Christoph Graupner, who was active for over 50 years at the Hessian court in Darmstadt, is a kind of insiders’ tip whose rich musical production is barely visible. For all that, he was the preferred candidate for the post of cantor at St. Thomas’ Church in Leipzig in 1723, which Johann Sebastian Bach accepted in his stead.

The present CD introduces first recordings of three of his unusually colourful bass solo cantatas as well as an original Suite for Chalumeau. In his cantatas, Graupner uses texts structured similarly to those of Bach: they consist of chorale verses and poetry based on Biblical quotations. The melodic language of these cantatas frequently proceeds in tortuous paths and the content of the text is repeatedly depicted in harmonic surprises and sharp dissonances. When listening to these works, it immediately becomes clear that Graupner was "not a slave to his predecessors, but a genius in his own right", according to a contemporary appraisal. The reason why his works remain largely unknown is that the original scores were kept strictly under lock and key for decades. Over 1400 cantatas of Graupner have been preserved in Darmstadt, the city where he worked, ever since a dispute over his estate remained undecided. There, the bass-baritone Klaus Mertens, one of today's most well-versed and prominent singers in the early music scene, has occupied himself intensively with these works, selecting three cantatas which he interprets with his warmly sonorous, unmistakeable voice.