This is an album of Bach cantatas with a difference, and it is a major one: it covers members of the Bach family including Johann Sebastian himself, and, more unusually, his predecessors rather than his sons. This is intriguing for two reasons: first, the works of these composers were not well preserved; second, as performed here by the delicious choir Vox Luminis and leader Lionel Meunier, the music reveals the largely unsuspected influence of these composers on Johann Sebastian. It's not as though Johann Sebastian tried ...
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This is an album of Bach cantatas with a difference, and it is a major one: it covers members of the Bach family including Johann Sebastian himself, and, more unusually, his predecessors rather than his sons. This is intriguing for two reasons: first, the works of these composers were not well preserved; second, as performed here by the delicious choir Vox Luminis and leader Lionel Meunier, the music reveals the largely unsuspected influence of these composers on Johann Sebastian. It's not as though Johann Sebastian tried to hide this (in a sketch of his own genealogy, he called Johann Christoph Bach "the profound composer"), but works by these composers have rarely been put together on an album. Generally, the list of Johann Sebastian's influences focuses on the music of Buxtehude, Georg Böhm, and other members of the North German organ school. However, consider Johann Christoph, the first cousin of Johann Sebastian's father, Johann Ambrosius Bach (and also the uncle of Johann Sebastian's first wife,...
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