Guest Post: Bach's 133 Arias For Tenor

Jon Ploug Jørgensen is a young Danish classicist, or teacher of classics, with a strong proclivity for all things classical.

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It was only a year ago that I discovered Bach's arias. I always knew they were there and have enjoyed them when I heard works such as the Christmas Oratorio, St. Matthew Passion, etc. But it was only when I started to use Spotify that I learned about the hundreds of other arias which Bach composed as a small part of his hundreds of cantatas - an achievement I still find it hard to comprehend! Perhaps the greatest discovery here was that these arias - composed at a furious pace - were as good as the arias from the large and more famous oratorios.

It was especially the arias for tenor that caught me, and I must admit that I almost never listened to any other music for the last six month. For convenience, I set up a playlist in Spotify, where I gathered all Bach’s arias for tenor, which I hear present.

When you stumble upon something great you want to share it and I am therefore pleased that Ulysses will present them on his excellent blog. A blog, which also has brought me lots of inspiration for classical listening.

Here's the Spotify playlist: Bach's Arias for Tenor (133 tracks, total time: 9 hours) Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view

Guest Post by Jon Ploug Jørgensen.

P.S. There are at least six complete or semi-complete sets of J.S. Bach's cantatas on Spotify, you can get them in six playlists here and here.