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Reviewer: David Vickers
The St Matthew Passion was probably first performed in 1727 but the music we usually hear is from Bach’s revised score, prepared afresh for a revival in 1736 (and used again in 1742). The original 1727 score is lost but traces of it are evident in manuscript copies made by Johann Christoph Farlau (pupil of Bach’s son-inlaw Altnickol) and Agricola. Most variants are minuscule details but there are some obvious differences: the end of Part 1 has a simple chorale (‘Jesus lass ich nicht von mir’) instead of the extended chorus that later replaced it (‘O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde gross’); at the beginning of Part 2 ‘Ach, nun ist mein Jesus hin’ features bass solo voice instead of alto; the obbligato instrument in ‘Komm, süsses Kreuz’ is not the usual viola da gamba but an archlute (one of the few times Bach used a lute in his Leipzig church music).
In contrast to Richard Egarr’s preference for large-scale forces, Peter Seymour adopts the Rifkin/Parrott theory that Bach’s concerted church music was probably sung by ‘concertists’ and ‘ripienists’. The baker’s dozen of singers are led by Charles Daniels’s serene Evangelist, whose poetic wisdom illustrates the description of Peter’s weeping with unusual bitterness. Peter Harvey’s Christus radiates compassionate authority, and his softly intimate ‘Komm, süsses Kreuz’ is an ideal foil for theorbist Elizabeth Kenny and Seymour (using a harpsichord lute-stop). The second bass is Matthew Brook, who therefore sings different arias from those he recorded with the Dunedin Consort (Linn, 4/08); he firmly captures the dichotomy of articulate precision and dramatic desperation in ‘Gebt mir meinen Jesum wieder’. Helen Neeves’s shapely phrasing in ‘Blute nur, du liebes Herz’ accords intuitively with the contoured strings. Bethany Seymour sings ‘Ich will dir mein Herze schenken’ with an attractive lightness of touch. Julian Podger’s forceful ‘Geduld!’ takes no prisoners but Joseph Cornwell’s florid higher passages are effortful (‘Ich will bei meinem Jesu wachen’). The double orchestra’s single strings cause textures with woodwinds to be balanced transparently; the prominence accorded to two oboes da caccia in ‘Mache dich, mein Herze, rein’ creates a fruitier rustic character than usual.
Seymour’s pacing often has a comfortable feeling of ‘rightness’ and integrity. Chorales and turba choruses tend to be brisk and gutsy, and the only noteworthy idiosyncrasy is the reduction to organ accompaniment in a few chorales, such as those at the heart of Part 2 (hardly a cardinal sin, so to speak).
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