If you were to hear this performance of
Bach's Christmas Oratorio by the
Boston Bach Ensemble in Marsh Chapel at Boston University one snowy Sunday afternoon, you'd probably count yourself lucky to have been there. It has good to very good soloists -- tenor Robert Pitcher is good while bass
Max van Egmond is very good -- it has got a strong, supple chorus in the Marsh Chapel Choir, a colorful, powerful orchestra in the
Boston Bach Ensemble and cool, competent leadership in conductor
Julian Wachner and organist
Peter Watchorn. If, however, after listening to a recording of the same performance you reflect that there are recordings of the work that seem to go deeper into the spirit and music -- you might, for example, think immediately of
John Eliot Gardiner -- you would still not regret having spent the two-plus hours communing with a fully worthy if not perhaps ultimately immortal performance of one of the great seasonal sacred choral works. Titanic's 1998 digital sound is rich, warm, full, and deep if not quite as vivid as a major-label recording.