Journeying with Bach

LIMERICK EARLY MUSIC FESTIVAL
presents

Journeying with Bach

Co-directed by Cecilia Madden & Peter Barley

Soloists:

Catherine Redding, soprano
Eoin Conway, alto
Stuart Kinsella, tenor
William Gaunt, bass

In the winter of 1705 at the age of 20, Johann Sebastian Bach famously made a journey of over 250 miles to hear the music of Dietrich Buxtehude, the renowned organist of the Marienkirche, Lubeck. He travelled from Arnstadt (Thuringia), in the heart of Germany, to Lubeck, near the Baltic coast—a journey even more extraordinary in that Bach made it on foot. Bach was so taken with what he heard that he stayed nearly three months, much longer than had originally been envisaged—thus incurring the wrath of his church employers. Our programme will include music by Buxtehude, as well as by Heinrich Schütz, another of Bach's forebears. The programme will be framed by two Bach cantatas, and we take up the theme of last year's concert with this further exploration of the tradition into which Bach was born. Ancór, St Mary's Cathedral Choir, Sagittarius Hiberniensis, and the Limerick School of Music Senior Choir will be joined by the LEMF orchestra and vocal soloists for this popular part of the festival calendar, co-directed by Cecilia Madden and Peter Barley.