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Christmas Oratorio Comp Germa

Johann Sebastian Bach (Artist) | Format: Audio CD

4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

Price:	CDN$ 35.62 & this item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping. Details
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Product Details

Audio CD (Aug 18 2008)
SPARS Code: DDD
Number of Discs: 2
Label: Universal Music Group
ASIN: B0000057D5

Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #21,918 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
- #5 in Music > Opera & Vocal > Divas > Otter, Anne Sophie von
- #98 in Music > Opera & Vocal > Oratorios

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Disc: 1
1. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Coro
2. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Evangelista
3. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Recitativo
4. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Aria
5. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Choral
6. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Evangelista
7. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Choral - Recitativo
8. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Aria
9. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part One - For The 1st Day Of Christmas: Choral
10. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Two - For The 2nd Day Of Christmas: Sinfonia
See all 36 tracks on this disc
Disc: 2
1. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Four - For The Feast Of The Circumcision: Coro
2. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Four - For The Feast Of The Circumcision: Evangelista: Und da acht Tage um waren
3. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Four - For The Feast Of The Circumcision: Recitative (Basso): Immanuel, o susses Wort; Arioso (Soprani, Basso): Jeu, du mein liebstes Leben
4. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Four - For The Feast Of The Circumcision: Aria (Soprano, Echo Soprano): Flosst, mein Heiland, flosst dein Namen
5. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Four - For The Feast Of The Circumcision: Recitative - Choral
6. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Four - For The Feast Of The Circumcision: Aria
7. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Four - For The Feast Of The Circumcision: Choral
8. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Five - For The 1st Sunday In The New Year: Coro
9. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Five - For The 1st Sunday In The New Year: Evangelista
10. Christmas Oratorio BWV 248: Part Five - For The 1st Sunday In The New Year: Coro - Recitativo
See all 29 tracks on this disc

Product Description

This isn't an oratorio in the Handelian sense, but a series of cantatas for various days from Christmas to Epiphany. Bach's music is loaded with treats: an echo aria for soprano and oboe; a "pastoral" sinfonia; bravura arias for tenor with flute and bass with trumpet; a giddy soprano-bass duet; a transporting lullaby for alto. Then there are the choruses, featuring the Monteverdi Choir at their best: exuberant full-orchestra choruses in parts one and three; a lilting triple-time chorus with horns in part four; the joyful skittering chorus in part five; and the triumphant opening and closing of part six (with spectacular trumpet solos). John Eliot Gardiner's direction is vigorous; the soloists, the best group you'll find on CD, include a terrific young Anne Sofie von Otter. --Matthew Westphal

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Customer Reviews

2 Reviews

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Average Customer Review

4.0 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews)

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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good, but it's still Gardiner!, Aug 25 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Christmas Oratorio Comp Germa (Audio CD)

I must say that for most of Gardiner's recordings that I find them
rather dull. I bought his Beethoven symphonies, his Bach St. Matthew Passion, his Bach B Minor Mass, and, of course, this one. The Mass is not bad (three stars), the Beethoven is too fast and perky, and the St. Matthew.....well, it's popcorn Baroque interpretation all the way, though it has some fine singers on it. But Gardiner and his damn lack of musical instincts ruins it with tempi that are too fast. (I am a musicologist, so I am aware of his son's statement about his tempi....but we really have NO idea what that meant for the times. We must trust the natural flow of the harmonic rhythm of works to determine what the best tempo must be.)

But here again in this recording of the Christmas Oratorio, Gardiner has fine people to work with, and yet somehow misses the joy of this work. It is good, but not the best. Spirited, but not full of the Spirit. Clean, but rather soul-less. Best to stick with Karl Ritcher or a fine recording that is overlooked by Philip Ledger (King's College Choir) with Janet Baker. Or the more recent Rene Jacobs one. I've not heard the Rilling, so cannot comment on it.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Review, Dec 16 2002

Ken Aquino (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Christmas Oratorio Comp Germa (Audio CD)

I bought this just to listen to Anne Sofie Von Otter's voice on "Schlafe mein Liebster ...". Very beautiful.

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com ^(beta)

Amazon.com: 4.2 out of 5 stars (21 customer reviews)

44 of 44 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gardiner does it again with a fine "Christmas Oratorio", Dec 11 1999

By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com

This review is from: Christmas Oratorio Comp Germa (Audio CD)

This worthy performance of Bach's "Christmas Oratorio," recorded in 1987, further enhances John Eliot Gardiner's substantial discography of performances of Baroque, Classical, and Romantic masterworks. Very rarely does Gardiner turn in a lackluster performance, and this reading of the six-part Bach work sparkles. I cannot reconcile the criticism I read from another reviewer--that Gardiner turns the opening chorus of Part 1 into a "military march"--with what I hear on the recording; perhaps this reviewer was unaware that the chorus derives from the cantata "Toenet, ihr Pauken!", BWV 214 (where its opening words are "Sound, drums! Ring out, trumpets!"), so that any "military" quality he hears is what Bach wrote into the music. The soloists are uniformly good, especially mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter and bass Olaf Bar, and the disk timings (73:01, 67:03) show that the buyer certainly gets his or her money's worth of music.

As far as the music itself, although, as indicated above, Bach did a fair amount of recycling (from BWV 213, 214, 215, and from the lost "St. Mark Passion" BWV 247 and a presumed lost cantata BWV 248a), the reused music is of the highest quality, and in certain cases Bach even seems to have had second thoughts and decided to write new movements for the "Oratorio" rather than add new texts to old movements. The result, of course, is up to Sebastian's usual magnificently-high standard.

If you are considering buying a recording of Bach's oratorio, I don't see how you can go wrong with Gardiner's rendition. Highly recommended.

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gardiner does it again, Jan 7 2000

By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com

This review is from: Christmas Oratorio Comp Germa (Audio CD)

By far the best performance on record, outstanding on all fronts (solo, choral, instrumental). To me, the old warhorse compared in the two-star review below doesn't even come close. It indicates that the reviewer is a traditionalist with a very fixed view, not at all in keeping with modern knowledge of period performance. These works weren't played in the overly reverent 19th century inflated grandiose manner (a manner from which Handel's "Messaih" has been finally rescued), but in a lively fashion. Gardiner might indeed push at the limits a bit (given the technical ability of the Monteverdi Choir in particular, who can blame him?), but in this version, to me he gets it dead right - a nicely-balanced performance which brings back the joy and exhilaration in a great piece of music.

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You can lead a warhorse to water..., Mar 18 2001

By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com

This review is from: Christmas Oratorio Comp Germa (Audio CD)

...but you can't make it think? No, that's unkind and unmerited. Mr.Nielsen the warhorse man (neigh sayer?) clearly likes his Bach old-fashioned and warhorseish and that is his right. I have had the privilege of hearing Richter do this "live" with an equally stellar cast in the Kongressaal, Munich too many years ago. It was good, but more than ever I'm convinced that this is yesterday's Bach. I agree, Wunderlich et al have great voices - for opera. Bach did not have such voices, and his music is best served by lighter vibrato-free voices rather than ponderous bel canto styles. And I'm sorry, I cannot agree that the excellent young singers in the Gardiner version lack feeling in what they sing. And why shouldn't Bach be impressive? The city fathers at Leipzig would have wanted that. So, although there are other excellent performances (e.g., Pickett and Herreweghe - and I commend to Mr. Nielsen Eugen Jochum's verion as the best of the "Warhorse" versions), Gardiner still comes out tops.

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