Bach : Messe en Si

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) Messe en si mineur Thursday, June 17, 8 PM Chapelle Royale Duration: 1h50 without intermission This is perhaps the most accomplished masterpiece of Baroque sacred music, an intoxicating work

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

Messe en si mineur

Thursday, June 17, 8 PM

Chapelle Royale

Duration: 1h50 without intermission

This is perhaps the most accomplished masterpiece of Baroque sacred music, an intoxicating work of choral beauty rich in dazzling arias. The origin of this famous Mass in B Minor is fascinating. It was finalised by Bach in Leipzig around 1748, two years before the composer's death, by assembling his Missa Brevis of 1733 (a Kyrie and a Gloria dedicated to the Elector of Saxony, for the brilliant court of Dresden – Catholic) with various pieces already written, notably the Sanctus dated Christmas 1724, but also with new compositions, to form what his son Carl Philipp Emanuel called the “Great Catholic Mass”. It is, in a way, a theoretical work, whose purpose was not dictated by a specific performance objective: Bach would thus have created his Grand Œuvre, a sacred musical summa after fifty years dedicated to cantatas and passions… Published only in 1833, the complete work was certainly not performed during Bach's lifetime, but became in the 19th century a symbol of compositional mastery, then with the Baroque revival an essential work of German Baroque and universal music, placed on the same level as his St Matthew Passion. In Bach's oeuvre, this great Latin mass contrasts with its splendour with the Protestant passions. The stubborn pain of the Crucifixus, where each voice weeps for Christ, is succeeded by the exhilaration of the Resurrexit, with all brass and timpani out, carried away by the joyful clamour of the faithful. Bach's musical testament, it is now one of his most performed works.