JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH (1685-1750)
A Concert of Music by Bach
GLORIOUS BACH



Christine Schafer, soprano
Anna Korondi, soprano
Bernarda Fink, alto
Ian Bostridge, tenor
Christopher Maltman, baritone


Arnold Schoenberg Choir, Erwin Ortner
Concentus Musicus Vienna, Nikolaus Harnoncourt

Kloster Melk Benedictine Monastery, Austria


01. Cantata BWV 61 "Come Redeemer of the Gentiles" (16m 10s),
02. Cantata BWV 147 "Heart and Mouth and Deed and Life" (32m 25s)
03. Magnificat in D major BWV 243 (28m 48s)


This DVD presents a concert recorded in the Kloster Melk Benedictine Monastery in Austria of two of Bach's finest cantatas and his Magnificat. All three of these feature choral movements, and the Arnold Schoenberg choir participates greatly, providing a beautiful sound and an excellent performance.

Glorious Bach is a simple, straightforward record of a concert at the Benedictine Abbey of Melk of three Bach works for the season of Advent. All of them are, in different ways, meditations on the imminent arrival of Christ, both as child and as Messiah, and on the role of Mary as his mother. Nikolaus Harnoncourt has this music in his bones and so do his impressive team of soloists and the Arnold Schoenberg Choir; the Concentus Musicus of Vienna by now play original-style instruments so smoothly that one has almost to remind oneself of how shocking the authenticity movement sounded a few short years ago. Ian Bostridge is especially fine in the extended tenor part of the less well-known piece Nun Komm, der Heiden Heiland; Bostridge combines an absolute vocal purity with a fierce intelligence in his approach to the words--the advantage of the DVD is that it lets us see him and his fellow soloists thinking as well as singing. Christine Schafer is particularly fine in the Magnificat in D, in which Harnoncourt lets his orchestra rip, reminding us why this is such a popular festival piece.