The Sächsisches Vocalensemble under Matthias Jung has now recorded its second selection of Christmas gems for cpo from one of the most important collections of Lutheran church music, the St. Augustin School in Grimma, Saxony. The focus: festive, magnificent church cantatas (most of them including Christmas trumpet splendor) by composers from Central Germany who were famous musicians and held prominent posts during the years before and after 1700. To name only a few: Johann Schelle, Philipp Heinrich Erlebach, and Johann Rosenmüller, as well as composers such as Christian Liebe or Gottfried Vogel who are no longer remembered today but whose music brings wonder to modern listeners.

This imaginatively-curated, generously-filled Christmas package is sure to find favor during this and future holiday seasons. Why? Because it packs in every conceivable carol, tune, choral work or song in timeless performances from the greatest artists in the world: singers of immense communicative gifts including Cecilia Bartoli, Bryn Terfel, Renee Fleming and Luciano Pavarotti to name but four. It truly offers something of every Christmas mind, spirit, and looks fantastic.

The Messiah by Gottfried August Homilius (1714-1785) was performed by the Sächsisches Vocalensemble and the Batzdorfer Hofkapelle under the conductor Matthias Jung at St Anne’s Church in Dresden on the occasion of the three-hundredth anniversary of the composer’s birth on 5 June 2014, and is now being released on CD by cpo. Homilius is regarded as one of the most significant church composers during the transition between the baroque and classical eras.