St Thomas'’s Boys Choir: Cantatas for Easter 5/10

The liturgical year with Johann Sebastian Bach: Rondeau Production and Deutschlandradio Kultur are currently releasing a ten-disc CD series with Thomanerchor Leipzig (St Thomas’s Boys Choir Leipzig). The choir presents selected cantatas for the liturgical year in new, vibrant recordings. The music for the liturgy holds a very special place at St Thomas’s Church Leipzig: even today, the church’s boys choir and the Gewandhausorchester (Gewandhaus Orchestra) perform a cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach every week.

Bach composed numerous cantatas for Easter, three of which - Christ lag in Todesbanden (BWV 4), Der Himmel lacht, die Erde jubilieret (BWV 31), and Halt im Gedächtnis Jesum Christ (BWV 67) - are recorded here. The production is complemented by a contemporary work: Georg Christoph Biller, cantor at St Thomas, composed his St Thomas Easter Music on the occasion of the 800th anniversary of St Thomas’s school. Under his direction, St Thomas’s Boys Choir gave the work its premiere performance together with the Gewandhaus Orchestra at St Thomas Leipzig on Easter Sunday 2012. Like Bach, Biller uses a framework of choruses, chorales, and recitatives for his composition. Today’s cantor at St Thomas demonstrates the musical present, nurtured here particularly strongly by the music of the past, has a future. This CD features the first recording of the new work in its arrangement for organ.

Georg Christoph Biller performs the cantatas with extraordinary boys’ voices in the solo parts for soprano and alto, a sign of the new recording’s unique quality.

The following recordings are published as part of the ten-CD series (Order No.THO2012):
Cantatas for Advent BWV 36, 61, 62 (ROP4040)
Cantatas for Christmas BWV 63, 110, 190 (ROP4043)
Cantatas for Epiphany BWV 3, 65, 72 (ROP4038)
Cantatas for Passiontide BWV 22, 23, 182 (ROP4044)
Cantatas for Easter BWV 4, 31, 67 (ROP4045)
Cantatas for The Ascension BWV 37, 43, 128 (ROP4041)
Cantatas for Pentecost BWV 34, 74, 172 (ROP4026)
Cantatas for Trinity Sunday BWV 75, 194 (ROP4036)
Cantatas for Marian Feast BWV 1, 125, 147 (ROP4039)
Cantatas for Reformation/Michaelmas BWV 19, 50, 79, 80 (ROP4031)


10% discount on our recently completed CD-edition: pay only €143.55 (instead of €159.50) if you order the ten-disc edition ‘The Liturgical Year with Johann Sebastian Bach’ today – you save €15.95!

Thomaner Paul Bernewitz
Thomaner Johannes Hildebrandt
Thomaner Friedrich Praetorius
Thomaner Stefan Kahle
Thomaner Jakob Wetzig
Tobias Hunger
Martin Petzold
Andreas Scheibner
Gotthold Schwarz
Matthias Weichert
Thomaner Sebastian Heindl , organ
Gewandhausorchester
Thomanerchor Leipzig
Thomaskantor Georg Christoph Biller