MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

REVIEW


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 

alternatively
CD: MDT AmazonUK AmazonUS
Sound Samples & Downloads

Johann Hermann SCHEIN (1586 - 1630)
Israelsbrunnlein (1623) [94.23]
Dresdner Kammerchor/Hans-Christoph Rademann
rec. Emmauskirche, Dresden, 22-27 March 2000; Konzertsaal der Hochschule fur Musik, Dresden, 2-4 March 2012
CARUS 83.350 [47.07 + 47.25]

Experience Classicsonline

Schein was one of Bach’s predecessors as cantor at the Thomasschule in Leipzig. He had been a boy chorister in Dresden and trained at Leipzig University, working in Weimar before settling in Leipzig. He was a friend of Heinrich Schutz, but unlike Schutz he never made the journey to Italy. That being said, he managed to absorb the Italian madrigal style to a remarkable degree. He wrote alternating collections of sacred and secular music with the intention of providing music which can be used in worship and in social gatherings.
 
His most spectacular work is Israelsbrunnlein (Israel’s Fountain), a collection of 26 motets written to German Biblical texts but in the Italian madrigal style. The short texts are taken from the Psalms (the fountain of the title) and other books in the Old Testament. The words are not liturgical and the motets seem to have served no liturgical function. In the motets Schein uses Italianate techniques of word-painting to develop the expressivity of the music, but using German texts and accentuation.
 
The purpose of these pieces is debatable. There is a suggestion that they were intended for special occasions and academic or civic functions. It is doubtful if the boys of the Thomanerchor would have been capable of coping with the treble and alto vocal parts, though we should not forget that boys’ voices then broke rather later. Even if this music was performed in a liturgical context, in style it was as easily capable of being sung in a domestic setting. We should consider the music in the context of the body of vocal chamber music being developed by composers in the 17th century, with an emphasis on sacred texts as well as secular. Schein’s music would bring the madrigal style of Italy into a devout Lutheran household.
 
These performances, were recorded in two sessions over ten years apart. It is a testament to performers and recording engineers that the different tracks do not stand out too much, but create more of a unified whole. The choir used consists of 22 people in 2000 and 16 in 2012 with a continuo group of lute/theorbo, cello and organ. Though, once you know that the tracks were recorded at different times, it is rather easy to become obsessive about spotting differences.
 
The vocal performances are excellent technically, with fine control from the choir and a nice sense of line and blend. There is good attention to the words so that the syllables dance in the way that madrigalian writing should. That said, I can’t help feeling that Hans-Christoph Rademann’s speeds are rather too stately. It is a testament to the choir’s feeling for the music that they make it work at a steady pace.
 
The other problem that I have is the size of the performing group. The tradition in the performance of the Lutheran motet was generally to have one singer per part. This is the structure on which Bach’s music is based and the cause of all the discussion about the size of the choir in his pieces. If you consider these pieces as sacred madrigals, to be performed in a domestic setting, then the number of voices is still too big.
 
These performances are fine, as far as they go and you could well be perfectly happy with them. The motets are rather episodic in nature and the programme does not really benefit from being played at one sitting. This is a collection to dip in an out of and, if you do that, then I found that the specific drawbacks that I mentioned above rather diminish.
 
The CD booklet includes articles about Schein and his music along with texts and translations.
 
Schein’s work is rather under-represented on disc and the Dresdner Kammerchor are to be congratulated for managing, finally, to complete their collection of the composer’s masterwork and for allowing us to hear it in performances of great charm.  

Robert Hugill

 

 

 

 

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools






Error processing SSI file