The theme of this year’s Bachfest was “Vita Christi”, featuring 115 concerts including performances of J.S. Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, the St. John Passion, and the Easter and Ascension Oratorios. These works mark the most important festivals in the Christian church year, and must have made a memorable impression on the city of Leipzig when they were performed in 1734–35 during Christmas, Holy Week, Easter, and Ascension. To supplement these works, sixteen cantatas that recount the teaching and miracles of Jesus Christ were included in the program, along with works like Beethoven’s oratorio Christus am Ölberge, Schubert’s Stabat Mater and the incomplete oratorio Lazarus, as well as C.P.E. Bach’s oratorio Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt Jesu. Rounding out the week were other recitals for organ and chamber music, academic lectures and seminars, excursions to nearby towns, plus innovative offerings in “BACHmosphere” (mixing jazz and open-air performance), and “b@ch for us!” (concerts and workshops for families and youth).

The festival opened on Friday, 14 June, at the Thomaskirche with the theme Christ’s Incarnation. (I was able to watch a live stream from the Bach-Archiv Web site: http://bach-leipzig.de). The program opened with J.S. Bach’s Fantasia in G Major, BWV 572, played by Thomasorganist Ulrich Böhme. After speeches by the mayor of Leipzig and the director of the Bach-Archiv, Christoph Wolff, we heard Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140, and part I of Handel’s Messiahin Mozart’s arrangement, performed by the Thomanerchor Leipzig and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, conducted by Thomaskantor Georg Christoph Biller. It was a little strange to hear music usually associated with Advent in mid-June, but that was the point of the festival: to compress the events of Christ’s life into just over a week. The second concert in the series, on Sunday, 16 June, commemorated Christ’s Birth, with J.S. Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248, at the Gewandhaus, Grosser Saal. Trevor Pinnock led the Tenebrae Choir and Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, with soloists Malin Christiansson (soprano), Christine Rice (mezzo-soprano), Daniel Johannsen (tenor), and Johannes Weisser (baritone). (I was not able to attend this concert, but I spoke to two or three people who were very enthusiastic.)

I arrived in Leipzig on Monday, 17 June, to hot summer weather and attended the third concert at the Thomaskirche, with three works exploring the Arrest and Crucifixion of Christ. The first, J.S. Bach’s Jesu, der du meine Seele, BWV 78, was first performed in Leipzig on 10 September 1724 for the 14th Sunday after Trinity, and is based on the Gospel according to St. Luke, which tells how Jesus healed ten lepers. The first movement of the cantata is an impressive chorus combining Italian and French ostinato form—passacaglia and chaconne—on a descending chromatic bass. The second movement, “Wir eilen mit schwachen, doch emsigen Schritten,” is one of the most lively duets for soprano and alto, sung by Miriam Meyer and Susanne Krumbiegel; the third and fourth movements comprise a recitative and aria for tenor (Jörg Dürmüller) with a flute obbligato, and I thought the tenor was too strident calling the host of hell to battle (‘Der Höllen Heer zum Streite’). The fifth and sixth movements, an accompanied recitative and aria for bass, Henryk Böhm, tell of Christ’s suffering on the cross, and the chorale asks for help in his weakness (‘Herr, ich glaube, hilf mir Schwachen’).

How different is Beethoven’s approach to Christ in the Mount of Olives the night before his crucifixion. Christus am Ölberge was written very quickly in 1803 and performed on 5 April along with his First and Second Symphonies, and his Third Piano Concerto; the oratorio was published much later as Op. 85. Beethoven depicts Jesus as a heroic tenor, and perhaps even as a model for Florestan in his opera Leonore/Fidelio. A far cry from the bass Jesus in J.S. Bach’s Passions, Dürmüller seemed much more suitable for the oratorio. Beethoven concentrates on three soloists, a Seraph and Peter in addition to Jesus, though the closing Maestoso for the Chor der Engel is rousing.

The nineteen-year-old Schubert was equally under the influence of Pergolesi and Beethoven when he composed his Stabat Mater, D 383, to a German text by Klopstock. The program notes, by Frauke Heinze, pointed out that J.S. Bach also made an arrangement of Pergolesi’s piece, and perhaps it would have been more appropriate to perform this work at the Bachfest. Schubert must have gotten the nod due to movements like no. 7,“Erben sollen sie am Throne” (‘They will inherit the throne’), which has a Beethovenian fugue. Overall, it was a meaty piece for the Monteverdi-Chor Hamburg and the Mitteldeutsches Kammerorchester, directed by Gotthart Stier.

On Tuesday, 18 June, the theme was Death and Raising at the Nikolaikirche. There were just two works on the program, and I had expected that J.S. Bach’s Christ lag in Todesbanden, BWV 4, would be done before Schubert’s incomplete oratorio Lazarus, oder Die Feier der Auferstehung, D 689. But Frieder Bernius, conducting the Hofkapelle Stuttgart, chose to begin with the later piece. Schubert was in his early 20s when he abruptly stopped working on it, literally in the middle of an aria for soprano near the end of part 2. I had never heard the work before this performance, and I will admit I was skeptical when the program notes, by Christine Blanken, suggested that Lazarus should be regarded as a precursor to Parsifal. Indeed, Schubert was writing music more like late Schumann or even Brahms and Wagner; he was certainly leaving the oratorios of Handel and Haydn far behind. Surely, Lazarus would have been a hard sell in Vienna in 1820—did Schubert think it could have been staged as an opera? Or did one of his friends tell him it was too difficult? Nevertheless, when it was eventually discovered and performed in 1863 in Vienna by Brahms, it was apparently quite successful. But it is not likely to enter the repertory, in part because it is unfinished.

There is little for the chorus to sing, except for some male and female part-songs, and the soloists bear the weight of the piece. The cast included Sarah Wegener (soprano—Maria), Johanna Winkel (soprano—Martha), Sophie Harmsen (mezzo-soprano—Jemina), Andreas Weller (tenor—Lazarus), Tilman Lichdi (tenor—Nathanael), and Tobias Berndt (bass—Simon). One of the problems with Schubert’s work is a lack of contrast between roles. Simon only enters in part 2, and part 1 is dominated by Maria and Martha—two sopranos—and Lazarus and Nathanael—two tenors. Lazarus’s first recitative sounds like a cross between an Evangelist in a Passion and a Lieder singer. The musical texture moves freely in through-composed accompanied recitative, arioso, song, and aria, with little drama. Though Mary and Martha are clearly distinguished in St. John’s Gospel, the libretto by the Protestant theologian August Hermann Niemayer makes little difference between them. There is some contrast when Jemina is introduced, but it is not until the final aria of act 2, when Marthawants to join her brother in death, that Schubert shows real passion. However, the last fascicle of the aria is missing (or was never written), and it ends abruptly on a B seventh chord. This just happens to be the dominant to the opening Sinfonia of BWV 4 in E minor, which followed. In this cantata, the Kammerchor Stuttgart has almost as much to sing in three choruses as it had in Lazarus. There is a vast sonic difference between Bach’s early cantata (c. 1708, rev. 1724) and Schubert’s forward-looking oratorio, but somehow the combination worked.

The next installment of the “Vita Christi” concerts was on Thursday, 20 June: Suffering and Death of Jesus. Sir John Eliot Gardiner conducted his ensembles—the Monteverdi Choir and The English Baroque Soloists—in a performance of J.S. Bach’s St. John Passion, BWV 245, at the Thomaskirche. Historically, the St. John Passion has played the poor step-sister to Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, BWV 244, ever since Mendelssohn’s famous revival in 1829. The St. John Passionshows Bach at his most baroque, in passages like the long melismatic text-painting of the Evangelist on “weinete bitterlich” (‘wept most bitterly’) in no. 12c or on “geißelte ihn” (‘scourged him’) in no. 18c. The turba chorus no. 21d “Kreuzige, kreuzige!” (‘crucify’) is as vivid and gruesome as the medieval paintings depicting Christ’s death. But it ends with the proto-romantic chorus no. 39, “Ruht wohl, ihr heiligen Gebeine,” which C.P.E. Bach borrowed for the conclusion of his first St. John Passion in 1772, almost 50 years after it was first performed in Leipzig in 1724. As Peter Wollny summed up in his program notes:“… the unique quality of the St. John Passion always has something new to teach the listener.”

Professor Gardiner taught us well. Indeed, I don’t think I’ve ever heard a more expressive performance from beginning to end. Mark Padmore and Matthew Brook sang the roles of the Evangelist and Jesus with conviction. Among the excellent arias, three deserve special mention: the intensely heartfelt alto aria no. 30“Es ist vollbracht!” (‘It is fulfilled!’), accompanied by thunder in this performance and ending in a whisper, sung by Meg Bragle; the bass aria with chorale no. 32, “Mein teurer Heiland,” sung by Peter Harvey; and the soprano aria no. 35 “Zerfließe, mein Herz, in Fluten der Zähren,” sung by Hannah Morrison, and preceeded by the arioso no. 34 “Mein Herz, indem die ganze Welt,”sung by tenor Nicholas Mulroy. All four soloists are members of the Monteverdi Choir.

The following two nights, Friday, 21 June, and Saturday, 22 June, there were two contrasting concerts on the theme Resurrection and Ascension, both at the Nikolaikirche. In the first, we heard J.S. Bach’s Hält im Gedächtnis Jesum Christ, BWV 67, paired with C.P.E. Bach’s Die Auferstehung und Himmelfährt Jesu, Wq 240, and performed by Rheinische Kantorei and Das Kleine Konzert, directed by Hermann Max. These two pieces were written 50 years apart, with BWV 67 performed on Quasimodogeniti Sunday in 1724 at the Thomaskirche in Leipzig and Wq 240, at least part I, on Easter Sunday 1774 in Hamburg. The bass aria with chorus “Friede sei mit euch” in BWV 67 offers support for Joshua Rifkin’s theory that the cantatas were sung by soloists in Bach’s time (Sigiswald Kuijken has recorded it with one per part on ACCENT ACC 25311), but Max chose to use SAT chorus plus bass soloist, Matthias Vieweg. C.P.E. Bach’s oratorio is one of his best vocal works, and I thought Max’s reading was well paced, bringing out progressive harmonies and sonorities which nevertheless remain rooted in the contrapuntal world of the composer’s father. The tenor aria “Ich folge dir,”sung by James Gilchrist and accompanied by a soaring trumpet, is one of the high points, as is the chorus beginning “Triumph!” heard three times (nos. 5, 16, 19), while the final chorus no. 22, “Gott fähret auf mit Jauchzen,” is a compendium of choral music in the eighteenth century, while also foreshadowing Beethoven’s Ninth in places.

But J.S. Bach is not easily outdone. His Easter Oratorio, Kommt, eilet und laufet, BWV 249, and Ascension Oratorio, Lobet Gott in seinem Reichen, BWV 11, are part of a trilogy, with the Christmas Oratorio, on the life of Christ. All three works are based in part on earlier works; for example, the Easter Oratorio began life as a congratulatory cantata for Duke Christian of Saxe-Weissenfels in February 1725. That same year it was heard in Leipzig with a sacred text for Easter. J.S. Bach later revised it in 1735 as an oratorio, in which the soloists have character names: Maria Magdalena (alto), Maria Jacobi (soprano), Petrus (tenor), and Johannes (bass). Similarly, the music for the opening chorus of the Ascension Oratoriooriginally served as re-dedication music for St. Thomas’ School in 1732. And the alto aria no. 4, “Ach, bleibe doch, mein liebstes Leben,” is later found in the “Agnus Dei” in the Mass in B Minor. (This piece was performed in the final concert on Sunday, 23 June, at the Thomaskirche by the Thomanerchor and the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra; this too was streamed live, and is now available to watch at arte live web: http://liveweb.arte.tv/de/video/Abschlusskonzert_Leipziger_Bachfest/).

It is always a little difficult and unfair to compare different works performed by different ensembles. J.S. Bach’s Easter and Ascension Oratorios are not nearly as well-known as his Christmas Oratorio. But all three are better known than C.P.E. Bach’s Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt Jesu. And while Max’s performance was excellent, Gardiner’s was superior. I would have liked to hear Gardiner’s take on C.P.E. Bach’s oratorio. The high points in the Easter Oratorio included the second movement of the Sinfonia, which is virtually an oboe concerto, featuring Michael Niesemann; aria no. 5, “Seele, deine Spezereien,” sung by Hannah Morrison; the mesmerizing obbligato flutes played by Rachel Beckett and Christine Garratt in aria no. 7; and aria no. 9“Saget, saget mir geschwinde,” with oboe d’amore (Niesemann again). The chorus and band were in top form, and no one would leave the Nicolaikirche until we had two encores from the Ascension Oratorio, the opening chorus with three trumpets and the understated but beautiful choral no. 6, “Nun lieget alles unter dir.”

In addition to the main concerts and the “Motette” services, I heard “Bach and His Pupils”on 20 June at the Altes Rathaus by NeoBarock: Volker Möller (violin), Maren Ries (violin, viola), Ariane Spiegel (violoncello), and Fritz Siebert (cembalo). In addition to trio sonatas by C.P.E. Bach (Sonata in D Minor, Wq 145), Johann Philipp Kirnberger (Trio in D Minor), and Johann Gottlieb Goldberg (Sonata in G Minor), they played two reconstructions of works by J.S. Bach. The first was a reconstruction of an early version of Sonata in G Major, BWV 1039, by Hans Eppstein (1911–2008), and the second was an attempt by the musicologist Klaus Hofmann to reconstruct the lost Trio for violin, viola, and bass written by J.S. Bach and C.P.E. Bach (listed in the latter’s estate catalogue among the“Vermischte Stücke”), based on BWV 1038. The ensemble missed an opportunity to present an earlier version of Wq 145, the Sonata in D Minor for Keyboard and Violin, BWV 1036, which was probably written by C.P.E. Bach under his father’s tutelage.

On 22 June at the Alte Handelsbörse there was another kind of reconstruction: a Soirée at the Court of Frederick the Great. Although we usually associate flute music with Frederick the Great, including the Trio Sonata in the “Musical Offering” by J.S. Bach, there obviously were other kinds of music performed at court. Lucile Boulanger (viola da gamba) and Arnaud De Pasquale (cembalo) offered selections by C.P.E. Bach, Carl Friedrich Abel, J.S. Bach, plus an anonymous work attributed to Ludwig Christian Hesse, one of Frederick’s gamba players. The viola da gamba allows chords and contrapuntal music better than a violoncello, and Boulanger is a virtuosa on the instrument. In addition to accompanying the gamba, De Pasquale played C.P.E. Bach’s Suite in E Minor, Wq 62/12 with gusto. I detected the influence of C.P.E. Bach’s keyboard music in the anonymous Sonata in D Major, especially in the Poco allegro.

Next year, for the 300th birthday of C.P.E. Bach, Bachfest 2014 promises much more of his music, including his oratorio Die Israeliten in der Wüste and Magnificat, as well as Haydn’s Creation.