"Ich bin vergnugt" (I am content) is the title of the new CD by soprano Miriam Feuersinger. It refers to Johann Sebastian Bach's cantata "Ich bin vergnugt mit meinem Glucke" BWV 84, but it also corresponds entirely to the feelings of the singer, who is fulfilling a long-cherished wish of her heart with this programme.

The young Austrian soprano Miriam Feuersinger presents her debut CD accompanied by the Capricornus Consort Basel with a selection of several cantatas by the Kapellmeister at the Darmstadt court. With the agreeable timbre of her easily appealing voice, she succeeds wonderfully in recreating the appropriate tone of Graupner's sensuous cantata style. As with those of Bach, the cantatas of Graupner aim to stir the listener, but without sacrificing intellectual elegance or even the composure fitting for a predominantly courtly community. Unlike the confidently catchy Telemann, Graupner prefers a refined and subtle elaboration that audibly reckons with skilful interpreters and always seeks to move the listener. Despite all these advantages, the discographical exploration of Graupner's over 1400 cantatas has only just begun.

'Herzens-Lieder' [Songs of the Heart] – this title would certainly have appealed to the two librettists and four composers featured upon this CD. In terms of music and church history, they all – Johann Kuhnau, Georg Philipp Telemann, Christoph Graupner and Johann Sebastian Bach – form part of the Lutheran church choir tradition.

Philipp Heinrich Erlebach (1657-1714) is one of those composers who was forgotten by history. Originally from East Frisia, he arrived at the court of Rudolstadt in Thuringia at the age of 24 to serve as music director, remaining there for the rest of his life: the lustre of the court faded and the collection of over 2500 works by himself and others, amassed by Erlebach during the course of his life, was destroyed by fire. Thus this once significant composer 'from the Province' faded from memory.

It was Christoph Graupner who was selected as the Thomaskantor in Leipzig after Johannes Kuhnau, and it was only the fact that Graupners patron in Darmstadt did not let him go that Johann Sebastian Bach got the job! In fact Graupner was the more famous and more modern composer during those years, yet history almost forgot him for more than two centuries even having composed five times as many cantatas as Bach. An important and highly praised step in the re-discovery or Graupners music was already presented by the soprano Miriam Feuersinger and her ECHO Klassik awarded debut release on Christophorus together with the Capricornus Consort Basel. She is now joined by countertenor Franz Vitzthum for a new album of duo cantatas. This is music of great depth, with the two voices blending so well that sometimes they seem just one.