St. Mark Passion - Nikolaus Matthes - Markuspassion

Markuspassion - Nikolaus Matthes

First complete new baroque setting of the text by Picander

Composer and Conductor: Nikolaus Matthes

The new St. Mark Passion



In March 2023, the first performance of this St. Mark Passion took place; it is the first complete new baroque setting of the text by Picander which had presumably been set to music by Johann Sebastian Bach and first been performed on Good Friday, 23rd March 1731 and again in 1744 in St. Thomas’s Church, Leipzig. In the later version, it had been extended with two arias and was changed in many details. The score of this St. Mark passion, though, is considered to be lost.

On the basis of the surviving text sources, Nikolaus Matthes has presented the first complete new setting of the text by Picander and, at the same time, the first new setting to music in the baroque style. Some very first sketches of  the composition were made in spring and summer 2019; on Christmas 2019, Matthes took on the composition and finished it around Easter 2020.

In March 2023, the new St. Mark Passion has been first performed in four Swiss cities. The composition is entirely in the style of Johann Sebastian Bach’s musical language, but it doesn’t include any entire existing works by Bach or other baroque composers, except for some explicit quotations. So, the public and all musicians were able to get as close as possible to the experience of a baroque first performance.

The live recordings of the March 2023 first performances in Zurich and Lucerne have been edited and brought together to this integral recording of St. Mark Passion.
 
Soloists of St. Mark Passion

Evangelists - Daniel Johannsen and Georg Poplutz

Jesus - Daniel Pérez

Soprano - Maya Boog

Alto - Annekathrin Laabs

Tenor - Daniel Johannsen und Georg Poplutz

Baritone - Matthias Helm


Choir and orchestra - Gli Aspetti

Concert master - Germán Echeverri Chamorro



Conductor - Nikolaus Matthes

Further information: www.markuspassion.org