The Bach family was one of the most musically active dynasties of the 17th and 18th centuries, with many musicians and composers around the courts and churches of what is now Germany. Johann Sebastian took a great interest in the music of his ancestors: he collected and performed it, but much of it was mislaid in the second world war. It surfaced quite recently in Kiev, so this collection includes some serious discoveries, beautifully performed. Unity is provided by the way that chorale melodies are threaded through all these sober, often funereal motets. More cheerful numbers celebrate the new year; especially touching is a JC Bach Advent motet, which JS Bach copied out in his last months.
