In the Missa Brevis in G major K. 140 the buoyant folk-inspired melody with a voice leading containing many parallel thirds and sixths approaches the genre of the pastoral mass. The movements are characterized by songlike themes. The voices move in an apparent carefree manner – but the jumping melodic lines are not so easy to sing. The model offered by the carus music app helps to achieve this lightness and in addition, when practicing singers can hear the cheerful alternation between solo and tutti passages.
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Whether at home on your tablet or PC or on the road on your smartphone: with carus music, the Choir Coach, you always have your choral works with you to practice! With the carus music choir app, you can listen to your score together with a first-class recording on any device and easily practice your own choir part with a coach. With carus music, your concert preparation is easy, efficient and fun to master!
Performers: Agnès Mellon (soprano), Elisabeth Graf (alto), Oly Pfaff (tenore), Franz-Josef Selig (basso) – Kölner Kammerchor, Collegium Cartusianum – Peter Neumann
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Composer
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
| 1756-1791As the son of the deputy Kapellmeister to the Salzburg Prince-Archbishop, Mozart was constantly surrounded by church music in his youth. On his travels Mozart became familiar with Italian church music, and later in Vienna he studied the works of Bach and Handel. After moving to Vienna he was faced with the new challenges of composing opera and piano concertos, and significantly the “C Minor Mass” KV 427, the greatest sacred work of the first Vienna years, remained unfinished. The last period of his life again shows a change of direction to church music: Mozart successfully applied to succeed the terminally ill Leopold Hoffmann as Kapellmeister at St Stephen's Cathedral, but he was unable to take up the position as he died before Hoffmann. A gem such as the “Ave verum” KV 618 and the incomplete Requiem KV 626 give us an idea of what Mozart might have achieved as a composer of sacred music if he had taken up this important position. Personal details
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Editor
Ulrich Leisinger
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Continuo realization
Willi Schulze
| 1909-2005
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Ensemble
Kölner Kammerchor
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Ensemble
Collegium Cartusianum
The period instrument ensemble Collegium Cartusianum, founded in 1988 as successor to the Barockorchester Koln, has a repertoire ranging from Monteverdi to Brahms. The ensemble’s participation in the complete recording of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s masses conducted by Peter Neumann earned it an outstanding reputation, subsequently confirmed by many concerts, radio broadcasts and CD recordings. As well as collaborating with the Kolner Kammerchor, the Collegium Cartusianum has also received international acclaim for its performances of J. S. Bach’s Orchestral Suites as well as Mozart and Beethoven symphonies. With Mozart’s Il Re Pastore, Mendelssohn’s St. Paul and Elijah, and Dvo?ak’s Requiem the orchestra has extended its repertoire to include opera and romantic works. It has appeared at many leading festivals in Europe and Japan, recently at the Leipzig Bach Festival with a Handel-Bach program, with Handel’s Serenata Aci, Galatea e Polifemo in Krakow and Essen at the second “Fest fur Alte Musik” in Cologne in February 2012. Personal details
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Conductor
Peter Neumann
| 1940In recent years Peter Neumann, born in Karlsruhe, has made a name for himself particularly as a conductor of Handel’s music. This is demonstrated both by the concert series “250 Years Handel Oratorios” which he initiated – performing nine music dramas in accordance with Handel’s concert schedule of 1749–1752 – and by his numerous CD recordings. He has performed masterworks from vocal and orchestral music in the European musical capitals and at many renowned festivals, ranging from Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo and Vespers for the Blessed Virgin (Palais Garnier, Paris) through J. S. Bach’s passions (last in Moscow, Oslo and Versailles) and Mass in B minor (BBC Proms) to Debussy’s Le Martyre de Saint Sébastien at the MusikTriennale in Cologne. 2010, Peter Neumann and his ensembles Kolner Kammerchor and Collegium Cartusianum were guests at the Rheingau Music Festival with Schumann’s Das Paradies und die Peri and at the Schumann Festival in Dusseldorf as well as the Leipzig Bach Festival in 2011. In June 2012 he made his highly acclaimed debut at the Cologne Opera with Handel’s Alcina. As a guest conductor, Neumann has collaborated with, among others, ChorWerkRuhr, the Netherlands Chamber Choir, the SWR Vokalensemble Stuttgart, the NDR Choir, the Schola Cantorum Tokyo, the Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie and Concerto Koln. Highlights of his extensive discography include the complete recording of Mozart’s masses (Gramophone “Crown of Crowns”), Schutz’s Musical Vesper, Schumann’s Missa sacra (Diapason d’Or) and recordings of Bach’s St. John Passion and Handel’s Alexander’s Feast and Brockes Passion (Carus). Personal details
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Soloist - tenor
Oly Pfaff
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Soloist - bass
Franz-Josef Selig