive research and deepened by countless concerts. Soloists Krešimir Stražanac and Maximilian Schmitt demonstrate the breadth of their talents in the roles of Jesus and the Evangelist.
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REVIEW:
Contributing to the discerning unity of vision and character of this performance is how the instruments sit embedded at the heart of the vocal sound…This is indeed one of the most thoughtful, affecting and powerful St John Passions in recent years. It reveals the mature mastery of Herreweghe at his most perspicacious and consistent, with Collegium Vocale Gent paving the way with gold.
Marked by a profound dramatic and spiritual intensity, the St John Passion was composed by Johann Sebastian Bach in 1724. Based on the Gospel according to St John, it recounts the last moments of Christ's life, from his arrest to his burial in the tomb. The Cantor's Passion is one of the most sublime works in his repertoire, drawing the listener into a mystical and contemplative reflection. Gaétan Jarry conducts the Orchestre de l'Opéra Royal and the child singers of the Tölzer Knabenchor, to restore this treasure of sacred music to it's rightful place.
J.S. Bach composed his St John Passion during his first winter in Leipzig, in advance of the Good Friday Vespers service of 1724. It is written for an intimate ensemble (much more modest than the scoring of his later St Matthew Passion) and was originally to be performed in the Thomaskirche, being moved to the Nikolaikirche at short notice. The music is a vivid representation of Christ's Passion as told in St John's Gospel, constructed of recitatives and choruses, with commentary in reflective chorales, ariosos and arias. The music is, by nature of the story, inherently dramatic, and tells the story of Jesus' death through the words of the Evangelist (tenor), Christ (bass) and a number of smaller roles including Pilate and Peter. Few who attended the service in the Nikolaikirche can have experienced, outside of the opera house, a work on the scale of the St John Passion, one that included such a large proportion of recitative. Today it, together with the St Matthew Passion, is regarded as a masterpiece of devout Lutheran church music, but in it's day it must have sounded radical. That being said, the chorales (or "hymns") within the work were designed to involve everyone in the performance, and these would have been familiar to the congregation (Melchior Vulpius's melody, for instance) - whether or not they ended up singing them. Some of the most affective moments of the work occur in these chorales as well as in the arias, which are remarkable for their range of expression as well as their instrumentation. Take, for instance, the poignant use of the bass viol in the accompaniment of Jesus' last words on the cross in the expressive aria 'Es ist vollbracht'. A masterpiece of expression and theatricality such as the St John Passion requires a masterful interpretation; in this recording, under the baton of Ludwig Güttler - who shot to fame as a Baroque trumpeter - the Hallenser Madrigalisten and Virtuosi Saxoniae rise to the challenge, giving a "technically accomplished and expressive" performance (Gramophone). They are joined by acclaimed tenor Christoph Genz in the role of the Evangelist and Egbert Junghanns as Jesus. Bach's Johannes Passion may be on a smaller scale than the Matthäus Passion, it is by no means less monumental or dramatic. This reissue of a Berlin Classics recording achieves with it's relatively small ensemble and choir an intimate yet powerful performance in which the drama of Christ's suffering is presented in deeply moving arias and chorales. Played on modern instruments the Virtuosi Saxoniae under Ludwig Güttler adhere to the principles of Historically Informed Performance Practice. The soloists include Christoph Genz, Christiane Oelze and Egbert Junghanns.
In contrast to the St. Matthew Passion, Bach repeatedly changed and supplemented parts of the St. John Passion, but apparently never found a final version. The earlier parts in particular have their charm: less sublime in tone, but more spontaneous, angular and intimate. "In its more intimate tone, the second version of the St. John Passion of 1725 seemed to us to be ideal for a recording which, without a conductor, is controlled entirely from the inner life of the musical lines, from listening to one another, in the giving and taking of spontaneous ideas". So much for the Ensemble Wunderkammer, which certainly lives up to its name and even with Bach still finds something unheard-of.
Gramophone states, "A unique statement, one that can't fail to make an impression. Recorded in the sumptuous acoustic of the Jesuitenkirche in Vienna, there's a detectable flavor of southern European oratorio, ebulliently theatrical, immediate and free-breathing (...). This is the most culturally alert reading in years and a truly original and illuminating experience." This recording won a Grammy Award of Best Choral Performance and a Diapason d'or de l'annee in 2001, and it's one of the 100 Greatest Recordings from Gramophone: an absolute landmark of Bach's masterpiece, the Saint Matthew Passion.
Bach: St. John Passion / Otto, Bachorchester Mainz
Naxos
CD
$29.99Feb 09, 2018
Johann Sebastian Bach’s St. John Passion is, along with the St. Matthew Passion, without doubt one of the most important works he ever composed. It established a new tradition for Good Friday vespers in Leipzig, and with sublime skill Bach managed to retain a spirit of church worship while creating an almost operatic narrative that movingly depicts Christ’s trial, death, and ultimate apotheosis. Bach’s numerous revisions always demand a certain amount of scholarly decision-making, and this recording of the St. John Passion uses the final 1749 version that not only draws on and reinforces the best of Bach’s original concept, but incorporates the additional movements of the 1725 version.
Christoph Demantius has largely been forgotten, likely because so little is known about his life. Born in late 1567 in Reichenberg, Bohemia, he studied in Wittenberg and served as cantor in Zittau before taking the same position at Freiberg Cathedral in 1604, where he remained until his death. Beyond these sparse details, his biography offers little more. His body of work, however, is anything but modest. Among his compositions, the Johannes-Passion of 1631 stands as a monumental achievement - a pinnacle of early Baroque Passion settings. In this work, a six-voice ensemble narrates the Passion story "collectively", employing intricate vocal counterpoint and an unparalleled expressive intensity. Ensemble director Alexander Schneider has included music by Andreas Hammerschmidt, Heinrich Schutz, Johann Hermann Schein, and other contemporaries to enrich the program. The result offers a vivid reconstruction of how a Good Friday service in central Germany might have sounded - assuming, of course, that an ensemble as skilled as Polyharmonique was performing.
"A concert performance starring four of the greatest singers of the era (Wunderlich, Ludwig, Lipp and Berry).
In this 1962 live performance, conductor Karl Böhm leading the Vienna Symphony and the Vienna Boys Choir.
This is the only complete recording of Bach's St. Matthew Passion with tenor Fritz Wunderlich in the role of the Evangelist.
Newly remastered."
Bach revised his St. John Passion time and again - indeed making it one of his most enigmatic and fascinating compositions. On the 300th anniversary of it's world premiere, MDG is reissuing the highly acclaimed recording for the first time in full three-dimensional sound on Super Audio CD for the PREZIOSA series.
The music of J.S. Bach's "St. John Passion", which the composer wrote for Holy Week in 1724, immediately after his appointment as cantor of St. Thomas's Church in Leipzig, still retains all its freshness and vitality nearly 300 years later, and is a true Baroque delight. The two main choruses "Herr, unser Herrscher" and "Ruht wohl, ihr heiligen Gebeine" form the beginning and culmination of a large-scale orchestral and vocal structure in which Bach reveals his absolute mastery of polyphony. Inwardly reflective chorales are as much interwoven into the events of the Passion as the haunting arias which comment on the biblical texts of the Gospel of St. John. Throughout this solemn Passion oratorio, there is a constant emphasis on Baroque musical magnificence. What makes this live recording of the concert version in March, 2015 so special? The fresh voices of the young and excellent vocal soloists, the regularly praised "astonishing three-dimensionality" and "crystalline clarity" of the Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks under the direction of Peter Dijkstra and, of course, the renowned period instrument ensemble Concerto Köln.
Hermann Max and the Rheinische Kantorei set out on new paths toward the interpretation of Bach’s motet cosmos. The present CD also includes the Motets BWV Anh. 159 because Bach scholarship has come to regard these works, long ascribed to Johann Christian Bach, as compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach as they clearly bear his musical signature.
With this recording, the Gaechinger Cantorey turns to Johann Sebastian Bach's motets, works widely regarded as a pinnacle of sacred vocal music. Emerging from an intensively prepared series of concerts and recorded at the TauberPhilharmonie Weikersheim, the album combines tonal transparency, expressive power, and vibrant historically informed performance practice at the highest level. Bach's motets rank among the most impressive works in the choral repertoire. Between intimate devotion and the splendor of double-choir writing unfolds a musical cosmos filled with contrapuntal mastery, emotional intensity, and eight-part virtuosity. Finely balanced instrumental colours complement the choral sound, lending the works remarkable transparency and flexibility. For many years, the Gaechinger Cantorey has played a defining role in the performance of Bach's music with a sound that is at once precise, agile, and immediate. Under the direction of Hans-Christoph Rademann, the ensemble's interpretations understand historically informed performance practice as a means of rediscovering the emotional power and complexity of this music. The ensemble's distinctive artistic profile is especially evident in the motets: transparent in sound, closely attuned to the text, and driven by great musical energy. With this release, Accentus Music continues it's long-standing collaboration with the Gaechinger Cantorey, which has already resulted in several highly acclaimed Bach recordings.
Johann Sebastian Bach composed his most renowned organ works — the Toccatas, the Fantasia in G minor and the Passacaglia in C minor — in Weimar, in the stylus fantasticus so beloved of his Northern German masters Buxtehude and Reinken. Bach here follows in his predecessors’ footsteps in all of these large-scale works: the freely inventive writing in the preludes is linked to the rigour of the fugal construction and so brings them to a majestic conclusion. This recording includes all of these magnificent masterpieces. Bernard Foccroulle was born in Liège (Belgium) in 1953. He began his international career as an organist in the mid-70s, playing a wide range of repertoire from Renaissance to Contemporary Music. His discography as a soloist includes more than forty CDs. He has won awards including the Diapason d’Or for his recording of Dietrich Buxtehude’s complete organ works for the Ricercar label, as well as for the complete organ works of Johann Sebastian Bach, which he recorded on beautifully preserved historic instruments.
Wer Ist Der, So Von Edom Kommt - Passions-Pasticcio / Concerto Vocale, Sachsisches Barockorchester Leipzig
CPO
CD
$36.99Jun 07, 2019
This month we are happy to present to you a great Passion oratorio that Johann Sebastian Bach in all likelihood pieced together for his last Passion service. He took a work by Carl Heinrich Graun, a composer whom he admired, and expanded it to produce a magnificent two-part Passion. To it he added compositions of his own authorship and others by his friend Georg Philipp Telemann. The result was a pasticcio, a new work consisting of set pieces. This practice was very common during Bach’s times. Both composers on whose works Bach drew were contemporary stars who did not at all object to this practice, especially since they occasionally operated in precisely the same way. The composer Georg Philipp Telemann saw no reason to complain about the reuse of his works. Although we do have quite a bit of background information about the Passion, the riddle surrounding it is only beginning to be solved. Accordingly, Bach scholarship can only hope that additional sources will be found and prove Johann Sebastian Bach’s authorship once and for all. The work perhaps even offers evidence pointing to one of his lost Passions, and it might even be his last Passion oratorio – which, as the current state of research knowledge sees things – can only have been written during the years following 1733.
Johann Sebastian Bach and the Akademie f�r Alte Musik Berlin go back a long way together. This recording, made with the welcome participation of Isabelle Faust and Antoine Tamestit, follows the complete violin concertos (2019), which left a lasting impression. Ever since a memorable first recording in the late 1990s, the Berlin musicians have returned regularly to the inexhaustible source of the Brandenburgs. They have achieved a sovereign mastery of what is not a single work, but six. In their hands, they become successive episodes of a piece of musical theater in love with dance, transparent sound and freedom.
Johann Sebastian Bach composed his most renowned organ works — the Toccatas, the Fantasia in G minor and the Passacaglia in C minor — in Weimar, in the stylus fantasticus so beloved of his Northern German masters Buxtehude and Reinken. Bach here follows in his predecessors’ footsteps in all of these large-scale works: the freely inventive writing in the preludes is linked to the rigor of the fugal construction and so brings them to a majestic conclusion.
