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NB: upon purchase you receive 3 versions: normal version for soprano recorder, normal version for alto recorder, a version with the original chorale text underneath it.

Arrangements of the Matthew Passion by Johann Sebastian Bach for a recorder.

In the past there were no cds or apps. If you wanted to take your favourite music home, you had to play it yourself. A fascinating example of this is Händel’s operas, almost all of which have been published in an arrangement for solo recorder (!). Of course, a lot is lost, but recently I have started being interested in the idea of cutting away that much of the music and seeing what (if any) essence might be left? In my Passion for a Flute project, I’m curious to what extend this is transferable to the Matthew Passion. This epitome of baroque music is a masterwork of counterpoint. In comparison to Händel’s music there is much more counterpoint. I have therefore opted for a different style than that in the Händel arrangements, where mostly the first violin and vocal parts have been taken as the melody. Having studied Telemann’s flute fantasias and their application to improvisation for my thesis, I apply in these arrangements the ideas for sharing counterpoint rhythmically over the beat.

Although the music is slow and not that complicated, this turned out to be a veritable etude. Trying to figure out how to make the big leaps on the recorder whilst finding a melody in the upper part AND trying to express some of the articulation of the original words was quite a task!