This CD by the Ensemble Correspondance features a number of religious masterpieces from the German Baroque period of the 17th century. Among them Die Sieben Worte Jesu Christi Am Kreuz by Heinrich Schütz. In his novel Trefpunt Telgte (Meeting Point in Telgte), Günther Grass gives a beautiful characterization of the old Schütz: 'His certainly not imperious, in fact somewhat anxious appearance
… (...) raised the level of the meeting of the poets in Telgte, but at the same time made it seem less important. They were visited by a man whose size overshadowed any group. All right, that's fiction. But it could not have been made up if Schütz had not been the greatest German composer of the 17th century. Further on in the story Schütz even sings something from the Sieben Worte; 'with gifted old man's voice'. Another classic among 'Passionsmusik' is Buxtehude's Membra Jesu Nostri: a seven-part meditation on the limbs of the suffering Christ. Also beautiful is Buxtehude's Fried- Und Freudenreiche Hinfahrt, about the old Simeon from the Christmas story. Buxtehude composed it in 1674 after the death of his father. (HJ)more
