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12 unusual facts about St Matthew Passion


Arnold Schoenberg Choir

In 2002 the Schoenberg choir, jointly with instrumentalists and soloists, received a Grammy Award in the category Best Choral Performance for its recording of Bach's St Matthew Passion, conducted by Nikolaus Harnoncourt.

Bas Ramselaar

He is noted in particular for singing all of the bass parts in the complete Bach church cantatas cycle for Brilliant Classics, as well as Bach's St Matthew Passion and St John Passion.

Berliner Singakademie

On 11 March 1829, the 20-year old Felix Mendelssohn, who was himself a pupil of Zelter, conducted here his famous revival of Bach's St Matthew Passion, a major milestone in re-establishing its composer's reputation as a founding father of European musical traditions.

Flute repertory

J. S. Bach: Brandenburg Concerto No. 5; "Aus Liebe will mein Heiland sterben" from the St Matthew Passion; Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B Minor

Hildegard Laurich

In 1974 she sang the alto part in Bach's St Matthew Passion in the Konstantinbasilika of Trier with Gertraud Stoklassa, Kurt Huber, Siegmund Nimsgern, William Reimer, the Trierer Bachchor, the Rundfunk-Sinfonie-Orchester Saarbrücken, conducted by Ekkehard Schneck.

Jennifer Vyvyan

She was also known for her interpretations of the soprano solos in Beethoven's Symphony No. 9, Britten's War Requiem, and Bach's St John Passion and St Matthew Passion.

Jonathan Gregory

Throughout his career, Gregory has been a regular concert performer, giving performances in the UK of oratorios and orchestral music, including Bach’s St Matthew Passion, St John Passion, Mass in B Minor, Christmas Oratorio, Elgar’s Apostles, Handel’s Messiah and Britten’s War Requiem.

Maureen Lehane

Lehane was mostly at home in Handel operas and oratorios; over the span of her career she was involved in over 100 productions of Handel's Messiah, 50 Bach cantatas and 40 St Matthew Passions.

Picander

Most notably their collaboration was on religious works in a Lutheran tradition such as the St Matthew Passion (BWV 244).

Progressive tonality

While J.S. Bach in his instrumental and orchestral suites would often place every movement in the same key (see, for example, the solo cello Suites, BWV 1007-1012 or the equally homotonal A minor solo flute partita BWV 1013), in a work like his St Matthew Passion he felt able to 'progress' from an E minor start to an ending in C minor, and his Mass in B minor actually ends in D major.

Saint Matthew Passion

St Matthew Passion, a musical composition written by Johann Sebastian Bach

Sydney University Musical Society

SUMS has performed many great works over its lifetime, including the Australian premiere performances Bach's Mass in B minor and St Matthew Passion in 1880; premiére performances of Martin and Peter Wesley Smith’s Songs of Australia for the Australian Bicentenary in 1988, the world premiére of Nicholas Routley’s Mycenae Lookout in 1998, & world premiére of Anne Boyd’s carol, A Lullaby of the Nativity, written for SUMS in 2003.


American Tune

The tune is based on a melody line from a chorale from Johann Sebastian Bach's St Matthew Passion, itself a reworking of an earlier secular song, "Mein G'müt ist mir verwirret," composed by Hans Leo Hassler.

Klagt, Kinder, klagt es aller Welt, BWV 244a

The possibility of a reconstruction arose when the nineteenth-century scholar Wilhelm Rust discovered that Bach in part built the Trauermusik with movements from the Trauer-Ode for the Electress of Saxony Laß, Fürstin, laß noch einen Strahl, BWV 198, and from the St Matthew Passion.