SACDs - Bach, J S

This landmark series is nearly at its end in this antepenultimate recording. The three cantatas on this recording come from the first half of the 1730s and clearly show Bach’s affinity for instrumental colour and expressive melodies rich in syncopation and suspensions.

All three works are choral cantatas based on well-known hymns and are therefore more choral in style.

Jonathan Freeman-Attwood’s ‘A Bach Notebook for Trumpet’ is a celebration of the music of the famous Johann Sebastian and ten other lesser-known Bachs, re-imagined for the combination of trumpet and piano.

Bach specialist Daniel-Ben Pienaar has arranged music from a great uncle, close cousins, distant cousins, and five sons, all related to the great J. S. Bach in a wholly unique recital programme.

Aesthetic passions drive the repertoire and performance choices as the duo explore vocabularies not usually associated with trumpet and piano chamber music: brushing up against ‘period’ gesture, ornamentation and articulation, whilst also co-referencing less fashionable inspirations from the past, including those judged ‘romantic’ in coloration, whether in the use of the pedal, rubati or articulation.

Jonathan is an established authority on Bach interpretation, particularly as it challenges and refocuses historical  perspectives on ‘performance practices’ and how recordings of the past can influence current priorities and tastes.

As a trumpet player and recording artist, Jonathan Freeman-Attwood has attracted plaudits from the press; his producing career has resulted in over 200 recordings and several awards including Diapasons d’Ors, eight Gramophone Awards and many nominations.

Jonathan broadcasts regularly for BBC Radio 3 and is in demand as an essayist for EMI, Warner, Deutsche Grammophon and other major record labels.

Daniel-Ben is active as a recitalist and chamber musician. He has received great acclaim for his interpretations of Bach’s keyboard music: ‘Pienaar produces a breathless, highly energised reading’ Gramophone on his Goldberg Variations.

This is the premiere recording J.S. Bach’s John Passion heard for the first time within its original liturgical context.

This recording marks the return of Dunedin Consort’s star studded cast including, Nicholas Mulroy, Matthew Brook, Robert Davies, Joanne Lunn and Clare Wilkinson.

Director John Butt has given listeners an interpretation that will provide a refreshing outlook on this masterpiece and will show the John Passion in a completely new light.

The Consort recreate the context of a passion performance during Bach’s time at Leipzig; the University of Glasgow Chapel Choir (directed by James Grossmith) and a congregational choir of amateur singers perform motets and chorales from an original Leipzig hymn book and John Butt takes centre stage to perform organ preludes on the Collins organ at Greyfriar’s Kirk in Edinburgh, where the recording took place.

'No performance could better justify small-scale Bach than this convincing marriage of scholarship and inspiration.’ BBC Music Magazine (on J.S. Bach: Mass in B Minor)

‘The playing and the singing is outstanding, undoubtedly enhanced by John Butt's scholarly and revelatory handling of the score.’ The Observer (on J.S. Bach: Matthew Passion)

The Dunedin Consort has established a reputation as the finest single-part period performance choir currently performing, under the direction of prize-winning Bach specialist John Butt O.B.E.

The multi-award-winning Dunedin Consort has won praise for the natural style of its soloists and renown for the virtuosity of its singers.

Since receiving a Gramophone Award in 2007, Dunedin Consort has continued to receive accolades: Esther was voted one of the ‘Top 10 Classical Albums of 2012’ by The Times, 2011 saw them included in Gramophone’s ‘Twenty Greatest Choirs’ list and its recording of Bach’s Matthew Passion was named Building A Library: First Choice by BBC Radio 3 - CD Review.

In Volume 52 of his monumental sacred cantatas project, Masaaki Suzuki includes one of J.S. Bach’s best-loved cantatas of all, Wachet auf ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140.

The famous chorale is joined by a couple of the most beautiful love duets in the history of music, here sung by the soprano Hana Blažíková and bass Peter Kooij.

Der Herr ist mein getreuer Hirt (‘the Lord is my faithful shepherd’) follows. Psalm 23 provides the text for all five movements.

Wir danken dir, Gott, wir danken dir was composed for a church service celebrating the inauguration of a new city council – a ‘Ratswahl cantata’ – in which Bach shows off his capabilities as a composer. The first chorus is a reworking of material which Bach would return to in his Mass in B minor.

This startling recording project now nears its conclusion with three final volumes left to be released.