Heinrich Schütz continued to set himself challenges throughout his long career. Of all the genres of sacred music that he undertook, the oratorio offers us his most contrasting ideas. His Historia der Geburt Jesu Christi (1664) is, in many respects, the model for the genre that would later be employed by the musicians of Johann Sebastian Bach's generation. The score that Vox Luminis use for this recording has been reconstructed from manuscript sources in the Düben Collection in Uppsala. The album is completed with a number of particularly festive motets for the Christmas period by Heinrich Schütz and his illustrious contemporary, Andreas Hammerschmidt.