The charismatic baritone Benjamin Appl has been an advocate for broadening the audiences for classical vocal music, taking it out of the concert hall into unconventional venues. The same spirit is evident here, although there's nothing unconventional about the tracks on the album singly. Appl is accompanied by the historical-performance group Concerto Köln, which also breaks up the program with instrumental tracks. What's unusual is the broader concept: the idea of a Bach recital, extracting arias from cantatas and the St. Matthew Passion, BWV 244, is not one that's often done. Certainly there are Bach greatest-hits albums, but that's not what Appl is up to here; instead he's after an appreciation of the range of Bach's musical expression. The instrumental movements play a key role here, breaking up the program into self-contained groups of pieces, each of which may have sharp contrasts. Far from greatest hits, Appl chooses unusual number such as the title movement from the secular, Saxon-dialect Mer hahn en neuer Oberkeet, BWV 212, known as the Peasant Cantata. He is humorous, he is reverent, he is stentorian; above all, he seems to care about the words he is singing, and to want to put them across. This is all to the good, although the reason this kind of program is rare -- because it seems unnatural to divorce these arias from the specific religious statements made by the larger works of which they're part -- still applies here. You pay your money, and you can take your choice, which is a new and fresh concepet. The downside is that the low end of Appl's range, which you might call the sweet spot of the baritone voice, disappoints a bit. Sample the pair of pieces from the cantata Wachet! wachet! betet! Wachet!, BWV 70, together with their surrounding instrumental selections, for an idea of the album's strengths and weaknesses: the operatic "Ach, soll nicht dieser große Tag" and the gently arioso-like "Seligster Erquickungstag" are surprising and stand out in your mind, but the latter could use more oomph vocally. When you do get to one of the few real hits at the end, "Jesus bleibet meine Freude," from the Cantata No. 147, you feel as though you have arrived there on a new route. Recommended.