The seven works brought together on Vol.4 of our complete recording of Kuhnau’s cantatas offer a remarkable cross-section featuring sacred works and more. They have also been transmitted in all sorts of different ways. The spectrum ranges from extant autographs and original printed editions leaving no doubt about Kuhnau’s authorship to copies from what was clearly a later time or sources from rather peripheral lines of transmission in which the materials themselves as well as the stylistic findings offer reasons for critical scepticism about the ascription of the works to Kuhnau. The most reliable sources as far as authenticity is concerned are those for the two burial songs, ‘Gott hat uns nicht gesetzt zum Zorn’ and ‘Ach, Gott, wie lässt du mich verstarren’. These two works are from Kuhnau’s early period but nonetheless pieces of great artistic mastery and have to be regarded as model examples of the church style that exercised an absolutely enormous influence on the formation of the church styles of Bach, Handel and Telemann.