Bach & Co

The dynamic ensemble Brecon Baroque was founded in 2007 by violinist and director Rachel Podger as resident ensemble at her annual Brecon Baroque Festival.The international line-up consists of some of the leading lights in the period-instrument world,such as cellist Alison McGillivray,flautist Katy Bircher,oboist Alexandra Bellamy and violist Jane Rogers,as well as some of Rachel's former students who now occupy leading positions in many of Europe's finest ensembles:violinists Bojan Cicic and Johannes Pramsohler.

For those who already appreciate Rachel Podger's unique brand of magic I'll just say that this return to recorded Bach is lovely and all that one could hope for. All that one looks for is here, and there is more. For those who are not familiar with Rachel Podger, she is a unique voice among violinists. She has absorbed the principles of late Baroque performance practice and made them a part of herself, so that the articulation and inflection of that rhetorical approach to music flows from her as a natural idiom of expression.

“Jan Willem de Vriend oversees a joyful account of Bach's festive music with light-footed responses to dance rhythms. I can whole heartedly commend this issue for its expressive warmth, its disciplined choral singing and its natural declamation.”