Just a clarification about the director, Georg Christoph Biller. He resigned as director of the St. Thomas Choir in 2015 due to ill health, and died in January of this year. Bach was Kantor of the St. Thomas Choir School, and Kappelmeister for the city of Leipzig. The choir school was, and is even today, a public school run by the city, not the church. In Bach's day it provided choir boys to four of Leipzig's churches, not just St. Thomas. The main church back then was actually the St. Nikolai church, a larger edifice. Even today, St. Nikolai is the main Lutheran church in Leipzig, and many of Bach sacred works were actually premiered there.
Hearing Bach's masterpiece being played by his choir in his church to his grave is one of the most beautiful things I've seen. Must have also been an overwhelming honour for the kapellmeister.
Es gibt auch Aufnahmen, da singen sie im Altarraum, und dann stehen sie direkt auf dem Grab von Bach, nur ein mobiles Chorpodest auf dem sie stehen überspannt dann die Grabplatte. Die Kirche wurde im 19. Jhd. erheblich umgebaut, deshalb kann man nicht von der originalen Akustik ausgehen. Soviel ich weiß ist die Nikolaikirche wesentlich näher am damaligen Zustand (eine große Orgel wurde später noch eingebaut), sodaß bei Konzerten aus der Nikolaikirche die Akustik wohl näher am Original ist.
I’ve been a fan of J.S. Bach since I was a kid, and as a vocalist who has performed the Gloria in D Major, by one of Bach’s fellow baroque composers, Vivaldi, it’s one of my goals to not only perform his B Minor mass but also to visit the church where he was kapellmeister. When I first started listening to Bach I only listened to his instrumental works (Brandenburg Concertos, Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, etc.) but now I know he didn’t have to go so hard when he wrote his big choral works, like this, the John passion and the Matthew passion. Long live Bach! God’s blessings from Connecticut.
My favorite of Bach's genius musical performances. Blessed to have been in the chorus several times. Singing it with an orchestra is an amazing experience.
A warm performance of a master work, filled with tradition. Lovely music, lovely respect for tradition, for old age, for youngsters. This music cannot die. Many thanks DW. Vielen Dank.
Prf. Billers dirigat ist wirklich beeindruckend, wunderschön anzusehen! wow Ich könnte mir alleine seine Art und Weise zu dirigieren Stunden lang anschauen
Immer wieder: Danke an Georg Christoph Biller für seine Lebensleistung, die musica sacra in Leipzig auf solides seelisches und emotionales Fundament gestellt zu haben. Im Zeitalter hoher Geschwindigkeiten tut es so gut eine gänzlich durch-fühl-bare Musik zu hören.
In the Embrace of Classical Elegance. 🎵🌌 The graceful cadence of classical compositions creates an otherworldly experience, transcending time and connecting us to the brilliance of musical masters.
Incarnatus est....... Sublime. Tempo excellent. De la pure tradition dans une interprétation de Bach. C'est un grand plaisir de revenir zux sources de LA musique. Merci
I wonder if any of those boys continue their career in singing or music Edit: I just found out some of them became well-known musicians, such as Felix Bender and Moritz Caffier. Excellent 👏🎶
The fiddle parts that Bach wrote for the soloist in his Brandenburg concertos and some of his choral works are more difficult than what he wrote for his violin concertos. I wonder why. Thank you for uploading this great performance. The B minor Mass is certainly a masterpiece but I still prefer the St Matthew Passion.
I don’t quite understand your comment. Coming into it’s own?!?!?! Do you know the Thomanerchor has a history of more than 800 years, and it’s arguably the best choir in the world, right?
Las interpretaciones con coros infantiles y niños cantores solistas son excasas. Es mucho más difícil llevar un coro de muchos niños, a una ciudad fuera de su sede, que a un coro de adultos. Pero las obras originales están compuestas para niños también.
This piece surpasses the 9th and everything Beethoven and others ever wrote. Not even being reborn 1000 times could they ever come even close to Bach. That said, the Missa Solemnis perhaps is a worthier competitor than the 9th, but still.
Yup. I knew listening without seeing the moment the duet started that yet another mezzo got dissed, and not for the better. Check out the BBC Proms recording for a marvelous example of how wonderful the Christe Eleison sounds when the soloists’ voices blend nicely, which alas is not the case here.
UGH….a countertenor instead of an alto! _If they’re going to insist on “historically informed practice,” then they need boys to sing the soprano and alto roles._ *BACH DID NOT USE COUNTERTENORS, THEY WEREN’T INVENTED!!* Everybody know that horrid sound comes from tenors who couldn’t make the grade.
Bach was attuned to the JOY and the EXALTATION of the Cosmos.... and I feel that he revealed some of the 'Mystery of the Universe'...... And a big THANK YOU for no ads in this recording!!!! I will listen to this every day, if possible....
Not from "humanity"... This genial work was not made by others - it was made solely by Bach. And It was not made in Arabic countries, in Africa or in China. It was made just by a white European man.
@@hannaalailan6743 Ha-ha-ha! That's just one envious, uneducated being! What are you talking about, you envious little one? No, Miserere Mei, Deu by Allegri, for instance, does not belong to the heritage and history of, let's say, China or Brazil! The word "orchestra", the whole definition of it in the modern sense of the word, almost every instrument spanning from violin to piano, Notes(!), great opera houses, the mere definition of opera, all the techniques of singing beginning from belcanto and so on - NONE of these inventions were made in any other part of the world but in the West - in Europe as well as the USA! And about the impact of the church: No - it does not make any geniuses itself, if there wasn't any church, there - either way - would be Bach, Mozart, Vivaldi and so on. The first sentence of what you gave written is just a good example of envious foolishness. The others are a mere devotion of proper knowledge.
One of the very few performances of this great work that I like. The Gloria in excelsis deo leading into the Et in terra pax is the most joyous music I have ever heard in my life. It's as though the light of heaven overwhelms.
When those trumpets really burst onto the scene towards the end of Et in terra pax… it’s just like pure glory and ecstasy. I can’t help but listen with really loud volume and headphones for this, and I can never sit still. Just a pure delight and thrill.
One of my greatest joys -as a student- at the Peabody Conservatory was to sing the B minor Mass in the chorus (although I always choked during the Confiteor.)
So… I’m the only one here who finds this reading rushed, and the way the performance is led, nuance, levels, phrasing, echo effects, etc., are all rinsed away? Also - the occasional SUNG interjections by the conductor in random keys between sections - no one else finds that disturbing? Is this a convention I don’t know about? I bow to the wisdom of the crowd. Tremendous musicianship in the orchestra, I submit.
Dieses Konzert hätte im Jahr 2020 nicht aufgeführt werden können, wie einige Kommentare zu implizieren scheinen. Im Jahr 2020 war Herr Biller leider zu krank. This concert could not have been given in 2020, as some comments seem to indicate. In that year Herr Biller was sadly too ill.
i was thrilled to see no countertenors in the choir (or at least i cant hear them - the timbre sounds like boy altos) but then the soloists - not my cup.
Presumably the Christoph Biller took time off from his duties in Heaven to conduct this work in 2020 (see first note at the top of the page) five years after his untimely death in 2015
Herr Biller starb im Jahr 2022. Herr Biller died in 2022. Und dieses Konzert hätte im Jahr 2020 nicht aufgeführt werden können. And this concert could not have been given in 2020.
