A singer of exceptional intelligence and technical ability, Elizabeth Watts impressed in a couple of leading opera roles for the London Handel Festival while still a student at the Royal College of Music but her Baroque experience has only recently begun to manifest itself on disc. Hot on the heels of her contribution to the Classical Opera Company’s splendid recording of Arne’s Artaxerses (JS lauded her “ruthless virtuosity” – Linn, 4/11), this recital collects together Bach’s two greatest solo soprano cantatas, BWV51 and 199; it is forgivable that these have been paired together on disc quite a few times because they are ideally contrasted in sentiment, dramatic mood and musical style. The commonplace pairing is fleshed out with four pleasingly varied arias from an unpredictable choice of cantatas and a concise booklet-note by John Butt gives an insightful introduction to the music (which covers both Weimar and Leipzig periods of Bach’s career).

The programme commences with the gentle pastoral hints of “Letzte Stunde, brich herein” (from BWV31), which features Katharina Spreckelsen’s lovely oboe obbligato and beautifully controlled pizzicato strings; Watts’s tone of voice differentiates astonishingly between the softly lyrical opening number and urgent desperation during the subsequent “Ich wünschte mir den Tod” (from BWV57, in which Bicket optimises the pathos of the rich string parts). The mood of intense penitence intensifies in Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut: Watts’s smouldering vocal approach to the text is deeply involving rather than merely lovely (a mild criticism that might be levelled at Natalie Dessay’s 2008 disc – Virgin, 1/09). The English Concert’s upper strings and oboe provide beguiling weightlessness in “Wie zittern und wanken” (from BWV105); Watts’s passagework is impassioned, although some might find her engrossed melodramatic style a shade too powerful to be ideally didactic (maybe not everything in Bach always has to be profoundly extrovert). After an abundance of doleful piety, the D major festivity and trumpet-laden jollity of Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen! (BWV51) is a welcome change: Bicket’s pacing allows the orchestral contribution to be both lively and detailed, and even if Watts’s gutsy abandon might not cater for all tastes, her gleeful dialogue with Mark Bennett’s meaty trumpet-playing in the finale has plenty of ballsy jubilation.