Spectacular Bach!
A glorious performance of two superb Bach cantatas by the late, lamented Lorraone Hunt Lieberson, whos magnicient mezzo voise will be long remembered. No finer version of these works os likely ever to be recorded.

Lovely, poignant music
I'm always sad when I listen to this gorgeous disc. Lorraine Hunt-Lieberson died of cancer on July 3, 2006 at her home in Santa Fe, New Mexico at the height of her musical and expressive powers, aged only 52. Only a few years previously, she had nursed her sister through her final illness with the same disease.
Ironically, in 2000 Hunt-Lieberson had sung one of these cantatas in a semi-staged performance directed by Peter Sellars. In Cantata BWV 82, Ich Habe Genug ("I Have Enough"), she was wearing a flimsy hospital gown and thick woolen socks, her face contorted with pain and yearning, portrayed a terminally ill patient who, no longer able to endure treatments, wants to let go and be comforted by Jesus.
I can't imagine a more fitting memorial for this wonderful musician than these utterly moving performances.

Glorious and heart-breaking
Now that Ms Hunt Lierbeson has died, it is difficult to listen to these profound recordings without feeling acute pangs of heartache, especially during the first aria of Ich Habe Genug. If you have read anything about Peter Sellars's staged versions of this cantata, where Hunt Lieberson appeared dressed in a patient's hospital gown, attached to IV's, that image will haunt you as you listen to this sublime recording. Ms. Hunt Liberson's voice is clear and supple, able to express subtle and grand emotions with small vocal inflections, gestures and delicate phrasing. A revelation of a recording that will likely bring tears to your eyes

Her song to a new legency
Bach's cantata BWV82, there were many versions written by Bach himself, includes for Bass, for Soprano, and for alto--- and we could find more singers record it. I must say Hunt would be one of most excellent in recently years.
Her pure voices to bach cantata is easy to express original emotion to touch listeners inner heart.
Hunt was a famous singer of Handel, so that this album it's more valuable to find her another perform, I could promise it's a good and beautiful enjoyment of bach music.

PROFILES OF BACH
My appreciation of the infinite musical genius of Bach only gains from hearing him interpreted by different artists. I already owned two formidable accounts of cantata 82, one from the great tenor Ian Bostridge in his debut disc, the other from a great bass (the work was originally written for a bass soloist) John Shirley-Quirk. Shirley-Quirk's performance dates from 1965, but he performs with the Academy of St Martin's under Marriner, and they were already committed to an `authentic' style in Bach and Handel. The authentic movement rapidly became `still more authentic' in the hands of, say, McCreesh, but Bostridge and Europa Galante in 2000, and now Hunt Lieberson with her Boston associates two years later, have settled for much the same style as Marriner's. She thus faces formidable competition (if that is any way to look at the matter), but the comparisons only invite gratitude and applause for the special excellence that each exhibits.

One thing that gives this disc a special appeal for me is that the instrumentalists are apparently freelancers. They are totally professional, but the professionalism manages to be combined with the special sense of enthusiasm that I associate more with good amateur music-making, a feeling of individuals coming together to make music together rather than the atmosphere of a band with contracts of tenure. The lengthy and garrulous liner-note tells us all about it, as well as much else. Lieberson's tempi are rather faster than those in the other sets, and the engineers have given her a more forward balance. No complaints from me, not when it is a voice like this. For exquisite vocal sound may I recommend in particular her low notes on `Schlummert ein' and the heavenly treatment of the imperfect cadence (a technical term of course) at `selig zu'.

I have no other account of cantata 199, an earlier work and not quite the equal of its great companion here. That makes this one all the more welcome, and the performance is fully on a par with the other. One interesting point is that the chorale is sung by Lieberson on her own, but as you might expect that gives me no kind of problem. This music is all radiant with Bach's perception of death as a gateway to final fulfilment, and it would be a very dull sort of atheist who can't sense and share the sheer transcendental greatness of the inspiration.

The recorded sound is just fine by me, provided there is no objection to the forward recording of the soloist, which is not overdone in the old manner by any means. The liner note is nothing if not informative, and I urge you to get through it to the end, with the help of a drink if necessary. Bach would not mind that in the least, if certain anecdotes about him are to be believed. Above all, this disc has brought the voice and musicianship of Lorraine Hunt Lieberson into my collection and into my home for the first time, and for that Wie freudig ist mein Herz.