The Venice Baroque Orchestra have already made friends with their vigorous and colourful Vivaldi. Bach is, of course, quite a different matter and this programme with mezzo Angelika Kirchschlager demonstrates, at best, how soloist and orchestra forge something which can resonate beyond the potentially fragmented context of excerpted arias.

The programme traverses many landmark cantata arias of a voice-type which seems to have induced a special reflective sympathy in Bach: apart from movements taken from the renowned solo cantatas Nos 54 and 170, the choice also extends towards the soprano tessitura with a ‘Schlummert ein’ from Ich habe genug (the version Bach transposed up a third from the original bass). This is the least satisfactory track; Kirchschlager’s voice is often intensely expressive but it loses allure at the top end and tuning dips too regularly. Moreover the orchestra plumps for an almost soporific evenness of line which, while appropriate in its textual reference to deathly slumber, leads to overall enervation.

There are some gems, however, especially when the soloist conveys her considerable esprit, as in the ebullient ‘Nichts Kann mich erretten’ from Cantata 74 and ‘Laudamus te’, or the contemplative delicacy of ‘Widerstehe’ and the great aria from No 42 in which the Venetians show off their sweet-toned and poetic oboist, and ‘Erbarme dich’, in which Giuliano Carmignola provides beguiling and free-spirited violin playing.

Judged by the very highest standards, Kirchschlager in Bach has neither a supremely ravishing sound nor quite the capacity to embody a text with a consistently engaging level of warmth or characterisation, this despite an intermittently compelling expressive freedom. She is a highly responsive and imaginative singer (superb diction) and many will appreciate her unequivocal vocal presence and the orchestra’s bright-eyed, if unseasoned view of Bach. I should add that the editing (or choice of takes) is not all that it could have been: distinctly unpolished in places. A qualified success.