Bach, J S: Cantata BWV178 'Wo Gott der Herr nicht bei uns halt'

John Eliot Gardiner’s choral Pilgrimage exploring the magnificence and grandeur of all of Bach’s cantatas continues with this 2CD release, combining cantatas for the eighth and tenth Sunday after Trinity, recorded live in August 2000.

BWV 178 Wo Gott der Herr nicht bei uns hält, premiered in Leipzig on 20th July 1724 derives from the Gospel reading (Matthew 7:15-23) and warns against hypocrites and false prophets. With its opening powerful chorus, the mood is set for this chilling cantata fraught with anger and a grim mood of foreboding.

In contrast, hope and belief permeate BWV 136 Erforsche mich, Gott, und erfahre mein Herz and BWV 45 Es ist dir gesagt, Mensch, was gut ist. The penitential tone of BWV 136 is stressed through the beautifully crafted pleas of ‘Prüfe mich’ (‘Try me’) which appear in the extensive opening choral fugue. BWV 45 is Bach’s last surviving cantata for this Sunday and is replete with emotional turmoil.

In BWV 46 Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgendein Schmerz sei, Bach unsurprisingly, excels producing a richly thematic cantata depicting clearly the story’s vivid, unsettling patterns of destruction and restoration, of God’s anger and Christ’s mercy.

The antithesis between God’s anger and mercy resurfaces in Bach’s two later cantatas for this Sunday; BWV 101 Nimm von uns Herr, du treuer Gott and BWV 102 Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben!

With their customary brilliance and expert musicianship, the Monteverdi Choir and the English Baroque Soloists triumph, making this the ideal next instalment in what many have already come to regard as the first choice of recorded Bach Cantata series.

Recording locations: Christkirche, Rendsburg & Braunschweig Cathedral

This collection is Sigiswald Kuijken’s personal selection of recordings by La Petite Bande and also celebrates their 40th anniversary. It includes excerpts from opera, baroque compositions and the works of Bach.

This 9-CD boxed set of first releases from the RIAS archives presents the first ever attempt at a recording of the complete Bach cantatas.

For everyone who is interested in the history of Bach interpretation and in the development of Germany’s post-1945 cultural rebuilding, these recordings represent a significant enrichment. From 1946, Karl Ristenpart established choral and orchestral ensembles at the RIAS Berlin, directing the RIAS Kammerchor and the RIAS Kammerorchester. With these ensembles, and emerging young singers (including Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Helmut Krebs and Agnes Giebel), Karl Ristenpart and Elsa Schiller, then head of music at the RIAS, embarked in 1947 upon a recording series of the complete Bach cantatas. However, it proved impossible to realise the project in its entirety. The 29 cantatas which survive in the RIAS archives document a Bach ideal which is pioneering even by today’s standards: thanks to small-scale forces the musical structures are distinct and transparent, and the singers link their articulation to that of the instrumentalists.This interpretation, which is free of any monumentalism, paved the way, aesthetically, for historically informed performance practice.

Upon popular demand available again: Bach’s complete Sacred Cantatas, newly compiled, on 50 CDs, an unbelievable bargain.

These recordings, produced for the Bach‐year 2000, feature a superb boys choir, the Holland Boys Choir, a tradition going back to the time of the composer. The Netherlands Bach Collegium consists of Dutch early music specialists playing period instruments. Conductor Pieter Jan Leusink puts his entire soul in these recordings of what one might call “the greatest and most humanly moving corpus of sacred music ever written”.

Reviewers around the world praised the set for its “characteristic performances, marked by a great sense of authencity, especially from the use of boy sopranos”. It sounds very much like it might have sounded in Bach’s time (Gramophone).

Written to exalt the glory of God and to facilitate Lutheran worship, Johann Sebastian Bach’s sacred cantatas stand among the highest achievements of Western musical art. This acclaimed recording sees the works performed in their entirety by a stellar line‐up of musicians that includes the renowned Holland Boys’ Choir and period instrument ensemble Netherlands Bach Collegium. The cantatas are directed by Pieter van Leusink, one of Holland’s leading Bach experts. From the plaintive opening of Weinen, Kleinen, Sorgen, Sagen (‘Weeping, lamenting, worrying, fearing’) BWV12 to the triumphant D major chorus in Man singet mit Freuden vom Sieg BWV149, the works traverse a wide range of themes and moods, having been written for a variety of occasions throughout the liturgical year.

Between 1999 and 2006, the legendary baroque music specialist Ton Koopman brought together a stunning array of singers to record the complete cantatas of J S Bach alongside his own Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra and Choir. Released originally mostly in 3CD sets, this wonderful cycle is now being made available by Challenge Classics in its entirety. The 67 separate CDs have now been gathered together in a box with a booklet that includes a complete tracklisting and information about each recording.

Along the way these releases were acclaimed throughout the world, and received many major music prizes, including a BBC Music Magazine Award in 2006 for Volume 22 (CC72222). Featured soloists include most of the great modern day interpreters of the music of Bach’s time.