JS Bach: Cantatas For Bass – Matthias Goerne

   in Early Music Today (Dec, 2017)
Solo cantatas by Bach are rarities, Matthias Goerne here giving us two of the most popular, BWV 56, Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen, composed in 1726 for the 19th Sunday after Trinity, and BWV 82, Ich habe genug, which dates from 1731. Both are contemplations on the release of the weary soul into death, the text of BWV 82, for the Purification, being particularly suited to solo bass since it is based on the words of Simeon familiar as the Nunc dimittis.

Goerne recorded these two cantatas for Decca nearly 20 years ago, a disc I cannot but imagine being superior to this new CD. The voice is now …