No 141 St. Mark Passion

Three hundred years ago in Leipzig, on Good Friday 1726, Thomaskantor Johann Sebastian Bach performed a Passion not of his own composing but a St Mark Passion with which he had become familiar in Weimar. Of the composer of the piece, he provides only the last name on the score – »Keiser« – leaving open the question of whether the famous Hamburg opera composer, Reinhard Keiser, or his father, Gottfried Keiser, is meant. The vocal ensemble Voces Suaves and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin perform this impressive Passion in conjunction with an early Bach cantata and a very touching work by the organist of St Mary’s Church in Lübeck, Dieterich Buxtehude.