In 1680, Dietrich Buxtehude sent his friend Gustav Düben the score of Membra Jesu nostri. In this perfectly balanced work, he addresses the senses directly, immersing us in the sufferings of Christ: we feel the hammer blows, the heart that stops beating…

Sous les empereurs autrichiens de la maison des Habsbourg, les arts et tout particulièrement la musique jouèrent un rôle très important dans le cérémoniel de l'affirmation du pouvoir de la cour et de l'empire. Bien que Ferdinand III fût le premier des empereurs autrichiens à avoir composé lui-même de la musique, son second fils et successeur Léopold (1657-1704) était bien plus doué que lui…L'un de ses professeurs fut Antonio Bertali. Son répertoire trop peu connu et qui mérite d'être redécouvert est d'une extrême variété musicale, clairement influencée par la musique théâtrale: elle ne lassera jamais l'auditeur, qui pourra toujours s'attendre à d'agréables surprises après chaque cadence.

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.

It was between the publication of the Quatrieme Livre de Pieces de Violes in 1717 and the Cinquieme in 1725 that Marin Marais offered his public an exceptional collection of works that use both the violin and the viol.These works are very different from the earlier viol pieces, from the instruments used to the works' formal structures: they include a sonata inspired by Italian models marked a la maresienne (in Marais' own style), a piece on a three note basso ostinato that evokes the peals of bells in a Parisian church, and an astonishing monument of a piece - La Gamme - that Marais described as an example of a small opera for instruments.

Although it has been clearly established for which instruments the Musical Offering and the Art of Fugue were intended, the Musical Offering has continued to be the object of realisations for other instruments, such as Anton Webern's orchestrated version of the Ricercar à 6. Here Cindy Castillo marks the completion of a new organ in the German baroque style by Dominique Thomas in the church of Saint-Loup in Namur with her own realisation of this work, a monument to the late Baroque style.

Philippe Pierlot and the Ricercar Consort's 2006 recording of Bach's Magnificat brings back the glory days of historically informed performances, those halcyon days in the 1980s when musicians, empowered by scholarship and energized by virtuosity, were recording the Baroque repertoire with the zeal of the newly converted. Though Pierlot and his musicians are of a younger generation, they bring a missionary fervor to the music, a program of Bach's Magnificat, BWV 243, and Missa Brevis, BWV 235, interspersed with two well-chosen organ works, the Fuga sopra il Magnificat, BWV 733, and the Präludium und Fuga, BWV 541. Pierlot's textures are clean, his rhythms buoyant, his colors bright, and tempos brisk, but not rushed in the fast movements, and contemplative but not moribund in the slow movements.

Just in time for Christmas, Philippe Pierlot and the Ricercar Consort present a collection of Cantatas for the season by Johann Sebastian Bach. In these evergreen holiday favorites, flutes, oboes, trumpets, timpani and voices are used to express the comfort and joy inspired by the Nativity. The result is nothing short of magical. The Ricercar Consort was founded in 1980 by harpsichordist and director Philippe Pierlot. They have made a significant discography, especially on the Mirare label, where their recordings have met with consistent acclaim and respect, in particular for their exceptional Bach Magnificat.

Italian violinists invaded germanic countries from the beginning of the 17th century, with Farina in Dresden, Marini in Neuburg and Bertali in Vienna. Their influence was considerable, stretching over the entire Empire to the furthest flung towns of Central or Northern Germany. The Italian sonata went hand in hand with the violin, exemplifying a taste for the fantastic and the baroque. Michal Praetorius, despite his knowledge of Italian musical practice, preferred to discuss the instrument under its German name of "Geige", although the term of "violino" soon began to appear in every musical publication In this eagerly awaited, special prized re-release of his remarkable anthology of early violin music, François Fernandez gives a us a masterly and higly seductive lesson of style.

Bruhns was one of Buxtehude’s most talented pupils, impressing his contemporaries with his skills as an organist just as much as with his talents as a violinist and as a singer. He died at the age of 32, leaving five organ pieces (RIC204) and twelve sublime Cantatas that form an evident link between Buxtehude’s religious music and J.S. Bach’s. This programme is rounded off with the cantata Erbarm dich by Lovies Busbetsky, another Buxtehude pupil, which formed the inspiration for one of J.S. Bach’s chorale preludes.

The repertory for viol consort of the Stuart age in England consists of fantasias and miscellaneous pieces whose dense, continuous polyphony conveys a sonic and social ideal of concord and harmony. It also expresses the confusion of a period of disorder and anxiety (‘distracted tymes’) traversed by political, religious and philosophical upheavals that heralded the end of an era. This programme offers resonances for our own times, with their transformations and uncertainties.

The Sainte-Colombe family remains a source of mystery to this day: the first name and the origins of the father, who taught Marin Marais and composed numerous pieces for one or two viols, remains hidden in the mists of time. The same obscurity surrounds his son or sons: records show a few traces of him in London and Edinburgh around 1700, although all that is really known of him comes from the Pieces de viole recorded here; these five suites of dances in the French style, including a Tombeau pour Mr de Sainte-Colombe le pere, have survived in a non-autograph manuscript. The version presented here breaks with the usual interpretations of these Pieces de Viole, as it includes a reconstruction of a basso continuo part as was common in works by composers of the son's generation. The non-autograph source that has survived gives a general feeling that something is missing in the harmonic structure, a lack that is here filled by this new basso continuo part. Reconstructed in the musical language and style of the time, the music of Sainte-Colombe's son here seems to come back to life; these pieces have not only recovered their full meaning but also reveal a sublime music.

We follow the success of the album devoted to Jean-Marie Leclair by continuing our exploration of the rich 18th-century violin repertoire. Leclair's success in the late 1720s acted as a catalyst and many other talented composers emerged in his wake. Those years were particularly favourable to the instrument and the prowess of each violinist was closely scrutinised by observers: the title of Premier violon de France was the subject of fierce competition. This positive and adulatory atmosphere resulted in a great proliferation of sonatas for violin, out of which we have chosen the six jewels that appear here. The greater part of these works are recorded here for the first time.

Da pacem gathers music by Heinrich Schütz that expressed the prayers of his listeners during the troubling times of the Thirty Years’ War, a period when the people of Central Europe “in such great fear and danger of war, sang with each other such useful and comforting songs”. Whether in elaborate concertos or simple motets, his music conveyed people’s hopes for a fair and lasting peace that can still resonate in our ears today.

Les deux compositeurs choisis, l’un anglais, l’autre allemand, nés tous les deux la même année 1685, sont assurément les représentants majeurs du patrimoine musical baroque. Les œuvres présentes sur ce disque ont toutes été composées à des moments particuliers de leur vie, en marge de leurs commandes habituelles destinés souvent à des personnages de haut rang, et se distinguent par la constante recherche de nouvelles inspirations et styles de composition.

It was in Amsterdam in 1740 that a lawyer named Hubert Le Blanc published an astounding work that defended the use of the bass viol at a time when the violin and the cello were becoming more and more important in Parisian musical life. This recording provides a musical equivalent of his essay, depicting the initial success of the bass viol and of Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe (celebrated in the film Tous les matins du monde), its moments of glory and, above all else, the repertoire of the viol, violin and cello during the first half of the 18th century.