John Eliot Gardner is performing and recording all of Bach’s cantatas this year. “Though Bach is best known now for his grand masterpieces like the “St. Matthew Passion” and the B minor Mass, it was the 340 cantatas composed during his five years, starting in 1723, as cantor at the Thomaskirche in Leipzig that drew the most notice when he died on July 28, 1750. They were the only pieces of music noted in the first paragraph of his obituary.” – New York Times