On the surface, Bach's Easter Oratorio is an immaculately conceived celebratory work, intended for performance on Easter Sunday. Unlike the St John and St Matthew Passions, which tell the whole Easter story, it deals simply with the search for the tomb and the resurrection from the perspective of disciples Peter and John, and of two Marys, the mother of James and Mary Magdalene. Yet, for all its moments of genuine emotion bordering on the sublime, it was not written specifically for Easter Sunday and shows just what a pragmatic recycler Bach could be. Under pressure to provide music as per his Leipzig job specification, commissioning new words for a cantata that had twice done duty for birthday celebrations elsewhere was not a matter for conscience.
Bach's perception of the message of rebirth, essential to the Christian Easter, was emphasised in the unmitigated joy of this performance by the BBC National Chorus and Orchestra of Wales. The slumber aria, Sanfte Soll Mein Todeskummer, beautifully articulated by tenor James Gilchrist, was central, suggesting that Christ reduced the pains of death to gentle sleep. And while circumstances of composition might be the province of musicologists, the parallel in the Sinfonia to the Cantata No 174 - recycling the opening movement of the Third Brandenburg concerto - alerted the listener to niceties of Bach's instrumental colouring. That was heard at its most sumptuous in the cantata No 31 Der Himmel Lacht!, written expressly for Easter, and again joyously delivered.
The chorus and the reduced orchestral forces adapted well to the demands of Baroque style, as did the pretty fluting of soprano Joanna Lunn and the warm tone of Alison Browner and Matthew Hargreaves. Nicholas Kraemer's broad-sweeping gestures captured a festive spirit, but his innate sympathy for Bach was best demonstrated when accompanying the solo arias from the chamber organ. Eloquent both for their vocal writing and the instrumental obbligati, these were all the more intimate for the careful focusing of expressive effect.
