Almost to the day 300 years after the work's premiere, we hear Bach's St. John Passion in a recording with the French baroque ensemble Ensemble Pygmalion under its leader Raphael Pïchon. The work was first performed in Leipzig on Good Friday 1724. The Evangelist is sung here by Julian Prégardien and among the other soloists can be heard, among others Huw Montague Rendall, Ying Fang and William Shelton. In this recording from Bordeaux, Pïchon has also inserted other music for the time of the Passion. Therefore, the concert begins with the anthem "O Traurigkeit, o Herzeleid" and later in the program we hear, among other things, excerpt from Bach's cantata BWV 159, "Sehet, wir gehn hinauf gen Jerusalem".
—SVT