With this reissue of a 1986 recording, works of the important Czech humanist and composer Jan Novák are being made known to a wider public in Germany for the first time. Both compositions are based on texts of the ancient poet Virgil. In DIDO he depicts the torture of an unfulfilled love ending in suicide. Contrasting with this, Mimus Magicus is the drastically depicted love-magic of a Roman woman who knows very well how to help herself in earthly life. Rafael Kubelik, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and the soloist Marilyn Schmiege allow these ancient worlds to be graphically resurrected with a combination of precision and vitality in music making.