Sunday Afternoon at the Opera - Mattheson: Das grösste Kind; Pigs Can Fly

Sunday Afternoon at the Opera host Keith Brown writes:

People say the Christmas holiday season is meant for the children. Indeed, the central iconic figure of the holiday is the Christ Child.

I have never before broadcast any of the recorded music of Johann Mattheson (1681-1764). He was important to the musical life of Hamburg, where he held the coveted post of cantor at the Lutheran cathedral of the city. He wrote a vast amount of church music. Mattheson was called upon to compose cantatas, oratorios, and choral works to mark the major feast days observed at the cathedral.

For Christmas of 1720 he wrote an oratorio about the baby Jesus, Das grösste Kind or "The Greatest Child." His scoring for the Christmas oratorio was lavish in its day: an orchestra with all the usual strings, flute, a pair of oboes, bassoon, pairs of trumpets and horns, with timpani drums, plus harpsichord continuo. Eight skilled opera singers were brought in from Hamburg's Goosemarket Theater opera company. They sang the solo roles and combined their voices as a chorus. Mattheson's score incorporates the traditional German In dulce jubilo chorale tune set to new words. The oratorio concludes with a hallelujah chorus of well-nigh Handelian grandeur.

The German CPO label began issuing world premiere recordings of Mattheson's music shortly after manuscripts of his missing since 1945 were rediscovered in 1998. Das grösste Kind was issued on a single CPO compact disc in 2009. Michael Alexander Willens directs the period instrument players of the Cologne Academy.

Keep listening for more Christmas music. Thinking again of the children, you will hear tracks from the Naxos CD compilation Pigs Can Fly. Ronald Corp leads the New London Children's Chorus in choral compositions intended for performance by prepubertal voices.