Graupner / Brown / Poplutz - Epiphany Cantatas - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Spectacular Baroque Opera with the BEMF. The prizewinning Boston Early Music Festival, joined by the choicest soloists, once again presents a spectacular Baroque opera discovery with Christoph Graupner's Antiochus and Stratonica. Graupner composed the musical play L'Amore Ammalato, Die kranckende Liebe, oder Antiochus und Stratonica during his time as the harpsichordist at the Gänsemarkt Opera in Hamburg. The core subject of the opera is the love of the Seleucid prince Antiochus for his stepmother Stratonica. This match brings with it highly dramatic moments as well as deeply sad ones inasmuch as Antiochus is supposed to have an incurable illness - but then at the end three old and new romantic couples appear on the stage and everything comes to a happy ending. Graupner's opulent orchestral ensemble, which prescribes three recorders and four oboes in addition to strings and a large continuo apparatus, offers the most highly nuanced tonal manifoldness - and during his later decades as the Darmstadt court chapel master the composer would continue to expand this element.

The opus most decisive for Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber's fame and widely used into the 18th century are the eight sonatas for violin and basso continuo published in 1681. Since the Sonatae unarum fidium by the Viennese violin virtuoso Johann Heinrich Schmelzer, published in 1664, no violin solos of comparable extraordinary compositional and technical ambition had appeared. With his sonatas of 1681, Biber succeeded in setting new standards and achieving a previously unattained synthesis of equally high virtuoso demands, artistic content and compositional technical level. Our exceptional violinist Plamena Nikitassova uses a historical playing technique for her interpretation - a technique that is hardly cultivated any more even among baroque violinists. The instrument is not placed on the shoulder and, if necessary, held with the chin, but is placed against the left breast. This also requires a different posture of the bow the right arm is not raised very high, the thumb is placed on the hair and contributes to the tension. The sound is noticeably removed from the late Baroque aesthetic, but develops it's own charm, especially in the execution of the rapid passagework. Album Tracks 1. Sonata I~[Ohne Bezeichnung] 2. Sonata I~Adagio 3. Sonata I~[Ohne Bezeichnung]. Adagio 4. Sonata I~Presto 5. Sonata I~Variatio. Presto 6. Sonata I~Finale 7. Sonata I~Presto 8. Sonata II~[Ohne Bezeichnung] 9. Sonata II~Aria. Variatio 10. Sonata II~Adagio 11. Sonata II~[Ohne Bezeichnung] 12. Sonata II~Finale 13. Sonata III~Adagio. Presto. Adagio. Presto 14. Sonata III~Adagio 15. Sonata III~Aria. Variatio 16. Sonata III~Forte Presto. Adagio. Forte Allegro. [ohne Bezeichnung]. Adagio 17. Sonata III~Variatio. Adagio 18. Sonata III~[ohne Bezeichnung] 19. Sonata IV~[ohne Bezeichnung] 20. Sonata IV~Presto 21. Sonata IV~Gigue. Double. Double 2 piu Presto

On it's brand-new second Graupner album the Kirchheimer BachConsort performs solo and dialogue cantatas by this composer who always met the highest standards of his times. Graupner sought opportunities for original expression and was open to the latest developments and to unfamiliar instruments. With his inexhaustible imagination he was able to create cantatas rich in contrasts and with variability, originality, diversified instrumentation, special tone color opulence, intelligent voice leading, and drama schooled on the opera as their hallmarks. The interplay of the vocal and instrumental parts is also a special feature of his music. In the introduction to his Hymnbook published in 1728 Graupner emphasized what in his view was the most important task facing a composer InchEdifying words in a song make an even deeper impression on human hearts when the meaning and message of the text, as it were, are vividly presented through the music with carefully considered and select expressions. And this is the noblest thing in every composition in which specific texts and words are prescribed.Inch In his cantatas Graupner succeeded in employing purposeful musical affections to illustrate and represent the texts. For him there was no difference between secular and sacred music; he knew how to engage in skillful negotiations between these two genres. Album Tracks 1. Jesus ist und bleibt mein Leben GWV 1107/12~Nr. 1 Arioso Jesus ist und bleibt mein Leben 2. Jesus ist und bleibt mein Leben GWV 1107/12~Nr. 2 Recitativo secco So liebstu mich von ganzen Herzen 3. Jesus ist und bleibt mein Leben GWV 1107/12~Nr. 1 Arioso da capo 4. Jesus ist und bleibt mein Leben GWV 1107/12~Nr. 3 Recitativo secco Wie aber, wenn dich Kreuz und Leiden drückte 5. Jesus ist und bleibt mein Leben GWV 1107/12~Nr. 1 Arioso da capo 6. Jesus ist und bleibt mein Leben GWV 1107/12~Nr. 4 Reci