Bach Week Festival Free Concert in Chicago Loop- Preview

When:
March 20, 2020
12:30 PM

Where
Chicago Cultural Center’s G.A.R. Hall
78 E. Washington Street
Chicago

Musicians from the Chicago area’s Bach Week Festival will give a free public performance of music by the event’s namesake, German Baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach, from 12:30 to 1 p.m. on Friday, March 20, 2020, in the Chicago Cultural Center’s G.A.R. Hall, 78 E. Washington Street, Chicago.

The pop-up concert, organized and conducted by Bach Week’s music director Richard Webster, is Chicago’s link to the international Bach in the Subways movement, a grassroots phenomenon that encourages free classical concerts in public spaces worldwide — not just subways — on or around Bach’s March 21 birthday. Bach lived from 1685 to 1750.

All musicians participating in Bach in the Subways events volunteer their services and neither seek nor accept donations from bystanders.

A choral ensemble of around 25 to 30 Bach Week Festival Chorus members, North Park University Chamber Singers, and members of Chicago professional chamber choir Bella Voce will perform J.S. Bach’s motet Christe, du Lamm Gottes (Christ, Lamb of God), BWV 233a, and Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring one of Bach’s most popular pieces.

They’ll be accompanied by cellist Mark Brandfonbrener of Chicago’s Lyric Opera Orchestra, Lyric Opera Orchestra double-bassist Collins Trier, and Webster on portative organ.

In addition, violinist John Macfarlane of the Lyric Opera Orchestra, a soloist at this season’s Bach Week Festival, will play selections from one of J.S. Bach’s unaccompanied works for violin.

The goal of Bach in the Subways “has always been to bring live Bach, and by extension classical music, to as many people as possible, especially those who would not normally hear it,” the organization says on its website,

“Musicians who cannot access subways can perform wherever there are souls to hear the music – in malls, on the street, in churches, schools, coffee shops, airports, and more.”

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The project traces its origin to 2010, when its founder, cellist Dale Henderson, began performing Bach’s solo Cello Suites in New York City subways.

The local Bach Week Festival, founded in Evanston, Illinois, in 1974, is one of the Midwest’s premiere Baroque music events. The festival enlists musicians from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Lyric Opera of Chicago Orchestra, and other top-tier ensembles, while featuring some of the Chicago area’s finest instrumental and vocal soloists and distinguished guest artists from out of town.

The 47th annual Bach Week Festival will run from May 1 to 30, 2020, at locations in Evanston and Chicago.

For more information visit the Bach Week Festival website.

Photos courtesy of Bach Week Festival