Musen

The fourth volume of our complete recording of Bach's cantatas completes the series of secular cantatas from the composer's years in Leipzig. Seven works are involved here, spanning a period from 1725 to1742, the year of Bach's final secular cantata, BWV 212. Of Bach's occasional compositions, some fifty secular pieces have survived, yet these represent no more than a fraction of what must once have existed. Bach's secular cantatas cover a period of almost exactly three decades.

Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the Brandenburg Concertos; instrumental compositions such as the Cello Suites; keyboard works such as the Goldberg Variations and The Well-Tempered Clavier; organ works such as the Schubler Chorales and the Toccata and Fugue in D minor; and vocal music such as the St Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. Since the 19th-century Bach revival he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music.

The three compositions brought together on this CD demonstrates how Telemann could be relied on to compose not only church music for ordinary religious services, but also compose works for extraordinary sacred events and special occasions. Telemann’s dedicatory piece for the church in the St. Hiob-Hospital in Hamburg "Kommt, lasset uns anbeten" is scored for an ensemble that is noticeably smaller than those of his other compositions for the dedication of churches. This does not reflect lesser status, but owes to the small church space. As a result, the composition convinces the listener with its intimacy, while the ensemble limited to a few musicians contributes significantly to the exquisite impression made by this lovingly designed music displaying many beautiful details, above all in the melodic and harmonic spheres. By contrast, the stylistic modernity and wealth of imagination in Telemann’s sung poem 'Geschlagene Pauken, auf!' – which has been recorded here for the first time – makes us sit up and take notice.