Johann Sebastian Bach: St Matthew Passion BWV 244 (b)

Over 280 years after its first performance, Bach’s St Matthew Passion still exerts an unbroken fascination. The present recording was produced at the work’s historical home, and documents a long-standing performance tradition: the Thomanerchor Leipzig (St Thomas’s Boys Choir) and the Gewandhausorchester (Gewandhaus Orchestra) regularly perform one of Bach’s magnificent passion settings at St Thomas Leipzig on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. With this recording, the early version of the famous St Matthew Passion is now available on CD for the first time. The astounding soloists, the Thomanerchor Leipzig (St Thomas’s Boys Choir) with its superior, unmistakable sound, and the Gewandhausorchester (Gewandhaus Orchestra) and its exquisite instrumental soloists present the sufferings and death of Jesus of Nazareth in a performance of seldom heard dramatic impetus. This production under the direction of the present cantor at St Thomas, Georg Christoph Biller, combines a profoundly religious message with exceptional musical mastery.

Ute Selbig
Britta Schwarz
Martin Petzold
Matthias Weichert
Thomas Laske
Gewandhausorchester
Thomanerchor Leipzig