Montreal Bach Festival

The 6th edition of the Montreal Bach Festival will run from December 1st to 13th 2012 and will welcome renowned artists such as conductor Philippe Herreweghe from Belgium who will be appearing for the first time in Quebec. Maestro Herreweghe will conduct the musicians and voices of the legendary and prestigious Collegium Vocale Gent, an ensemble of more than 40 performers, in a presentation of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Christmas Oratorio. This work will be presented in its entirety featuring all 6 cantatas with performances at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday December 12th and Thursday December 13th at La Maison Symphonique de Montréal. The soloists will be soprano Dorothee Mields, countertenor Damien Guillon, tenor Thomas Hobbs and bass Peter Kooij. These concerts are a co-production with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal.

The Collegium Vocale Gent is one of the most highly regarded musical ensembles in the world. Under the direction of Phillipe Herreweghe, the ensemble has, over a period of 40 years,  given thousands of concerts throughout the world and has built a remarkable discography of more than 75 recordings most of which have been issued on the Harmonia Mundi France and Virgin Classics labels. It is a true honour to welcome these great artists to Quebec for their premier performance.

The Montreal Bach Festival will open with the Italian ensemble La Risonanza, conducted by organist and harpsichordist Fabio Bonizzoni. They will give two concerts in Bourgie Hall with the first, an all-Bach program featuring the Cuban soprano Yetsabel Arias Fernandez, on Saturday December 1^st at 7:30 p.m. The following concert will be on December 2^nd at 4 p.m. and will offer orchestral works and concerti by Vivaldi, Handel and Telemann. Originally from Havana and now established in Italy, Ms. Fernandez performs frequently throughout Europe with La Risonanza and with conductors as renowned as Jordi Savall. Note also that there will be a concert given by Fabio Bonizzoni on Tuesday December 4^th at 7:30 p.m. on the Christ Church Cathedral’s Wilhelm organ.

On Monday December 3^rd in Bourgie Hall, the McGill Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Boris Brott, will present J.S. Bach’s Four Suites for Orchestra. On Thursday December 6^th at 7:30 p.m., the voices of the Studio de musique ancienne de Montréal and the musicians of I Musici de Montréal Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Christopher Jackson, will present J.S. Bach’s Magnificat and the Berliner Messe by Avro Pärt.

At 8 p.m. on Friday December 7^th at the Chapelle Notre-Dame-de Bon-Secours, harpsichordist Luc Beauséjour, violinist Christina Day Martinson, gambist Margaret Little and flutist Grégoire Jeay offer us their Musical Offering, one of the Cantor of Leipzig’s most important works. This will be followed by three concerts given by the Arion Orchestre Baroque presented on Friday the 7^th and Saturday the 8^th both at 8 p.m. and on Sunday the 9^th at 2 p.m. The programs for these concerts will include works by J.S. Bach and his sons Wilhelm Friedman and Carl Philipp Emanuel. On Sunday December 9th at 5 p.m., Daniel Taylor and the Theatre of Early Music will give a concert at Saint-Léon de Westmount Church. The program will be announced shortly.

There will be an evening of jazz improvisation on the music of Bach at L’Astral on Saturday December 8^th at 7:30 p.m., featuring American pianist Steve Kuhn. Originally from Brooklyn, New York, this jazz legend began his studies as a classical pianist under the direction of Russian pianist Margaret Chaloff. After studies at Harvard, the young virtuoso joined the original John Coltrane Quartet and later on, Stan Getz’s group. Steve Kuhn returns to Montreal after a highly acclaimed performance at the 2010 Montreal International Jazz Festival. The program will also offer some of the most seductive jazz standards.

The annual interpretation of Bach’s Goldberg Variations is now a tradition at the Montreal Bach Festival. This year, Dutch harpsichordist Léon Berben performs this great work on December 10^th at 7:30 p.m. at the Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours. Berben, who was the harpsichordist for Musica Antiqua Köln, will also give a master class with details to be announced shortly.

On Tuesday December 11^th at 8 p.m. and once again at Bon-Secours, Magid El-Bushra, countertenor from the Sudan and the Ensemble Masques will present an evening of Schütz, Buxtehude, Johannes Schenk, Johann Christoph and Johann Sebastian Bach. The evening will be directed from the harpsichord by Olivier Fortin. Magid El-Bushra, who with this concert gives his Montreal premier performance, has most recently performed at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris. He also participated in Montiverdi’s L’Orféo as presented by Les Arts Florissants and William Christie at the Teatro Real in Madrid.

Finally, there will be a Bach–Beethoven recital performed by Ukranian Serhiy Salov, Grand Prize Winner of the 2004 Montreal International Musical Competition. This concert will be presented at the Chapelle historique du Bon-Pasteur on Wednesday December 5^th at 7:30 p.m. There will also be a noon hour concert given by a number of Montreal’s finest young organists on Friday December 7^th at McGill University’s Redpath Hall.

Tickets for the 2012 Montreal Bach Festival will be on sale from May 7^th.

Please visit www.festivalbachmontreal.com or call the Festival at 514-843-3414.