The fact that Johann Sebastian Bach was able to take up the post of Thomaskantor in 1723 was thanks to the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt. He refused to allow his court conductor Christoph Graupner to move to Leipzig, declared the appointment of the local magistrate null and void, increased the salary of his subordinate and was thus able to enjoy the versatility of the man, who achieved outstanding things in all areas of musical art at the time, for a long time to come. In orchestral music, for example, he sought unusual effects with unusual experiments by combining seemingly disparate instruments with one another and also knew no restrictions worth mentioning in formal terms. Would he have been just as successful with the dignified councillors on the Pleisse as he was under the aegis of his aristocratic employer? By the end of this 2½-hour selection at the latest, we must thank His Serene Highness for not letting Graupner go three hundred years ago.