Bach, J S: Komm süsser Tod, BWV478

Considered the first really modern violist, legendary Scottish musician William Primrose first came to prominence with the violin in the 1920s, turning to the viola on the recommendation of his greatest mentor, Eugène Ysaÿe. This programme includes four Paganini Caprices, which did more than any other of Primrose’s recordings to spread his fame among his peers, as well as two major works written especially for him: Arthur Benjamin’s Sonata, and Roy Harris’s Soliloquy and Dance. Primrose performs here with numerous noted accompanists, and alongside Jascha Heifetz in Halvorsen’s Passacaglia. This is the second of two volumes, the first of which is on 8111382.

The recorded legacy of William Primrose is well known, but newly re-mastered editions from our Historical catalogue always generate interest. The sonic results with this recital by ‘absolute stars’ (MusicWeb International on 8120607) producer David Lennick and restorer Graham Newton makes this the new standard bearer for these legendary recordings. This release joins volume one on 8111382 to make an eminently collectable pair.

German baroque masterworks for countertenor and strings Buxtehude’s fame rests principally on his keyboard music but this disc explores his outstanding vocal works, set in the context of J.S. and J.C. Bach. Each of these composers worked in important centres of Lutheran music in seventeenth and eighteenth-century Germany. Seventeenth-century German composers quickly adopted the new vocal styles that burst onto the scene in Italy at the beginning of the century: monody, in which a single voice declaims a text with special attention to the emotion and meaning of the words, and in the concerto style, consisting of opposing bodies of sound.

This celebratory recital includes favourites such as Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor BWV 565 and Mendelssohn’s War March of the Priests as well as works by Dupont, Cocker and Rheinberger. “A prodigious performance…Superb technique….This really was a recital to savour.” The Organ

The selection of songs and arias on this double SACD set reflect on the fundamental question of life and death and cover a period of almost two centuries, the composers featured ranging from Bach through to Tchaikovsky. They are performed by one of the great lyric tenors of our age Christophe Prégardien, accompanied by the pianist Michael Gees. The common theme in the music of this recording is the most fundamental of all, existence itself, life and death. The composers represented are Bach, Mahler, Schubert, Schumann, Mozart, Brahms, Loewe, Wolf, Mendelssohn, and Tchaikovsky. The songs and arias performed here range over almost two centuries with eleven compositions and many musical forms, the simple song with piano accompaniment, the narrative, expansive ballad, the great opera aria and more.

Christoph Prégardien is widely regarded as among the foremost lyric tenors of our time and frequently collaborates with conductors such as Ricardo Chailly, John Elliot Gardiner, Nicolaus Harnoncourt, and Phillipe Herreweghe. He is represented on disc with more than a hundred and twenty titles, including most of his current repertoire. His recordings of German Romantic Lied repertory, particularly his recent releases on Challenge Classics of Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin, (CC72292), and Schwanengesang, (CC72302), have been highly acclaimed by the public and press and have received many major international awards.