Bachfest Leipzig

There are Bach festivals all over the world, including one in Oregon where I sang in the choir years ago as a student. But none has the musical fireworks to compare with the one in Leipzig. Nor can any other lay a comparable claim to authenticity. Johann Sebastian Bach spent the last twenty-seven years of his life here, performed in and composed for venues that not only still stand but have been beautifully restored, and is buried in the altar space of St. Thomas’ Church.

I’ve been here several times, but always just for a day or two in my job as a radio host and producer for Deutsche Welle. Somehow, I felt at home. But just as I was feeling the magic, it was always time to move on. Would I ever return to experience the festival as a retreat and a musical rejuvenation, a Bach-around-the-clock total immersion, a festival in the truest sense of the word: a celebration?

YES! It’s happening for the 2025 edition. Not all 200+ gigs on eleven days though – that would be impossible – but for the whole first week and an amazing nineteen events. From cantatas (conducted by Gardiner) to cello suites (performed by Queyras) to The Art of Fugue and the Goldberg Variations (rendered by chamber ensembles), piano transcriptions for the twenty fingers of Tal and Groeutheuysen to an open-air event, a musical streetcar (don’t know what to expect there), the St. John Passion and a „Queer Passion“ (an adaptation of Bach’s music celebrating diversity), a museum tour, lectures, panel discussions … let’s see whether I live to tell the story. 

I expect to thrive, actually. Because Bach’s music always gives back more than you put into it in the currency of attention. So I’ll tell the story right here. 

Too bad there wasn’t time for the B Minor Mass, a Bachian visit to the zoo, an excursion to one of the historic organs in the region or a musical bike trip. Another time?

The motto of the Bachfest 2025 is Transformation, which seems fitting in a personal sense, because Bach certainly transformed my life.

Also not to forget this year’s innovation: through augmented reality, the famous portrait of Johann Sebastian Bach by Haussmann in the Bach Museum will come to life, the composer will get up, walk over to a harpsichord to play something and tell anecdotes from his life.

So expect on these pages experiences in words, images, interviews and bachknowswhat I manage in those brief moments in between events.

All this with support from the wonderful people at bachfestleipzig.de, to whom I owe sincere thanks!