Midway through the sacred cantatas, Mazaaki Suzuki and his seasoned Collegium are beginning what is, presumably, a mini-series of the secular works (there are only 20 or so surviving). The inaugural volume contains one of Bach’s most challenging solo soprano works, the wedding piece O holder Tag, and the Coffee Cantata, a perennial favourite. It has been well-characterised on record, from the delicate charm of Hogwood to the heavier guffaws of Rilling (though my favourite is Rolf Reinhardt’s imaginative, little-known pearl from 1955 – Vox, nla).

The centrepiece is the elegant sicilienne aria, ‘Heute noch’. Suzuki has an ideal Liesgen (the daughter) in Carolyn Sampson. She caresses the music, quivers at the prospect of a good man, which is the deal for giving up the coffee and yet clearly has no intention of doing so. Suzuki’s aesthetic judgement is finely honed here. Stephan Schreckenberger as Liesgen’s father responds with blustery badinage, but Suzuki himself misses the character of this domestic scena; the instrumental contributions are underplayed, apart from some outstanding flute solos. ‘Ei! wie schmeckt’ could certainly be better in tune.

The O holder Tag performance is in a different league. Bach explores a generic theme of music and love over the course of five brilliant and highly contrasted arias. Suzuki’s is a sensitive and considered reading, one less urgent and ecstatic than Dorothea Röschmann’s, but the composed warmth in the arias, ‘Spielet’ and ‘Schweigt, ihr flöte’, accentuates Bach’s most disarmingly generous gestures. Sampson is set to become a Bach singer of real stature – and, goodness, we need them – especially if she can let the music do the work (easier said than done in Bach) and know when to sail on the breath.