Bach, J S: Christmas Oratorio, BWV248 (Weihnachts-Oratorium)

After the success of his introduction to the St. Matthew Passion, author Wieland Schmid now takes us on a journey through the Christmas Oratorio with thrilling insights into Bach's creative process and background information on the composition. Outstanding narrators and the complete recording of the 2010 performance of the Christmas Oratorio with the Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks and the Akademie für alte Musik Berlin under the direction of Peter Dijkstra make this 4-CD set the ideal Christmas gift.

Three of The Sixteen’s celebrated Bach recordings in one stylish boxed set.

WEIHNACHTS ORATORIUM (COR16017)

The Christmas Oratorio is one of Bach's greatest masterpieces and this recording is one of The Sixteen's finest. Mark Padmore is one of today’s greatest ‘Evangelist’s’, and this recording shows him at his very best.

CANTATAS 34, 50, 147 (COR16039)

During his years as Leipzig’s Director Musices, Bach supplied at least three complete annual cycles of Cantatas for the church year. The rich variety of his writing for solo voices and orchestra along with thrilling choral textures is well represented in the three cantatas on this disc.

MASS IN B MINOR (COR16044)

Bach’s Mass in B minor displays all the ingredients that contribute to his supreme ranking amongst his peers of any age, and also demonstrates the breadth of compositional skills amassed during his lifetime. It demands choral singing of blistering athleticism but also sensitive, responsive and, at times, majestic orchestral playing coupled with virtuosic obligato.

This 7-CD budget price box includes the complete Christmas Oratorio, the complete Messiah and the complete Nutcracker ballet in top-notch performances that have been huge sellers over the years. Plus single discs of Christmas songs and carols from Germany and England to round off the package.

To celebrate the eminent conductor’s 80th birthday, Sony Music presents this collection of Nikolaus Harnoncourt’s recordings of great oratorios and sacred works. Presented in a sturdy and attractive outer box, and containing all of the original liner notes and information for each album, this 9 CD box set includes the following albums, all recorded between 2003 and 2007 with Arnold Schoenberg Chor and Concentus Musicus Wien.

Comprehensive booklet essay

Pioneering recordings from the 1960s and early 70s in first-rate stereo sound

In the late 1960 and early 70s Karl Münchinger and his Stuttgart forces were mainstay of the record catalogue when it came to Barock repertoire. Their recording of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons was a bestseller in its day, and had an very long life in the record catalogues. Münchinger and the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, whilst not period instrument musicians, were pioneers in what was then thought of as more authentic performance practice. These are clean performances with small-scale forces used with great precision, with all the 19th century excesses that had been necessary at one time to re-introduce these masterworks to the repertoire stripped away to reveal to many for the first time the true sound of the music. These recordings were the audio equivalent of seeing a restored painting by a great master for the first time.

Münchinger was astute in his choice of soloists, and the cast list for these recordings reads like a role call of the great names of the period. These are recordings that are both important historical documents, and that can hold their own alongside today’s period practice interpretations.

‘I enjoyed every moment of the fine performance, and the excellent recording, and found it alive from start to finish’ (Christmas Oratorio) Gramophone, December 1967

‘Many will be glad to hear Peter Pears’s superb performance of the Evangelist’ Gramophone, March 1965

The German singer Fritz Wunderlich has gone down in history as one of the most popular of all lyric tenors. The music presented in this 10-CD set features Wunderlich in recordings that come from the late 1950s, several of which have been gathered together here for the first time. They feature him as soloist in performances in Haydn’s “The Seasons” and “Mass in Time of War”, Bach’s “B Minor Mass”, “Easter Oratorio”, and “Christmas Oratorio”, and Handel’s “Messiah”.

Although revered as an operatic tenor in the grand tradition, it was the sacred music of the pre-classical masters that shaped Fritz Wunderlich’s vocal and artistic development early in his career, and the repertoire of that period remained important to him throughout his career. Thanks to South German Radio, Stuttgart (today merged with Radio Baden-Baden to become the SWR) we have a considerable number of recordings of such works that were made between the years 1955-60. Some of the best of these are gathered together here for the first time in this 10-CD box set to form a major part of the legacy of this great singer.