Bach Cantatas (Poll)

Started by KevinP, July 01, 2013, 01:53:47 PM

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How many of Bach's cantatas do you own?

I have them all and am very/reasonably familiar with them all.
4 (6.8%)
I have them all but am not yet familiar with them all / haven't heard them all.
16 (27.1%)
I don't own them all, but I have somewhere around 100 different cantatas.
6 (10.2%)
I have maybe around 50.
4 (6.8%)
I have a small handfull of cantatas.
17 (28.8%)
I don't own any of Bach's cantatas.
4 (6.8%)
I have all of them in multiple renditions
8 (13.6%)

Total Members Voted: 54

71 dB

Quote from: André on June 13, 2022, 04:22:08 PM
Thanks Poju !
Quote from: DavidW on June 13, 2022, 04:58:57 PM
Congratulations on completing the cycle!  And thanks for sharing your thoughts.


You're welcome! I needed something to take my mind off certain things...  0:)
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71 dB

#101
I received the Rilling boxser last Tuesday. I have been enjoying it, but the otherwise nice boxset has one serious brainfart to it:

The paper "envelopes" the CDs are in are GLUED shut!  :o I have to rip them open like I was opening letters from someone and there is all that glue ready to stick on the surface of the CDs + the paper envelopes suffer from this opening. So stupid and unnecessary! Who IMBECIL came up with this idea?  :P
Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
and less tiresome in headphone listening.

My Sound Cloud page <-- NEW Jan. 2024 "Harpeggiator"

DavidW

Yeah I hate that (glued paper sleeves).  I had a Bach organ set like that.  Very annoying.

Here is the offender!

71 dB

Quote from: DavidW on June 24, 2022, 07:16:28 AM
Yeah I hate that (glued paper sleeves).  I had a Bach organ set like that.  Very annoying.

Here is the offender!


How can they be that moronic?  :( Isn't it more expensive to glue them? This is my first "glued" box set and I hope it is also the last...
Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
and less tiresome in headphone listening.

My Sound Cloud page <-- NEW Jan. 2024 "Harpeggiator"

71 dB

#104
At this point I have only started listening to the Rilling box, but I think I may even prever Suzuki in the early cantatas to Rilling!  :o

Not saying Rilling is bad with the early cantatas, but I think Suzuki is much better with the early cantatas than with the later ones. I am not decided with this and I need to listen to Rilling much more to be sure, but this is how I feel. With the later cantatas I seem to prefer Rilling with a huge margin.

This may explain why I started collecting the Suzuki set over 20 years ago. The first releases pleased me a lot and I never realized how the later releases weren't to my liking as much. Only when I started listening to the cantatas systematically couple of months ago, I started to notice that something is wrong. Hearing Rilling as an alternative made me understand, that something REALLY is wrong. Suzuki just is too "spiritual" and calm for me in the later (1723 onwards) cantatas and the prominent reverberation and HIP mentality of the recordings doesn't help.

Rilling's modern non-HIP style might be too modern for the early cantatas influence by middle-baroque style.

Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
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André

JPC sells the 60-disc Harnoncourt/Leonhardt set of the sacred cantatas for 89€ (75 €outside of the EU). I have about 60% of it on double cd cases. The box set is space-saving and has 2 booklets (notes and work presentation), but no texts/translations (can be found online, I guess).

I ordered it. It will cost me a lot less than buying the missing discs, which are hard to track down anyway.




DavidW

Leusink eat your heart out!  A new, better played bargain box is here!  I remember when I paid much more for that set.  Though of course streaming exists now.

DizzyD

Quote from: 71 dB on June 24, 2022, 07:09:41 AM
I received the Rilling boxser last Tuesday. I have been enjoying it, but the otherwise nice boxset has one serious brainfart to it:

The paper "envelopes" the CDs are in are GLUED shut!  :o I have to rip them open like I was opening letters from someone and there is all that glue ready to stick on the surface of the CDs + the paper envelopes suffer from this opening. So stupid and unnecessary! Who IMBECIL came up with this idea?  :P
Wow, I have that Rilling set and yep the CDs are in white envelopes, but not sealed. They just have an unsealed flap. Still it was only about $49 so I can't complain. I love Rilling's interpretations but sometimes as in BWV 140 (opening chorus waaaaaay too fast imo) I find things to nitpick. Another Rilling bargain set to get is the Bach Great Sacred Choral Works set of 10 CDs (I think I paid $15 for it on Amazon). His reading of the Magnificat (in D major but with the "Christmas interpolations") is one of my favorites.

DavidW

Quote from: DizzyD on July 03, 2022, 04:20:03 PM
Wow, I have that Rilling set and yep the CDs are in white envelopes, but not sealed. They just have an unsealed flap. Still it was only about $49 so I can't complain. I love Rilling's interpretations but sometimes as in BWV 140 (opening chorus waaaaaay too fast imo) I find things to nitpick. Another Rilling bargain set to get is the Bach Great Sacred Choral Works set of 10 CDs (I think I paid $15 for it on Amazon). His reading of the Magnificat (in D major but with the "Christmas interpolations") is one of my favorites.

That was the same for me (the Rilling set), they must have changed a perfectly good solution in a reissue.  I agree his Magnificat is superb!  I think I had it on a separate cd.

71 dB

Rilling's BWV 20 is very impressive!  :o Love it! Suzuki is good, but Rilling takes it and makes it epic!   8)

Rilling isn't as good with BWV 21. Suzuki is better, because it is an early Weimar cantata. Rilling sounds "off" with the cantatas before Leipzig, but the cantatas from 1723 onwards sound exactly as I want!  :)

Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
and less tiresome in headphone listening.

My Sound Cloud page <-- NEW Jan. 2024 "Harpeggiator"

DizzyD

Quote from: 71 dB on July 04, 2022, 12:26:28 AM
Rilling's BWV 20 is very impressive!  :o Love it! Suzuki is good, but Rilling takes it and makes it epic!   8)

Rilling isn't as good with BWV 21. Suzuki is better, because it is an early Weimar cantata. Rilling sounds "off" with the cantatas before Leipzig, but the cantatas from 1723 onwards sound exactly as I want!  :)
I would disagree a little re: Rilling and BWV 21. I think in the Rilling interpretation the gradual modulation from despondency to joy in the work is much more obvious, although of course this is just my subjective impression. I love the treatment of the final chorus in the Rilling.

71 dB

#111
Quote from: DizzyD on July 04, 2022, 07:12:49 AM
I would disagree a little re: Rilling and BWV 21. I think in the Rilling interpretation the gradual modulation from despondency to joy in the work is much more obvious, although of course this is just my subjective impression. I love the treatment of the final chorus in the Rilling.

These are my initial impressions. I am a total Rilling newbie. First listen of BWV 21 did not blow me away the way BWV 20 did, gradual modulation from despondency to joy or not (whatever that means...)

With Suzuki it is the other way around: BWV 21 > BWV 20
Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
and less tiresome in headphone listening.

My Sound Cloud page <-- NEW Jan. 2024 "Harpeggiator"

DizzyD

#112
Quote from: 71 dB on July 04, 2022, 10:01:04 AM
These are my initial impressions. I am a total Rilling newbie. First listen of BWV 21 did not blow me away the way BWV 20 did, gradual modulation from despondency to joy or not (whatever that means...)

With Suzuki it is the other way around: BWV 21 > BWV 20
De gustibus etc etc. "Modulation from despondency to joy" refers to the movement of BWV 21 as a whole. What the cantata is "about". If you don't know the site already, I'd suggest the late Julian Mincham's site jsbachcantatas.com. Not as an unassailable authority but as food for thought.

premont

Quote from: 71 dB on June 24, 2022, 07:23:02 AM
How can they be that moronic?  :( Isn't it more expensive to glue them? This is my first "glued" box set and I hope it is also the last...

I have met this in fortunately only two boxes:
1) Hänssler release of Tirimo's Beethoven Klavierwerke
2) Pourpre release (licenced fro MDG) of Bach concertos and violin/harpsichord sonatas by Musica Alta Ripa
γνῶθι σεαυτόν

71 dB

Quote from: DizzyD on July 04, 2022, 10:59:18 AM
De gustibus etc etc. "Modulation from despondency to joy" refers to the movement of BWV 21 as a whole. What the cantata is "about". If you don't know the site already, I'd suggest the late Julian Mincham's site jsbachcantatas.com. Not as an unassailable authority but as food for thought.

I am not at that level in my expertise of the cantatas. I am not analysing what the cantatas are "about." I assume them to be "about" how great the God is. What else could church cantatas of early 18th century be about? As an atheist I just "ignore" the meaning and message and listen to the music as if it was instrumental music.
Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
and less tiresome in headphone listening.

My Sound Cloud page <-- NEW Jan. 2024 "Harpeggiator"

DizzyD

Quote from: 71 dB on July 04, 2022, 01:40:25 PM
I am not at that level in my expertise of the cantatas. I am not analysing what the cantatas are "about." I assume them to be "about" how great the God is. What else could church cantatas of early 18th century be about? As an atheist I just "ignore" the meaning and message and listen to the music as if it was instrumental music.
*backs out quietly*

71 dB

I think Rilling is a bit too fast (3:21) in the opening Sinfonia of BWV 29. Not a big deal and the rest of the cantata has good tempi.

Now listening to Rilling's BWV 35-7 and he is much more interesting in these than Suzuki who makes these just dull.
Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
and less tiresome in headphone listening.

My Sound Cloud page <-- NEW Jan. 2024 "Harpeggiator"

André

I received my Harnoncourt/Leonhardt box this week. I can now stop purchasing individual sets of that series as well as any (or most) individual discs.

Spotted Horses

Quote from: 71 dB on May 08, 2022, 09:03:54 AMThe apartment building where my rental apartment is will move to geothermal energy. On week 20 they will start drilling the heating wells and that will cause a lot of noise. They will work Monday to Friday from 7 am to 10 pm and on Saturdays from 9 am to 6 pm. The drilling of the wells will take 3-4 weeks.

Interesting. Do you know how deep the wells will be?
There are simply two kinds of music, good music and the other kind. - Duke Ellington

71 dB

Quote from: Spotted Horses on July 17, 2022, 09:43:14 PM
Interesting. Do you know how deep the wells will be?

I have even done energy calculations concerning geothermic heating at work. Typically these wells are 200 meters (600 ft) deep. After 200 meters the pressure becomes so high that drilling it difficult and thats the reason why these wells aren't much deeper than 200 meters and often even less.

They drilled the wells in June. It has been quiet for weeks now.  $:)
Spatial distortion is a serious problem deteriorating headphone listening.
Crossfeeders reduce spatial distortion and make the sound more natural
and less tiresome in headphone listening.

My Sound Cloud page <-- NEW Jan. 2024 "Harpeggiator"