Georg Frideric Handel could hardly have wished for a better teacher than Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, the longtime organist of St. Mary's Church in Halle. Born into a family of Stadtpfeifer and given the broadest possible musical training by his father in the venerable traditions of the guild, the native of Colln on the Spree possessed the full range of musical skills needed to give a gifted young musician a thorough grounding in both the fundamentals of the craft and the art of sacred composition.

This should not suggest, however, that Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow was merely one of the countless competent minor masters who routinely discharged their duties at the organ and in front of the choir. His cantatas reveal a composer keenly attuned to the musical currents of his time, reflecting them in his own works while adding innovations of his own, yet never losing sight of the Lutheran chorale tradition that makes the works recorded here instantly recognizable as Christmas music to this day.