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15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Not just for Christmas, 17 Jul 2005
I must confess that this recording is not entirely to my personal taste, but it would be churlish to deny it a five star rating. As an atheist, I still get intense pleasure listening to the mass as an art form rather than as an act of worship. The Gabrieli Consort, here, offer a recreation of how a Lutheran mass might have sounded in the early-17th century. I have no doubts about the authenticity or quality of their production, it's just that the piece, itself, is not entirely to my taste.Born in Kreuzberg, Michael Schultheiss (1571-1621) was the son of a Lutheran pastor, a man, indeed who had been a student of Luther himself - he took the name Praetorius as a Latinisation of his surname (it means 'mayor'). Praetorius began his career as an organist in Frankfurt, but would later acquire the patronage of the ecclesiastical hierarchy and aristocracy, enabling him to travel around German and devote much of his attention to composition. His career encompasses a period of musical transition, particularly in the realm of church music - moving away from the High Church tradition which had dominated before the emergence of the Protestant churches, and celebrating the emergence of the baroque. The Gabrieli Consort & Players have an established reputation for their pursuit of authentic rediscoveries of period pieces - those who enjoy this disc may care to turn their attention to the ensemble's "A Venetian Christmas". Their Praetorius Mass recaptures that sense of movement away from High Church grandeur towards a more simple, one might say humanistic act of worship. Certainly, this is a plainer, more sparse mass than had gone before, but also a more joyous one. At times it echoes those boring church services which used to be played on Radio 4 of a Sunday ... hence my conclusion that the piece is not entirely to my taste: but it is a superbly produced and performed work which will be enjoyed by those with a appreciation of sacred music and those who enjoy the baroque.
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