Customer Reviews

Bach: Magnificat, BWV 243; Easter Oratorio, BWV 249; Lobet Gott, BWV 11; Christ lag, BWV 4; Nun is das Heil, BWV 50

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4 star:		(2)
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I've never been a fan of Bach's works being performed One-Voice-Per-Part, until I listened to this recording.

There is much to be praised about this recording. While I'd much prefer to hear the soprano and alto lines sung by trebles and boy altos or countertenors, the female singers here are superb. Emma Kirkby shines as usual. The Taverner Consort is very clean as well.

The Magnificat is very good here. This is no quick-paced interpretation with an obviously minimalistic sound (like McCreesh's). It even has the fervor of a larger ensemble, surprisingly. I never thought an athletic movement such as the "Fecit Potentiam" could be pulled off using One Voice Per Part, but Andrew Parrot does it very well.

BWV 4 is indeed taken surprisingly slowly, and I prefer the Konrad Junganel rendition on Harmonia Mundi much better. This Andrew Parrot rendition is well-done nonetheless, as I am a big fan of his alto-soprano duo. BWV 50 is also a rare surprise (It is, without a doubt, my favorite number on these discs). As a worthy finale to this two-disk set is "Preis Und Dank" from the Easter Oratorio. Highly reccomended.

At the moment, this is my favorite Bach recording. I am a big fan of the one-voice-per-part approach ("OVPP"), and I truly feel that, where its use is appropriate, a small consort of voices offers better results than a traditional chorus (current evidence suggests that OVPP was likely used at least in Bach's early cantatas and in Passions). If you listen to this recording with an open mind, you might be able to recognize the merits of this approach: clarity of lines, better balance between the vocalists and the instrumentalists, and a potential for a finer insight into the meaning of the text. Some tempo issues aside, this recording is nearly as good as they come (besides, tempi are, to some extent, a matter of personal preference). Andrew Parrott's direction is generally well judged, and the cast he assembled is superb. I particularly enjoyed the contributions of Charles Daniels (one of my favorite tenors) and Caroline Trevor. I have to admit to a bit of a bias in favor of male altos, but Caroline Trevor is so superb that few countertenors can compare. Her Saget, saget, mir geschwinde, for instance, is definitely the best I've heard. --gggimpy@yahoo.com

All my reservations I had against Parrott in Bach are completely gone with these discs.

I did like his Mass in B, but I found it at the same time a bit too fast paced and lightweight in the sound of both orchestra and singers and the recording itself sounds a bit thin too.
Then I got Parrott's St. John which I like very, very much and which is my favorite St. John along with Gardiner's and Herreweghe's 1st recording (haven't heard his 2nd yet).
The recording has much more substance and the orchestra has more weight.

Now, these performances of Magnificat, Ascension Oratorio and Easter Oratorio are truly wonderful.
The Magnificat is rather on the fast side, I prefer Herreweghe, but the equal attention Parrott gives to his orchestra and singers, just like Herreweghe, I like very much.
The sound is solid, warm and natural.
Parrott is more expressive than Herreweghe, thanks to his one voice per part reading I suppose, it sounds more enthusiastic and spontane.

The Easter Oratorio is more sensible paced and is very similar to Herreweghe's pacing, although "Sanfte soll mein Todeskummer" is taken too fast by Parrott, Herreweghe I like better and his orchestral accompaniment too, which is unearthy sounding in its polish and repeating figures.
Solists are great and I prefer Emily van Evera for Parrott over Herreweghe's Barbara Schlick.

I don't miss a bigger force (choir) at all, the Easter Oratorio as a whole I like better the way Parrott (and his 'one voice per part' method) performs it than Herreweghe - with the exception of "Sanfte soll..."

Simply wonderful.

Andrew Parrott conducts the Taverner Consort and Players is a very affordable set of discs that allow everyone to experience the 'non-choral' choral Bach. Instead of the usual chorus (even the pared down choruses of 16 - 30 members the way most 'authentic' performances use) the works are assigned to one person per part. The result is light, airy, transparent, and very lovely Bach.

Case in point: for the Magnificat 'for 5 voices, 5-part chorus, orchestra & continuo' in D major, Parrott conducts or rather inspires Emily van Evera, Evelyn Tubb, Taverner Consort and Players, Howard Crook, Caroline Trevor, Simon Grant in a new way to hear this gracious work. That Bach can be interpreted in so many ways gives credence to his importance in musical history. This performance, as pure and gracious as it is and a wonderfully fresh way to hear the work, is not the only 'authentic' way to hear Magnificat. In a stunning recent performance with members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic conducted by Bernard Labadie and his own La Chapelle de Quebec (30 members strong) and soloists Marie-Nicole Lemieux, Brett Polegato, James Taylor, and Mary Wilson the Magnificat offered was another 'option' used in Bach's time: four German Christmas carols were inserted between pertinent movements the way Bach made the work 'German' in his Leipzig Lutheran performances of his day. Another wholly satisfying and refreshing way to enjoy this great work.

Parrott does make his case for the single voice per part in the other works on this set with exquisite readings of the Ascension Oratorio, with Wilfried Jochens, Stephen Charlesworth, Evelyn Tubb, Emma Kirkby, and Margaret Cable, the 'Cantata No. 50 and Cantata No. 4 (Christ lag in Todes Banden) with Emily van Evera, Charles Daniels, David Thomas, and Caroline Trevor, and the 'Easter Oratorio' with Emily van Evera, Charles Daniels, Caroline Trevor, and Peter Kooy.

Every Bach lover should include this set in the library. It is yet another way to hear the Master's works in as pure a state as possible! Grady Harp, December 06

This is a very well planned pair of discs of Bach choral works. It also seems to me a very well performed set, as I shall try to explain. However the first thing that a review needs to make clear is that there is no `chorus' other than the solo singers themselves, not more than 5 in any one work. Anyone who cannot tolerate this style of performance presumably need read no further.

It is not, to be candid, my own favourite way of doing things. Nevertheless it has sound academic credentials, presented first by Professor Joshua Rifkin and put into practice in his own recordings. These have never convinced me to any great extent, but I have remained open-minded about the issue, and now I'm glad I have, because Parrott and his collaborators here are much more persuasive. The instrumentalists are a `period' ensemble, and although I'm only aware of knowing two of the soloists the two are Margaret Cable and the great Emma Kirkby, and they are in good company here. The main difference that I find from Rifkin is that Parrott's beat is more flexible and expressive and his tempi are livelier. You might find the Magnificat too fast, and there is certainly an impression that several numbers, (all of which are short in this work), end rather abruptly. My own view is that the Magnificat is not Bach's best composition, if I dare say so. No interpretation so far has ever persuaded me to the contrary, but this one has come nearest to it, and that despite being a one-voice-per-part rendering. I would even have to agree with the claim made in the sketchy liner note that this style helps with clarity and distinctness in Omnes generationes, which can easily turn into a pea-soup of constant word-repetition and dense imitative counterpoint. I am sure that Bach intended the kind of illustrative effect that so impressed the reverential Donald Francis Tovey, but illustrative effects are not Bach's thing at all in my opinion. If you want to hear how large-scale word-repetition can be astoundingly Handeled within the baroque style try To Thee Cherubim in the Dettingen Te Deum.

The rest of the set consists of one cantata, one fragment of a lost cantata, and the `oratorios' for Easter and the feast of Ascension. The two `oratorios' are just modified cantatas, rather longer than the average and using a larger orchestra than usual. The Ascension effort (Lobet Gott) has suggestions of the two Passions in the recitatives for an Evangelist tenor, very idiomatically done by Wilfried Jochens. It was the opening chorus of this piece that convinced me of the one-voice-per-part approach. The chorus is a majestic effort, and it would be ruined by a scrawny tone. Five voices, if they are the right voices, will do the thing full justice. It is not the same voices in the other choruses, but it is the same effect. They are enough because they are good enough.

The Easter oratorio starts with two sizeable instrumental movements, given with distinction by Taverner Players. Most listeners will, I expect, be particularly struck by a very long soprano aria Seele, deine Spezereien, 10 whole minutes of it. The singer is Emily van Evera, who in fact handles most of the soprano solo work throughout. She is not as individual in tone as Dame Emma is, but she is an assured professional, as indeed are they all. There is also one cantata from the standard canon, the early and solemn Christus lag in Todes Banden. This makes an impressive start to the second disc, with a very effective account of the opening sinfonia in particular, and this performance provides a very interesting foil to the Gardiner account in his great Pilgrimage series. Gardiner is no enthusiast for the one-v-p-p school, and although I am basically on his side I hope he will not view my indecision too unfavourably.

The other item is a fragment, from Bach's Leipzig period like most of his cantatas and similar. It is a majestic three-and-a-half-minute chorus celebrating some triumph of good over evil. This is much the tone of the other items except for Christus lag, and I found that the generally optimistic note, offset by just one of the works, made the set seem well planned and the items well chosen. Whether they have completely won me over I don't know, and it certainly does not amount to an outright conversion, but they have taken me a long way with them. The recordings are good too (1989 and 1993), and although the liner note is vestigial it is still informative up to a point, and I have certainly seen a lot worse. The value offered is excellent, but of course it all starts from a base of some of the most sublime music in the world. Play and sing it with conviction sympathy and understanding and you can suit yourself from there on regarding the precise details of voices per part.

I love Bach's orchestral compositions and wanted to add some of his choral work to my collection. It's pretty good, too.

The first half of the first CD, the Magnificat, is outstanding and worth the price of the collection. Performances are quite good. However, the rest of the album isn't very good. The main problem is the writing by Bach, not the performance.