Johannes Passion
Christoph Demantius

The fact that Christoph Demantius has been largely forgotten is probably mainly due to the fact that hardly anything is known about his life: born at the end of 1567 in Reichenberg in Bohemia, student in Wittenberg, cantor in Zittau and finally in the same position at Freiberg Cathedral from 1604 until his death – there is not much more. The lavish catalog of works, from which the St. John Passion, composed in 1631, stands out like a monolith and is regarded as a highlight of early Baroque passions, is a different story: A six-piece formation “collectively” tells the story of suffering in artful vocal writing and with an expressive sympathy that is second to none. Ensemble director Alexander Schneider has selected music by Andreas Hammerschmidt, Heinrich Schütz, Johann Hermann Schein and other contemporaries as musical commentaries – it could have sounded like this at a Good Friday service in central Germany. Provided it had been sung by a polyharmonic ensemble.