Baroque Sheet Music: Explore the Classics of a Golden Era

“Hail! bright Cecilia, hail to thee. Great patroness of us and harmony!” – this exclamation opens the final chorus of Henry Purcell’s eponymous Ode to St. Cecilia from 1692. A paean to the power of mu...

Das deutsche Nunc dimittis 'Herr, nun lässest du deinen Diener' hat Schütz 1656 anlässlich des Todes des sächsischen Kurfürsten Johann Georg I. gleich 'auf zweyerlei Art' vertont und drucken lassen. D...

In his Christmas motet 'Hodie Christus natus est' Schütz employs the full mastery of his madrigalian musical language and exploits all the sonorous richness which the six part scoring offers him. The...

No. 13 of the 'Opus ultimum'

Alongside Gesualdo and Monteverdi, Marenzio is one of the great Italian madrigalists. The influence of his sophisticated madrigalian art on the younger generation of composers is shown by the fact tha...

At the age of eighty-six Heinrich Schütz composed his last work in 1671 with his monumental setting of Psalm 119, complemented in an appendix with a setting of Psalm 100, and a setting of a German Mag...

The three great motets Quam dilecta, In convertendo and Deus noster refugium, which Jean-Philippe Rameau composed between 1713 and 1715, have remained relatively unknown to this day. And yet these mot...

What does Bach's "Christmas Oratorio" have to do with Hercules? More than you might think at first glance. In the summer of 1733, the eleventh birthday of the Saxon Elector Friedrich Christian on 5 Se...

Although Bach's Mass in B minor is one of the most frequently performed works by the Cantor of St. Thomas's, it is full of puzzles and problems. This applies not only to the question, still unanswered...

Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott BWV 80 (CV31080-00) is one of Johann Sebastian Bach's most frequently-performed cantatas. But the well-known form of the work, with its great opening chorale chorus, repr...

Great Baroque church music full of color and powerful imagery! 'Sing to the Lord a new song! Sing, rejoice and praise his holy name with the trumpets and cornetts! And nature shall join in, the seas s...

Johann Michael Haydn's masses are masterpieces of their genre and were extremely popular during his lifetime, as the large number of copies shows. This also applies to the Missa Sancti Dominici, which...

Starting with an understated first verse then moving into the "bell" section over the melody in the second verse and concluding with a triumphant ending. A great closer for your Christmas program.

Classic Bach in the hands of master arranger Russell Robinson means this setting will sound as full and rich as the original, but it will be accessible to three-part choirs in a very sing-able way. Th...

Art Thou Troubled' ist ein Lied, das die heilenden Kräfte der Musik anpreist. So ist sie der 'Quell der Freude' und wird alle 'Traurigkeit heilen', da sie uns mit 'göttlicher Stimme' ruft. Die lieblic...

The most famous of several Vivaldi works entitled Gloria (RV 589), this edition by Clayton Westermann includes a short preface to explain performance practice. Of the three recorded Glorias Vivaldi wr...

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) composed his CANTATA NO. 10: MEINE SEEL ERHEBT DEN HERREN, BWV 10 in 1724 as part of his second cantata cycle since becoming Kantor at St. Thomas the previous year. B...

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) composed his CANTATA NO. 10: MEINE SEEL ERHEBT DEN HERREN, BWV 10 in 1724 as part of his second cantata cycle since becoming Kantor at St. Thomas the previous year. B...

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) composed his CANTATA NO. 10: MEINE SEEL ERHEBT DEN HERREN, BWV 10 in 1724 as part of his second cantata cycle since becoming Kantor at St. Thomas the previous year. B...

The CHANDOS ANTHEMS, HWV 246-256, are a collection of eleven anthems composed by George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) when he was composer in residence at Cannons, the court of James Brydges, newly the...