Bach, C.P.E.: Hamburger Quartalsmusiken (2 CD)

Himlische Cantorey, Les Amis de Philippe, Remy, Ludger

CPO 777 594-2

C. P. E. Bach held the most important and influential post in Hamburg’s church music, comparable to his father’s post at St. Thomas’s Church in Leipzig, and was responsible for the music performed on Sundays in Hamburg’s five principal churches. The Quartalsmusiken (Quarterly Compositions) occupied an outstanding place among the figural compositions performed at the five principal churches during the course of the church year. Unlike customary cantatas, each of which was performed in one church on one Sunday, the Quartalsmusiken were heard in all five churches, in accordance with a set rotation schedule corresponding to the age of the churches. All four of the Quartalsmusiken for Easter, Pentecost, Michaelmas, and Christmas released here were instrumented with three trumpets and timpani in keeping with these festive occasions. And all of them are pasticci (combining compositions by others, compositions by Bach, and his reworkings of his own compositions) and thus reveal quite a bit about Bach’s understanding of the musical work of art as well as about the variety and quality of the sacred music presented to the Hamburg church public during his tenure there between 1768 and 1788.

CD

26.08.2010

761203759422