Countdown to the Festival: Tuesday Evening

We had another very-productive rehearsal tonight, and things are coming together beautifully for the concerts this weekend.  We worked on several movements of the Mass to begin, after listening to Mary Watt and the Orchestra play the opening sinfonia of Cantata No. 21. Mary is an exceptional oboist, and she has an wonderfully keen sense of phrasing (as well as seemingly endless breath support).  The sinfonia features slowly evolving phrases over a walking bass line, with oboe supported by a halo of strings.  Occasionally, the strings become duetting partners, with wrenchingly beautiful long lines.  This serves as a wonderful prelude to the lamenting choral parts that follow, which we covered later in the rehearsal. Those laments are almost mantra-like in their repetition, and this piece was one that one of Bach’s chirpier critics, Johann Mattheson (an ally of Georg Frederich Händel), singled out for comment.  Mattheson objected to the repetition relaying the text out of context, “I, I, I, I had much grief, I had much grief, in my heart, in my heart. I had much grief, etc., in my heart, etc., etc.”  Bach uses those repetitions to create a sense of despair, often creating dissonances between the vocal parts.  As this cantata is a favorite of Bach connoisseurs, I think history has come to a very different judgment of this piece!

We also welcomed the horns back for another survey of the rousing music of Cantata No. 79, which is coming together quite nicely.  This piece will open the program on Friday afternoon, and I can hardly think of a more engaging way to set off on the musical journey for this year’s Festival.

I had a moment’s visit with Tom Goeman, our wonderful Assistant Conductor and Organist, during one of our breaks, and he showed me the interesting organ obligato to Cantata No. 170, which is an solo cantata for alto, sung at the Festival by Daniel Taylor.  I’m not terribly familiar with this piece, but I’m very much looking forward to hearing Daniel sing it, and always admire the thoughtful preparation that goes into all of the instrumentalists’ work.

We also sang through the two choral movements of Cantata No. 80, and they’re also evolving in a satisfying way.  There are definitely some adjustments to be made with our adoption of the new stage arrangement, but everyone is getting more and more acclimated to the set-up, and things are sounding wonderful.  The opening of Cantata No. 80 is full of vigor and excitement, and, like No. 79, a great way to open the program.   The Reformation clearly was a source of great inspiration to Bach.

We concluded the rehearsal with the fourth verse of Cantata No. 4, which depicts the battle between life and death.  In an evocative choral fugue, Bach illustrates the ferocity of the battle with a mostly syllabic text setting – there are lots of ploded consonants and rolled Rs, creating an amazing aural picture of this wunderlicher battle.  In the midst of the malay, the alto section brightly sings the chorale melody, aided by the organ obligato.  This is a very challenging piece, and it’s The Choir’s mastery of it continues to grow.  We’ll return to Packer Memorial Church tomorrow evening for our last rehearsal before a night off to rest, and then it’s onward to the Festival.  I’ll update after the rehearsal tomorrow evening.

Countdown to the Festival: Saturday’s Events

As in most years, we’re offering two concurrent concerts on Saturday morning (and if music lovers are proximate, I suggest going to one the first weekend, and the other on the second Saturday).   One of the joys of the Festival is that it so often allows for concerts of varying intimacy, and the Saturday morning concerts this year are no exception.

Saturday Mornings, May 5 & & 12, 10:30 am –The Ifor Jones Memorial Chamber Music Concert
Eliot Fisk and the Bach Festival Orchestra

2012′s Festival marks the return of guitar virtuoso Eliot Fisk to Bethlehem.  We’re quite delighted to have him, and his performance with the Bach Festival Orchestra promises to be a highlight of proceedings!  I wrote an article in the Bach Choir News about Eliot’s performance, which you may read here.  He’ll be performing a concerto by the early 19th century composer Mauro Guiliani with the orchestra, and a transcription of the Chaconne from the D-Minor Violin Partita by himself. Eliot is excited to be playing his own cadenza to the Guiliani, which shall be an added delight!  Bookending those pieces will be two of Bach’s Orchestral Suites, including the intimate B-Minor, with our beloved principal flautist, Robin Kani as soloist, and the majestic D-Major, with the joy of trumpets and timpani added to the mix.

Saturday Mornings, May 5 & & 12, 10:30 am, Peter Hall
Bach and the Art of Dance:  Charlotte Mattax-Moersch, Harpsichord

The Choir’s wonderful continuo payer, Charlotte Mattax-Moersch, will be offering the complete Partitas for keyboard at what promises to be a fantastic recital in the intimate setting of Peter Hall at Moravian College.  This small hall, complete with beautiful stained glass, is a wonderful space in which to hear harpsichord music, and Charlotte’s playing is sure to be offered with the zest and panache for which she is justly famous.  The Partitias were published as part of the Clavier-Übung I, the first collection of Bach’s music published under his own direction. They number six, in total, and are made up of movements with the titles of French dances.  The evocative title of Charlotte’s program  alludes to those dances, and, with a little imagination, one can easy envision the courtly dances that this music evokes.  Charlotte will be playing a harpsichord built by Bethlehem’s own Willard Martin, and this recital will be an absolute delight for listeners.

Saturday Afternoons, May 5 & 11, 2:30 pm
The Mass in B-Minor

At the heart of the Festival for 105 years stands Bach’s towering masterpiece, the Mass in B-Minor.  I remember well my first Festival, in the spring of 1989.  The audience was still putatively observing the convention of no applause until the end of the Mass, and I eagerly joined in.  What a profound musical journey, and what glorious music!  In Sir Nicholas Kenyon’s Faber Pocket Guide to Bach, he quotes the American composer Michael Torke, “Why waste money on psychotherapy when you can listen to the B Minor Mass?”  I’m not at all willing to commend that particular prescription, but as a figurative endorsement of the power of this music, I’m in utter agreement. The wonderful thing about the Festival is that attendees and performers alike are privileged to encounter this music every year.  This year, I’ll mark my 26th and 27th performances of the Mass with The Choir, and I’m as excited to for this year’s performances as I was for my first (and just a little bit less daunted – it’s mostly committed to memory at this point).   The Choir knows and loves this music, and it’s always an utter joy to share in such beauty with our devoted audience.

Countdown to the Festival: Monday Night

We had an excellent rehearsal tonight.  Things started with The Choir and Orchestra acclimating to a new set-up that we’re debuting this year, for the Festival (we tried it out back in 2009 for a Händel and Bach concert, to rave reviews). The Orchestra is now on a platform in the crossing which allows The Choir to move forward.  We then dug into the first and second movements of Cantata No. 4.  This is early Bach, and the opening sinfonia for strings quotes the chorale upon which the cantata is based, Christ lag in todesbanden.  This plaintive orchestra prelude gives way to the rigorous counterpoint of the second movement, with the choral parts burnished with the beauty of the trombones. We then visited an excellent movement of Cantata No. 21, which begins with a semi-chorus, basso continuo, and the entire tenor section.  The other three vocal parts sing counterpoint over which the hymn tune “If thou but trust in God to guide thee” is superimposed in the tenor part.  Later, the full choir enters, along with the mighty trombones.  It’s arresting music.  We then had a first run through the concluding movement of No. 21, which begins with stately declarations of praise, followed by a very zesty choral dance, with long melismatic passages. This movement is very challenging to sing, but also a lot of fun.   Next up, we began Cantata No. 79, and greeted two exceptional horn players, who made their way through the difficult music with aplomb.  The theme they play among them is very high in the horn’s range, and is quite active, which leads to a different sonority from the sort of flaring, sustaining sounds to which we’re accustomed in modern orchestras.  Instead, they add a jolly, commanding melodic presence.  The Choir joins the dance with homophonic (chordal) entrances, followed by a very lively fugue, with sixteenth note runs in the orchestra and very active counterpoint in the choir. We next sang through the first movement of Cantata No. 80, with its lively counterpoint and canon between the highest and lowest instruments of the orchestra.  It was exciting to hear the organ pedals join the orchestral basses for a little extra gravity in that section of the piece.  Then came an especially exciting orchestral moment, in a movement of No. 80.  Over a searingly fast orchestral accompaniment with strings and wings in dialogue, the choir sings the chorale melody.  It’s a rhapsodic moment, and the sixteenth note runs whip along at astonishing speed.  We concluded our first rehearsal with the Kyries of the Mass in B-Minor, and a semi-chorus worked with strings and winds for the Qui Tollis movement of the Gloria.  Whew!  Musicians have now returned home for a well-deserved rest and will convene again tomorrow evening for more polishing and refinement.  We’re off to an excellent start!

Countdown to the Festival: The 105th Bethlehem Bach Festival

I spent an hour on air at WDIY this past Friday to listen to a little bit of our new St. John Passion recording, and to plug the upcoming 105th Bethlehem Bach Festival, and the host, Wally Vinoskis, asked me to summarize what was on tap for our audience.  I’m rather sure I prattled on for quite some time, and I’m not even sure I mentioned everything!  I will try to remedy that below with a hopeless partisan’s preview of the wonderful series of concerts  and related activities upon which we will soon embark.  Stay tuned for updates – our first rehearsal at Packer Memorial Church is tonight, and I’ll be posting all week (and weekend).   See, also, Steve Siegel’s preview in the Morning Call, here.

Fridays Afternoons, May 4 & & 11, 2 pm –Distinguished Scholar Lecture
Nicholas Kenyon: Bach in the 21st Century
Black Box Theatre, Zoellner Arts Center; Free Admission – no tickets required

Sir Nicholas will be coming to us from London, where he is the managing director of the Barbican Center.  Prior to that, he was was the director of the BBC Proms from 1996-2007, in which capacity he invited The Choir to perform at the 2003 Proms, which was the anchor of our wonderful tour of the UK that summer.  He recently penned an excellent book, The Faber Pocket Guide to Bach, which, I’m sorry to report doesn’t fit in my pocket (which is why I have both the print and Kindle editions of the book).  The Guide is an excellent overview of the Bach universe.  Sir Nicholas offers a surprisingly detailed overview, not just in terms of biography and repertoire, but also snippets of theological analysis, discussions of performance practice, and a very personal view of Bach and his music.  I read it straight through, in an afternoon.

His lecture, which Steve Siegel previewed in the Morning Call, here, is entitled Bach in the 21st Century, and it promises to be a very satisfying prelude to the festival.  Sir Nicholas is an exceptionally engaging writer and speaker, and I’m very much looking forward to his exploration of this subject.

Friday Afternoons, May 4 & 11, 4:30 pm – Bach Cantatas

The music starts with a joyful clatter:  the horns and timpani of Cantata No. 79, which is one of Bach’s two epic-scale cantatas in observance of the Reformation.  The Choir’s very good friend (and former tenor), Dr. Ellis Finger, headlined the Bach Choir News with an article exploring the music for the Festival, which you may find here.  To Ellis’ always-erudite ruminations, I’ll only add that Cantata 79, with it’s incorporation of the chorale tune,  Nunn danket alle Gott (“Now thank we all our God”), is an amazingly cheerful affair, full of beautiful, rousing music.  The concert will continue with Bach’s Cantata No. 170, a solo cantata for alto.  Joining the choir will be countertenor Daniel Taylor, who has riveted audiences in Bethlehem (and around the world – he’s worked with virtually all of the major players on the early music scene) for over a decade.  The program concludes with Bach’s Easter masterpiece, Cantata No. 4.  This cantata, which sets verses of the sturdy Easter chorale, Christ lag in todesbanden (“Christ lay in death’s bonds”), is an audience favorite, and is also widely held to be one of the best of Bach’s 200 surviving cantatas.  Ever the musical tinkerer, Bach added parts for cornet and three trombones to double the voices later in his career, and we’re happy to be presenting this scoring of the cantata.  The brass instruments add a kind of Brahmsian richness to the affair.

Following the afternoon concerts, audience members may elect to dine (with a reservation, of course) in the Asa Packer Dining Room in the Lehigh University Center.  Dr. Larry Lipkis, composer-in-residence at Moravian College, and deeply-esteemed member of the Baltimore Consort, will offer an informal discussion of the Festival repertoire.  Larry is an engaging and deeply-knowledgeable speaker (as well as a fantastic instrumentalist and composer), and his talks are always both fun and informative.

Friday Evenings, May 4 & 11, 8:30 pm – Bach Cantatas

The Friday evening concerts kick off with the tenors of The Choir declaiming the fugal subject based on the melody of Ein feste burg (“A mighty fortress”) which begins Bach’s wonderful cantata of the same name, No. 80.  Scholars have found this music in the Moravian Archives, dating from 1823, which leads us to the conclusion that Bethlehem was the site of the first performances of Bach’s music in America (this was 6 years prior to Mendelssohn’s revival of the St. Matthew Passion in 1829).  A beast for musicians, and a treat for listeners, this piece is also an audience favorite, and it will be a wonderful overture to an evening of stunning music.  Also on the program is Bach’s early cantata, No. 21.  This piece is a musical, spiritual, and intellectual journey from sorrow and distress to rapturous joy.  Like Cantata No. 4 in the afternoon program, Bach later buttressed the singing parts with trombones, and we’ll be using that scoring for our performances.  The piece begins with an achingly beautiful sinfonia for oboe soloist and strings and concludes with full choir, brass, strings, winds and timpani.  It is a marvel, from start to finish, and will be a fitting conclusion to the program.

I will update tonight with some reflections on our first orchestral rehearsals, and tomorrow I’ll preview Saturday’s events, including an appearance by Eliot Fisk, Charlotte Mattax-Moersch’s performance of the Partitas for harpsichord in Peter Hall, and, of course, the Mass in B-Minor.  Stay tuned!

Wrap-Up, Bach at Noon

We had a near-capacity turnout for our last Bach at Noon of the season, and it was a barn-burner.  First, Greg Funfgeld and Loretta O’Sullivan treated the audience to a beautiful Beethoven cello sonata, played with their characteristic panache and elan.  The music was quite lovely, and an excellent musical mirror of the glorious day outside.  Forthwith, I shall begin a campaign for them to visit the Brahms sonatas in the coming years.

I described my first experience hearing the orchestral accompaniment to Cantata No. 130 in my last post.  As I walked in this morning, our colleagues in the orchestra were playing the instrumental prelude, and it was as thrilling as ever.  Likewise was the performance – this is definitely some white-knuckle music, so full of vigor and zest.  Our fantastic trumpets played impeccably in the bass aria (baritone Dashon Burton was fantastic in his second Bethlehem appearance) – one could definitely hear the wag of the dragon’s tail, but also the triumph of the angels depicted in this exciting aria.  Rosa Lamoreaux and Robert Petillo acquitted themselves marvelously on their recitatives and aria, as did Robin Kani on her flute obligato.  It was very rewarding to have the audience join us for the last verse of the closing chorale, with Bach’s marvelous plenum of trumpets crowning the music.

Some years ago, when The Choir was doing the work of endowing the Bach at Noon series, choir members past and present were challenged to endow one of the concerts ourselves.  Many of us responded to that challenge, and a large amount of money was given from the singers to do just that.  It was very gratifying to be reminded of that in the program, and to think of that living legacy of beautiful music, a gift from The Choir, to  our beloved audience.  What a wonderful way to cap a season of Bach at Noon concerts!

I expect to be busy in the next few weeks, writing about the upcoming 2012 Bethlehem Bach Festival.  The Choir’s been hard at work on our repertoire for the festival, and much exciting music and revelry is on tap.  Please stay tuned!

The Angels Around Us: Bach at Noon, April 10th

The first time I heard the full accompaniment to Cantata No. 130 was in the rehearsal before a Bach at Noon.  The work is based on the hymn tune, Old 100^th¸ which most listeners will recognize as the doxology from many Protestant liturgies, “Praise God from whom all blessings flow.”  The tune comes from John Calvin’s Genevan Psalter, whose metrical psalmody (or metered hymn settings of the psalms) worked its way to Bach’s liturgical neighborhood, and, thus, we have another example of the omnivorous nature of Bach’s musical appetite.  Back to that Bach at Noon:  Greg and the orchestra were running the first movement as the choir was arriving, and, I have to confess, I thought, “Oh dear, he’s going much too fast.”  I’d heard Tom Goeman burn through the piano reduction, which simplifies the many lines of counterpoint, but this was the first time I’d heard all of the orchestral parts, in all of their synchronicity.  This music is both dense, in a textual sense, and extremely fleet of foot.  But, that fast?

Yes, actually.  About halfway through, I was able to exhale as I noticed our orchestral colleagues tearing it up on their respective parts.  The accompaniment is, among other things, a perpetuum mobile –there are extremely zippy sixteenth notes flowing for its duration.  On top of this, there are white-knuckle dialogs and echoes between the winds, the trumpets, and the strings.  The whole thing is a churning, swirling musical contraption, much like the wheels of a clock that has been wound perhaps a little too tightly, and I hope you won’t think it hyperbolic for me to suggest that the whole thing could easily go spinning out of control (it won’t, though).  Did I mention that, at this point, I’m only talking about the instrumental parts?  The soprano section is the first of the vocal parts to enter the fun, blazing away on the melody as the lower three voices latch on to different parts of the counterpoint with melismas that occasionally double the instrumental writing, and sometimes fling off on their own.  After each line of the hymn, there are instrumental interpolations of varying lengths to flesh out the movement.  There’s a sort of rapture to this movement that seems almost Mozartean in its ecstatic joy, but it’s also recognizably Bach at the helm.

The liturgical occasion for which it was written is the Feast of St. Michael, the archangel, and the imaginative texts abound in angels.  In the first movement, described above, the singers thank God for the blessing of angels.  The second movement, a recitative for alto, reflects on the presence of angels as protectors of the faithful.  Next, and elaborate aria for bass, trumpets, and timpani, evokes, according to the late, great Craig Smith (of Emmanuel Music in Boston), “the wagging of the dragon’s tail,” in a battle with St. Michael.  A duet in recitative style for tenor and alto again praises the assistance of angels in the story of Daniel and the lions’ den, as well as in our daily life and work.  This is followed by a gallant tenor aria that requests a journey on Elijah’s chariot for the faithful on their return to heaven.   A beautiful, characteristically elegant harmonization of the tune concludes the piece with continued praise for the intercession of angels, and a request for their protection.  In contrast to the overflowing exuberance of the first movement, Bach adds descants of trumpets and timpani at the end of each of the phrases, a sturdy and noble way to conclude a most ebullient cantata.

Join us on April 10th, at the Central Moravian Church, in downtown Bethlehem for a concert of angelic and rhapsodic music, a perfect way to continue the joy of Easter Sunday, which will precede our Tuesday offering.  Also on offer is a sonata for cello and piano, by Beethoven, which will be performed by Greg Funfgeld and Loretta O’Sullivan.  The two are peerless in their Bach interpretations, and, last year, we heard their mastery of Beethoven’s music.  It’s going to be fantastic.  The doors open at 11:30, and the concert starts just after noon.

The St. John Passion

Our recording label, Analekta, released last May’s recording of the St. John Passion at the very end of February.  You can listen to it on the Analekta site, on Spotify, and it’s available for download from iTunes and Analekta.  We think the best way to procure the recording is from us, by visiting our site, or calling the Bachhaus at 610 866 4382, (or stopping by).

A few thoughts about the recording (about which I wrote, at the time, here, here, and here):  This was definitely a labor of love.  The Choir loves singing the St. John  - It’s a very important part of our musical DNA. A precursor to our organization sang the America premiere in 1888, in Bethlehem, under the direction of The Choir’s founder, J. Fred Wolle.  We recorded it between weekends of the 2011 Bethlehem Bach Festival, a grueling schedule under any circumstances, especially so, since most of us have day jobs!  The exhaustion and other prosaic concerns were immediately washed away by the experience of the music.  In fact, I think the sessions were among the easiest in which I’ve ever participated, at least from an endurance standpoint.  This was made possible by several factors.  First, Greg Funfgeld works extremely hard to balance the pressures of recording difficult music with extremely high standards, while maintaining an atmosphere of loving calm.  Second, our producer and balance engineer for this project, Martha de Francisco, was also able to balance her exacting standards and insight with a similar sense of patience and calm.  Greg and Martha made a really remarkable dream team in working towards the goals of this project.  Third, we had a magnificent performance resonating in our musical souls from the previous weekend.  It was a St. John to remember, and the contributions from all the soloists were amazingly beautiful.  In particular, the singing of our Evangelist, Charles Daniels, set an extremely high standard that we couldn’t help but seek to achieve.  Charles was joined by wonderful soloists from both sides of the Atlantic:  Julia Doyle, Benjamin Butterfield, William Sharp, Christòpheren Nomura,  and David Newman.

My wife, mother-in-law, and I hard the privilege of listening to the first edit of the recording from start to finish, twice, during a Thanksgiving trip.  After listening about halfway through, my mother-in-law said, “I don’t know how you can sing anything else!”  The St. John is so laden with depth, with theological insight, with musical genius, that it’s definitely on my desert island list.  With the release of this recording, an important part of our living legacy is now preserved forever.  I am exceptionally proud of every facet of it (do read Robin Leaver’s exceptional essay on listening to the Passion with 21st century ears).

Those are some thoughts on the musical and spiritual aspects of the recording.  I’m also pleased to say that Martha and her assistants recorded and edited us extremely well.  This is no small feat:  balancing 100 singers against a chamber orchestra is quite a puzzle of microphone placement, as is capturing the ambiance of the room, and the pace of a live performance (from several disjunct takes).  Technically, in terms of sound and recording quality, I believe this is one of our finest recordings.  Analekta’s graphic design department did a wonderful job with the cover and the booklet.  I mused at the end of our last season that we seem to have reached a new altitude as an organization.  With this new recording, I think that evolution continues.

PS.  Happy Bach’s Birthday!