Bach Weekend 2015

As befits a composer routinely considered the greatest in history, Johann Sebastian Bach is one of the most frequently performed in London. The year ahead promises virtuoso readings of his solo violin music, outstanding renditions of his titantic oratorios and even jazz versions of keyboard works. But for complete immersion in his work, there is nothing to match the South Bank Centre’s Bach Weekend, now an annual fixture. Led by Martin Feinstein – one of the world’s most acclaimed flautists – and his Feinstein Ensemble, each weekend chooses to explore a single aspect of the composer’s inexhaustible canon.
This year it is the turn of the concerto. Over three dates and seven concerts, the Ensemble and others will plump breadth of both Bach’s concerti and the concerti that inspired and influenced his work. For anyone with a passion for the baroque, this will be quite the treat.
Proceedings begin at 7.45pm on Friday 13^th with five of Bach’s Violin Concerti, including the Double Concerto. Catherine Manson, leader of the Feinstein Ensemble, will be the primary soloist. The evening will conclude with a tantalizing chance to hear the reconstructed Concerto for 3 Violins.
The Saturday line-up commences at 11.30am with a set of influential chamber concerti from Telemann, Handel and Vivaldi. These pieces see the entire ensemble act as soloists. It will be followed at 3pm by a solo performance of Bach’s Concerto in the Italian Style from harpsichordist Stephen Devine, accompanied by Bach’s transcriptions of Vivaldi’s own Italian concerti.
Then, at 7.30pm, the Feinstein Ensemble will take to the Queen Elizabeth Hall to perform two of the prismatic Brandenburg Concertos along with Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and Soprainino Recorder Concerto, both of which helped to form Bach’s style. For those new to the baroque, this may just be the finest introduction all year to the era’s instrumental delights.
At 11.30am on Sunday, guest musicians Passacaglia – a well-established ad critically lauded period instrumental group – will introduce their audience to five French concerti by five different composers, all of whom were touched by the form’s development in Germany and Italy. Rameau and Couperin will be joined by de Bousset, Corette and de Boismorter, seldom showcased on these shores.
At 3pm, the Feinstein Ensemble will return for what might well be the highlight of the whole weekend. Joined by the London Bach Singers, they will perform Cantanas No. 115 and No. 9, respectively titled ‘Mache dich, mein Geist, bereit’ and ‘Es ist das Heil uns kommen her’, and the Sinfonia from Cantata No. 21. We may call these masterpieces ‘cantatas’, but Bach more commonly referred to them as his ‘Sunday Concertos’. And in their musical and vocal complexity, they echo and expand upon the instrumental genre’s capabilities.
This year’s schedule closes at 7.45pm with a second look at that most quintessentially baroque of instruments, the harpsichord. Robin Bigwood and Steven Devine will tackle five of Bach’s concerti, backed by the Ensemble. These works – which formed the template for over two centuries of keyboard concerti – fizz with sublime ideas. They will provide a suitable end-point to a truly celebratory series.