Bach, J S: Mass in B minor, BWV232
Susan Hamilton (soprano), Cecilia Osmond (soprano), Margot Oitzinger (alto), Thomas Hobbs (tenor) & Matthew Brook (bass)
Dunedin Consort & Players, John Butt (director)
Awards:
-
Gramophone Magazine, August 2010, Editor's Choice
Butt's players generate a lively sense of forward motion...No performance could better justify small-scale Bach than this convincing marriage of scholarship and inspiration.
Bach, J S: Mass in B minor, BWV232
Susan Hamilton (soprano), Cecilia Osmond (soprano), Margot Oitzinger (alto), Thomas Hobbs (tenor) & Matthew Brook (bass)
Dunedin Consort & Players, John Butt (director)
Purchase product
Awards:
-
Gramophone Magazine, August 2010, Editor's Choice
Butt's players generate a lively sense of forward motion...No performance could better justify small-scale Bach than this convincing marriage of scholarship and inspiration.
About
“The ensemble is nigh perfect… the freshness with which they sing radiates joy throughout the entire score." Classic FM Magazine
"The Dunedin Consort's exemplary singers produce virtuoso choruses that are theatrically charged, splendidly poised and exquisitely blended.” Gramophone
The Dunedin Consort’s recording of Bach’s Mass in B Minor revisits the spectacular individual virtuosity that made the Messiah recording so successful. This is the premiere recording of the work in the new Breitkopf edition, edited by Joshua Rifkin, a leading thinker in authentic period performance, who fully endorses John Butt’s interpretation.
Bach’s Mass capitalizes on the very essence of the group’s skills: skilled virtuosic choral performance coupled with outstanding, characterful solo singing.
Bach’s Mass in B Minor is undoubtedly his most spectacular choral work and the Dunedin Consort’s single-voice performance enables a level of clarity and expression that is not traditionally a feature of modern choral performance.
This recording features several soloists from the acclaimed recording of Bach’s Matthew Passion, which was named the BBC Music Magazine’s Benchmark.
Contents and tracklist
- The Dunedin Consort, John Butt, Susan Hamilton, Cecilia Osmond, Thomas Hobbs, Margot Oitzinger, Matthew Brook, Margot Oitzinger Thomas Hobbs
- Recorded: 13-17 September 2009
- Recording Venue: Greyfriars Kirk, Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Spotlight on this release
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Awards and reviews
-
Gramophone MagazineAugust 2010Editor's Choice
August 2010
Butt's players generate a lively sense of forward motion...No performance could better justify small-scale Bach than this convincing marriage of scholarship and inspiration.
26th May 2010
Butt’s direction is generally sound, sometimes inspired. The initial Kyrie deftly combines a measured, serious tread with vital buoyancy and momentum; the lively Cum Sancto Spiritu has terrific flair...The chief benefits of the one-to-a-part choir are agility and clarity, particularly welcome in the fiendishly complex fugues.
August 2010
...the Dunedin Consort and Players are never perfunctory or merely dogmatic...Butt's insightful direction and scholarship, integrated with the Dundin's extremely accomplished instrumental playing and consort singing, amount to an enthralling and revelatory collective interpretation
20th June 2010
Butt opts for 10 solo voices, his liner notes justifying when lines should be sung by two voices and when by just the one...His performance is powerful and beautifully shaped
22nd July 2010
It's a performance full of air and lightness; the instrumental textures have a springing, dancing vitality, the voices are perfectly focused, and agile...overall this is a fascinating and hugely rewarding account of one of the imperishable masterpieces of the western musical tradition.
13th June 2010
The Dunedin Consort's premiere recording of Joshua Rifkin's scholarly edition of Bach's B-minor Mass has many attractive features: the emphatic "k" that launches the first Kyrie (the orchestra sounding on the vowel), closely dovetailed counterpoint...and a calm but purposeful sense of narrative.
23rd May 2010
[The] constantly changing texture makes us listen afresh to the beauty of Bach's astonishing vocal writing. It's a joy to hear the principal singers...working together as a chorus, moving like a precision machine, each line clear and uncluttered under John Butt's meticulous direction. A definitive recording.
12th June 2010
Surely no other recording of Bach’s B Minor Mass bounces along with such joy as this...Lots of clarity, too, partly thanks to the slimmed-down forces, featuring only ten voices ...no clouds cover the instrumental finesse in an interpretation that eschews weighty grandeur for light and smiling exultation.
