Bach: Musica Sacra

‘I don’t believe in authenticity,’ remarked the conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who died in March 2016. For him, the challenge was to make music ‘in a way that is meaningful in terms of today’s world.’ He made no more significant contribution to the history of recordings than the complete cycle of Bach’s cantatas which is excerpted here, alongside the most dramatic and the most meditative movements from the Passions and the Christmas Oratorio.