Karl Richter (1926-1981) - (1/3) Bach (sacred compositions)

KARL RICHTER (1926-1981) --- "[...] In Leipzig, Richter studied with the former Thomaskantor Karl Straube (1873-1950) and also with Straube's successor, Günther Ramin (1898-1956). Richter always felt that he was a part of this Saxon tradition, a tradition to which Heinrich Schütz, too, had belonged but which was marked above all by the 19th century's attitude to art. [...] [F]or Richter, too, it was always important to 'study and master the works of all composers, old and new'. Equally important to him was the idea of inspiration, for it was this that turned the performing musician into a creative artist. Richter sought and found this inspiration not in history and scholarship but in the world of imagination [...]" --- Matthias Hengelbrock, "The Last Romantic" (Deutsche Grammophon), 2006.