Cantatas for Solo Soprano (BWV51, 52, 84, 199)

"You could never accuse Bach of being found wanting for melodic invention, even when on that treadmill of supplying an unending flow of cantatas to meet the demands of his employer. As an expedient he was not averse to borrowing from previous works of his own or others, the opening sinfonia of the Fifty-second cantata using music from his First Brandenburg Concerto. Elsewhere in the four cantatas everything seems to have been original, the Fifty-first, Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen! (Praise God in all lands) one of his most popular in the genre. They follow a similar formula of alternating recitatives and arias for the solo soprano voice with one movement given to the chorus, texts always of religious origin. The Norwegian soprano, Siri Karoline Thornhill, a singer of impeccable diction and intonation, has that stylised tonal quality now much favoured in Bach circles and is just one shade away from the boy soprano. It brings a sense of transparency to the vocal line that I enjoy. The conducting of Helmut Müller-Brühl avoids the excesses of period 'authenticity' now invading so many recordings. He uses a very small orchestra where the chamber organ is much in evidence, the many orchestral solo passages, particularly the oboe in BWV199, are well handled. The disc has been available in Germany for the past couple of years and enjoys good solid sound engineering."
David's Review Corner, December 2009

Among J.S. Bach's 200 or so surviving church cantatas, these four for solo soprano include the popular Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen!, in which singer and solo trumpet engage in thrilling displays of virtuosity. In the other cantatas, Bach provides equally beautiful obbligato parts for violin, viola and oboe, whose interactions with the soprano heighten the emotional significance of the sacred texts. For the opening sinfonia of the most richly-scored cantata here, Falsche Welt, dir trau ich nicht, Bach makes use of a version of the first movement of his Brandenburg Concerto No. 1.