Motets [Import]

An older and simpler form of choral music than the church cantata, the history of the motet can be traced back to the Medieval times. In Baroque times, the motet usually meant a choral composition accompanied by basso continuo. All the six (or seven - see below) surviving motets of Johann Sebastian Bach fall under this description.

Having recently been listening through Bach's entire surviving oeuvre of nearly 200 church cantatas, I thought I also needed to look at some other type of church composition that Bach wrote during his Leipzig period, and as I was new to the motets, they seemed a natural choice. The critic David Vernier of ClassicsToday gave this recording the full marks (10/10), so I decided to trust Harmonia Mundi's usually high production values in this case.

And I was not disappointed. Vocalconsort Berlin is a chamber choir of 18 members, and they perform the seven motets gathered here with great clarity of both line and diction. Due to the relatively wide spacing of the individual choir members, nowhere is the sound muddled up and you are able to hear each individual voice as the singers follow the contours of Bach's complicated polyphonic writing. Especially beautiful are the soprano voices, which form a suitably serene, angelic contrast to the voices of the altos, tenors and basses.

The listening experience is on the whole rather joyful and uplifting. One senses that full justice is done to the inner meaning of the motet texts. This is important, as in Bach, text and music form an inseparable whole. Unlike so many of the texts of Bach's sacred cantatas, which tend to wallow quite a lot in the miseries of the human condition and the unavoidable sinfulness of man, the texts of the motets concentrate on a joyful denunciation of all worldy values and the importance of praying and adhering to the example set by Christ. As such they seem more uplifting and forward-looking than many of the cantatas, and perhaps also for that reason may be more accessible to modern listeners. The primary reason being, of course, that they are such magnificent music...

This set includes all the six motets, BWV 225-230, usually included in recordings of Bach's motets, but also included is the motet Anh. 159, Ich lasse dich nicht, long thought of as not written by Bach, but which recent research has concluded was probably written by him after all. As it fits most naturally in sound and execution to the company of the remaining six, one must just conclude that this, in all probability, was indeed the case.

Most motets have organ accompaniment; BWV 230, Lobet den Herrn alle Heiden, has in addition accompaniment by strings (violone and cello).

The packaging is an ordinary plastic jewelcase. The cover image shows a detail from Albrect Dürer's first self-portrait, painted in 1493 when Dürer was 22. The disc label shows another detail of the same, and the whole painting is depicted inside the booklet. I am not sure what is the relation of this painting to Bach's motets. Probably no relation exists, except that Dürer was obviously a believer - a text snippet painted on canvas just above his head reads something like "Everything goes in my life as if ordained from above". In fact, it was the third self-portrait of Dürer dating from 1500 which is a true "imitatio Christi" by appearance. So why did they not choose that painting instead of this one?

The booklet text is informative, as is usual from this source. Not much is known for certain about the origin of these pieces, however. Texts are included in German, French and English.

Highly recommended. This CD would be a likely canditate for my "desert island discs".

› Go to Amazon.com to see the review  5.0 out of 5 stars