Handel's Eternal source of light divine is that rare phenomenon, a masterly simple score which speaks straight to the heart. It is a sound picture of daybreak, the panorama of sustained string tone pierced by James Bowman's commanding voice and the unearthly beauty of the natural trumpet played by Crispian Steele-Perkins. Difficult as it is to find companion pieces of comparable quality, we are offered a remarkable programme of highly individual pieces. Buxtehude's Jubilate Domino winds gently through unexpected paths. Johann Christoph Bach's Lamentatio is crowded with crushingly beautiful harmonies—a wonderful work, most movingly performed. Jesu, meine Freud und Lust represents Buxtehude at his most imaginative, a most memorable aria, sailing with Purcellian confidence through the fixed points of poetic structure. The two hymns by Georg Mathias Monn (a Viennese organist, 1717-50) are highly expressive melodies, one short, bright and cheerful, the other long and penitential but with cheerfulness breaking through, a leisurely setting of the psalm verses which begin ''My God, my soul is vexed within me''. The seemingly endless stream of string tone complementing the calm vocal line induces a soothing trance-like state. The final item by Johann Wolfgang Franck is in jaunty operatic style (he studied Monteverdi's music) and it's n ot surprising to learn that he had considerable success in England, where, in the late seventeenth century such graceful melodies as this were much sought after. This is indeed a disc full of revelations. Performances and recording quality of equally high standard.'