SDG174 is the much awaited last volume of the Bach Cantatas Pilgrimage, one of the most talked about musical events of the last decade.

This is an anthology of the Christmas period, combining cantatas for Christmas Day and the Epiphany.

It features ten acclaimed soloists, including Magdalena Kožená, Bernarda Fink, Michael Chance, James Gilchrist and Christopher Genz.

The album opens with Christen, ätzet diesen Tag (“Christians, engrave this Day”), which was performed on Christmas Day 1999 to launch the year-long pilgrimage. This is one of Bach’s best known cantatas. The accompagnato recit was sung by Bernarda Fink to great acclaim.

Gloria in Excelsis Deo, the song of the angels at the birth of baby Jesus, is best known as the Gloria in the B Minor Mass.

Sie werden aus Saba alle kommen (“All they from Sheba shall come”) describes the procession of the three magi. Bach conveys the majesty of the scene by using high horns, and the recorders and oboes da caccia create an Eastern-like atmosphere.

The cantatas on this album display a great variety of dramatic expression. Both Mein Liebster Jesus ist verloren (“My dearest Jesus is lost”) and Liebster Jesu, mein Verlangen (”Beloved Jesus, my Desire“) tell the same story, but in a different style, expressing different emotions.

This album was recorded at Weimar’s Herderkirche, Leipzig’s Nikolaikirche and Hamburg’s Hauptikirche St Jakobi.

SDG174 is packaged with a separate index sheet of the Cantata series.