This remarkable recording marks the first relationship on disc between an ensemble and the label Opus Arte, until now known for DVDs of live opera, ballet and theatre. Its new partnership with the choir of Magdalen College, Oxford, one of Britain's oldest and finest choral institutions, begins with Buxtehude's sublimely tender 1680 meditation on the crucified Christ, Membra Jesu Nostri. In the future, we are promised works by the glorious John Sheppard, a 16th-centuryinformator choristarum at the college, and contemporary pieces from Matthew Martin, a former Magdalen scholar recently given a British Composer award.

A transformative force in historically informed performance, Ton Koopman is renowned as a conductor, harpsichordist and organist. In 1979, aged 35, he founded the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra in the city where he had studied with the great Dutch harpsichordist Gustav Leonhardt. Drawing on an international pool of players, the ensemble soon gained a reputation for flexibility, colour and expressivity as it explored the music of such composers as the Bach family, Handel, Telemann and Buxtehude.

Des styles italiens novateurs comme l'opéra et l'oratorio, tous deux ayant pour base les mêmes concepts rhétoriques, se sont répandus très rapidement à travers toute l'Europe et c'est dans les régions de langue allemande que les modèles furent développés avec le plus d'ardeur. Le programme de ce CD Sanctum Desiderium est une soigneuse sélection de compositions allemandes du dix-septième siècle qui expriment un désir sacré en le traduisant aussi par des images musicales.

It's hard to believe this CD was done with only a violin, viola da gama and harpsichord. This is polyphonic music at its finest. It does tribute to Buxtehude, who preceded Bach. The ensemble is perfect - the instruments complement each other. When they go from slow to fast, it is remarkable to hear the contrast. These are expert musicians with a complete mastery of their instruments. They use loud-soft as easily as any masters of the Baroque. The result is joyous, lively and entertaining.

This acclaimed recording series of the complete organ works of Dietrich Buxtehude (c. 1637-1707) offers a unique musical journey in the footsteps of the Danish-German Baroque master. Organist Bine Bryndorf explores Buxtehudes inventive stylus phantasticus through the beautiful sound of five historic organs around the Baltic area, beginning in the composers native town of Elsinore, and ending in Lübeck, where his successor Johann Sebastian Bach famously went to experience the art of the ageing organ legend.

Sigiswald Kuijken directed these performers, based notionally in Trondheim, for a festival concert in Sarrebourg in 2015. Like other takes on the great corpus of Bach cantatas by groups who are attempting to show us his works in a wider context, this pair is presented in the wider context of the musical expression of the final conflict between the forces of good and evil in the late 17th century. Buxtehude’s cantata Befiehl dem Engel, dass er komm (BuxWV10) and Christian Geist’s Quis hostis in cœlis provide the context for Bach’s compositions for Michaelmas in 1724 and 1726.

Trio Sonnerie have chosen five of the 14 sonatas by Buxtehude from the 1690s to demonstrate their considerable fluency and rapport. These are witty and elegant works, finely crafted and requiring the skills of virtuoso players. Monica Huggett and Sarah Cunningham capture their essence with happily chosen and neatly articulated tempos—the vivace movements are effortlessly played—and beautifully transparent textures. Mitzi Meyerson provides a stylish and secure accompaniment, particularly in the G major Largo and the B flat major Vivace (which is, in fact, a chaconne).

Following on from and designed along the same lines as the Guide to Period Instruments, this boxed set includes an exhaustive introductory text as well as a great quantity of music excerpts on the set’s eight CDs. These extracts have been taken from the extensive repertoire recorded by Ricercar over many years, with excerpts from recordings kindly provided by our colleagues from Harmonia Mundi, Gimell, Accent, Alpha and Sony supplementing our programme where necessary. The Lutheran repertoire of the Renaissance has remained for all intents and purposes unrecorded up until now; the tracks illustrating this repertoire together with other excerpts have been recorded specially for this compilation by Vox Luminis.

Death and Devotion Cantatas by Tunder, Weckmann, Buxtehude, and Ritter It is a remarkable fact that the most expressive and original vocal church music composed in Northern Germany during the latter half of the seventeenth century was the work not of cantors, but of organists. Some of this is due to the exceptional status which had been achieved by organists in cities like Hamburg and Lbeck in the course of the century; they had become both virtuosi par excellence, and at the same time learned composers.

It is easy to imagine Dietrich Buxtehude’s enthusiasm when he received into his hands the text to Membra Jesu Nostri, which has been ascribed to Bernard of Clairvaux (c. 1090-1153). The text forms an account of the crucified limbs of Christ (feet, knees, hands, side, chest, heart and face) and its sensitive style relates strongly to sixteenth and seventeenth century Pietism, the central focus of which is emotion and passionate expression.

Northward ho! Sébastien Daucé and his musicians here make a geographical detour, forsaking England and France in order to explore Lutheran Europe before J. S. Bach. One is struck by the expressive vigour of these finely detailed works, which have retained all their power to fascinate today’s listeners. Merging old and new, the austerely beautiful language of Buxtehude, Schütz and the much more rarely heard Dijkman unexpectedly echoes the music of their contemporary Marc-Antoine Charpentier.

Widely regarded as one of the foremost interpreters of Bach's music today, Masaaki Suzuki has made his name both as the artistic director of the Bach Collegium Japan and as a performer on the harpsichord and the organ. Much interest has been focussed on the BCJ/Suzuki series of Bach Cantatas, begun in 1995 and reaching its final stretch with the recent release of Volume 46 (of a projected 55 discs). Hailed by the international music press, this monumental undertaking has acquired a world-wide following. From the very beginning of the collaboration with BIS, however, there have been numerous recording projects beyond the sacred cantatas of Johannes Sebastian, and, indeed, beyond Bach himself. Some of these acclaimed recordings can now be found in a limited edition boxed set, released in connection with the 20th anniversary of Bach Collegium Japan this year.

In this second instalment of complete keyboard works, Benjamin Alard demonstrates with splendid eloquence how invaluable the young Bach’s north German experience proved to be; his attentive examination of the works of the great organ masters and his craving for all kinds of music significantly broadened the stylistic foundations of his keyboard writing. The wide range of works presented here, complemented by pieces by Buxtehude, Reinken and Pachelbel, illustrates in exemplary fashion the power of a master in the making.

The cornett was considered the instrument of kings and was one of the defining instruments until the 18th century, when it fell victim to the orchestral innovations of the classical period and went out of fashion. To this day, however, its sound continues to fascinate. To help listeners experience the magic of his instrument, William Dongois has teamed up with Le Concert Brisé to put together three sparkling programmes tracing the history of the zinc in the Baroque era, available together for the first time.