A prolific composer of both sacred and secular music, Buxtehude wrote over 120 sacred cantatas for St Mary’s, Lübeck, where he had the prestigious and highly-paid position of Werkmeister. The works here recorded illustrate Buxtehude’s masterful command of the huge variety of styles that characterized the sacred cantata in Germany during the seventeenth century. All begin with an instrumental passage, and sung text is interspersed with instrumental responses, sometimes in strophic form. In the larger cantatas for all three voices, the music allows for the maximum of contrast, whereas the four solo cantatas give a more intimate expression of Buxtehude’s craft. Into the latter category falls the extremely virtuosic Jubilate Domino, one of Buxtehude’s best-known cantatas.