Customer Reviews

Knupfer: Sacred Music /King's Consort * King

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Before J.S Bach there WERE great composers in Leipzig! Knüpfer's cantatas and concertos are solemn and immensely dignified, yet never monotonous due to the artfully varied voice and instrument combinations. In its ability to elicit emotion this music is not a "primitive precursor" of Bach, but often powerfully sensitive to the varied texts, and when full of pomp takes no backseat. Counterpoint is not prominent, the music never sounds "busy." This disc begins with a blast of baroque brass as a mighty preface to the first piece, which is...a soprano concerto? This is just the first example of the startling shifts (or "inconsistencies") that animate Knüpfer's music and keep you alert and interested. Later, instead of the glory of heaven, the trumpets are used to express the anger of God. The choir passages are soprano heavy (doubled or tripled) and these are females, while the altos are sung by the famous countertenors Bowman or Blaze. Choirs are small, usually only one or two singers to a part.

Texts are given with English only translation. Dr. Wollny's fine notes are rather brief for what may be recording premieres. The ecclesiastical roles of the eight short pieces recorded here are not discussed, and there's little about what must have been the immensely difficult transcription of manuscripts to produce playable editions. Wollny does not point out whether or how Bach ever drew on Knüpfer's music. The picture of The King's Consort is too small to see the baroque instruments clearly.

This impressive disc is #2 in an extremely important CD series by the King's Consort, one misleadingly entitled "Bach's Contemporaries." This is the earliest of three discs (so far) which actually present three nearly forgotten composers who were lineal predecessors of J.S. Bach as cantor at the Thomaskirche, Leipzig (Schelle and Kuhnau are the other two). (18th century views of this church comprise the cover art.) So far none of these obscure (but truly excellent!) composers are properly "contemporaries" of Bach (Knüpfer died a decade before Bach was even born), and most of their music may have been tossed out by Bach or the Thomaskirche librarians (as was customary before Romantic historicism arose). Such nits aside, this series is off to a great start in rediscovering once prominent musicians who produced music that is also highly attractive to modern ears.

If you have already bought the King's Consort's Johann Schelle CD then this should be next on your list. If you haven't bought the Schelle disc, this is a good place to start. I guarantee you'll want the Schelle cantatas recording after you hear this!

The music ranges from brilliant Baroque works for strings, trumpets, drums, cornetts and trombones, to more introverted and heart felt works with voices, strings & basso continuo.
The singers are excellent and the instrumental ensemble is first rate.

Very little of Sebastian Knüpfer's music has been recorded. I think only Cantus Cölln has made any significant recordings of this composer's music before.

Congratulations to Mr Robert King and his team for this superb recording.