St John Passion

Bach: St John Passion

~ Andrew Benson-Wilson

Bach: St John Passion
Academy of Ancient Music, Lawrence Cummings
Barbican Hall, 18 April 2025


Nicholas Mulroy, Evangelist, Dingle Yandell, Christus,
Carolyn Sampson, soprano, Helen Charlston, alto, Ed Lyon, tenor, Jonathan Brown, bass

Music has played a key role in religious occasions since the earliest times, and has played a notable role in most aspects of Western Christianity. When listening to pieces like the John or Matthew Passions or Messiah, I often wonder whether it is the words and the story, or the music that has the most highly charged emotional effect on those listening. For Christians, 3pm on Good Friday is one of the most sacred times of the year: according to one of the gospels, the moment when Jesus died after a three-hour-long crucifixion. In many Christian traditions, the whole day is devoted to fasting. But, for around 2000 people, 3pm was the start of the Academy of Ancient Music’s performance of Bach’s St John Passion in a packed Barbican Hall.

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Prom 40: St John Passion

~ Andrew Benson-Wilson

BBC Proms: Bach’s St John Passion
Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki
Royal Albert Hall, 19 August 2024


Bach’s Passio secundum Joannem, the St John Passion, was first performed on 7 April 1724 during the Good Friday Vespers at the Nicholaskirche in Leipzig, a last-minute change from the originally planned Thomaskirche. It was less than a year since he took up the post of Thomaskantor, a post that, infamously, had been first offered to both Telemann and Graupner who both turned the offers down. The 300th anniversary of the first performance was one of several anniversaries celebrated during this year’s BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall. It was first performed complete at the Proms in 1967, although extracts had been incorporated into the popular ‘Bach Wednesdays’ since 1924.

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Academy Choir: St John Passion

~ Andrew Benson-Wilson

Bach: St John Passion
Academy Choir & Baroque Players, Matthew Best
St John’s, Wimbledon, 12 March 2022

Choral societies have a long and noble tradition in the UK. They provide much-needed employment opportunities for the young professional musicians brought in as soloists as well as giving the opportunity to perform for the vast body of amateur singers whose membership fees keep the shows on the road. The Academy Choir is one such. It was founded in Wimbledon in 1980 and since 2000 has been based at the church of St John the Baptist, Spencer Hill, Wimbledon. It is an auditioned choir, rather than taking all-comers, and the musical standards are obviously high. Since 2017 their musical director has been Matthew Best. My invitation to review their performance of the St John Passion promised that “our concerts tend to be ‘a cut above’ what might typically be expected to be found in a suburban church, given by a local choir”, a claim that proved itself correct.

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Bach: Johannes-Passion

~ Andrew Benson-Wilson

J S Bach: Johannes-Passion
Collegium Vocale Gent, Philippe Herreweghe
Outhere/PHI LPH031. 2CDs 107’08

 

Cover of CD of Herreweghe Bach Johannes Passion

I can often predict the way in which a performance of the Johannes-Passion is going to develop by the manner in which the opening instrumental bars are performed. The texture appears simple. Swirling low strings underpinned by the repetitive pulse of continuo bass, with two oboes slowly intertwining dissonance-laden melodic lines above them. It is one of those passages of music that can be interpreted in many ways, resulting in differing moods ranging from sinister, threatening, mysterious, to gently calming. Continue reading →

BBC Proms: Reformation Day

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BBC Proms: Reformation Day
Prom 47: Bach’s ‘Little Organ Book’ past and present
Prom 48: A Patchwork Passion
Prom 49: Bach’s St John Passion
Royal Albert Hall, 20 August 2017

Prom 47: Bach’s ‘Little Organ Book’ past and present
William Whitehead, Robert Quinney, organ

The BBC Proms’ acknowledgement of the anniversary of the Lutheran Reformation came with three concerts on Sunday 20 August, starting with a lunchtime organ recital featuring the premieres of three pieces from The Orgelbüchlein Project played by its founder/director, the organist William Whitehead. The programme opened and closed with Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in E flat (from the Clavierübung III, BWV 552), played by Robert Quinney (who also played Mendelssohn’s Organ Sonata in A major (Op. 65/3)). It also included the fourth of Schumann’s Fugues on B-A-C-H and two of Bach’s own Orgelbüchlein chorale preludes played by William Whitehead and, just before the final Bach Fugue, Samuel Sebastian Wesley’s ‘Prelude to the Grand Organ Fugue by Johann Sebastian Bach’: a duet for both organists. Continue reading →

Bach: St John Passion

~ Andrew Benson-Wilson ~ Leave a comment

Bach: St John Passion
Apollo’s Fire, Jeannette Sorrell
Avie AV2369. 2CDs 33’08+74’34.

This recording stems from a series of semi-staged performances in Cleveland and New York in March 2016. Videos of extracts of a live event can be viewed here. The project was referred to as ‘A Dramatic Presentation’, and involved the main protagonists singing from memory to each other and the audience, who were treated as part of the crowd in some of the turbo choruses, with half the choir moving from the stage to stand by the audience, notably during the scenes with Pilatus. A timely reminder, perhaps, of The immediacy and emotional intensity of the live performances can only be imagined from the recording, but the directness and strength of feeling remains. Continue reading →

Bach Shafted!

~ Andrew Benson-Wilson ~ Leave a comment

Bach: St John Passion
Hieronymus
Thames Tunnel Shaft, Rotherhithe.  11 April 2015.

This must be one of the most bizarre musical venues I have ever been in, and an extraordinary place to hear one of Bach’s most sacred works. Between 1825/43, Marc Isambard Brunel and his son Isambard Kingdom constructed a tunnel under the Thames between Rotherhithe and Wapping, the first of its kind in the world. In order to construct the tunnel, they sank a 15m diameter shaft on the south side of the river in Rotherhithe. With the addition of stairs, this shaft later became the pedestrian entry to the tunnel, but was closed when the tunnel started taking trains rather than pedestrians. The Thames Tunnel is now an active part of London’sWP_20150411_19_23_30_Pro railway system, and the shaft has been re-opened with a concrete floor inserted to separate it from the trains below. It is currently only accessible by wriggling through a 1.3m high entrance and clambering about 12m down on some rickety scaffolding stairs. Continue reading →