Our 113th Festival has been canceled, May 2020
With an immeasurable amount of sadness, but an abundance of caution, we announce that The 113th Bethlehem Bach Festival, a tradition that has continued largely uninterrupted since 1898, will not take place this year.
As we have all experienced, music is a transformative experience. The bonds it creates, the memories it evokes, the traditions it builds: each one remarkable and treasured. While we are unable to share these experiences with our Festival audience this season, we look forward to the days when we will once again forge connections through music and embark on those beautiful journeys together.
Although our Season was disrupted by the COVID-19 outbreak, we are re-scheduling some of our canceled concerts and adding them to our next season (some dates to come), including:
- Handel’s Messiah, Part Two and additional repertoire will be presented at our Spring Concert on Sunday, March 21, 2021
- The Chaconne Project, featuring the music of young composers, based on Bach’s Chaconne. This will also feature our 2020 Artist-in-Residence, guitarist Eliot Fisk, and will be scheduled as a Bach at Noon concert
- Young American Singers Competition Finals
Ticket buyers may choose to donate the value of their ticket(s) as a tax-deductible contribution, which would be greatly appreciated at this time. A portion of your contribution will help The Choir give some support to members of The Bach Festival Orchestra for their loss of income.
You may also request a voucher good toward future concerts by The Bach Choir through the 2020-2021 season.
CLICK HERE to DONATE or VOUCHER your ticket(s)
Please contact Renée James, Marketing Director, with any questions about making ticket donations or requesting vouchers: 610-866-4382 x 115 or renee@bach.org
Information about our 113th Bethlehem Bach Festival will continue to be updated as needed. We welcome you to the heart of our season and hope the glorious music offers you joy, comfort, inspiration and peace as only the music of J.S. Bach can.
Voices from the Choir…
Click here for a clip of rehearsal and some thoughts from two Choir members about the 2018 Bethlehem Bach Festival.
Our largest event of the year takes place in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, on the campus of Lehigh University and on the historic grounds of the Moravian community. Glorious tradition, spirited performances, festival premieres…music for you. It’s our distinct pleasure to welcome so many of you to Bethlehem every year!
Our 112th Bethlehem Bach Festival in 2019 was – as ever – a time of reunions, annual renewal and contemplation and sharing this exquisite music as a community. Please make your plans – and your reservations! – now and be part of this community in 2020, sharing your passion for Bach and celebrating this uplifting season.
“It’s not only the history of the Festival but the personal history that so many of the performers and members of the audience have with it that gives the weekend a very wonderful and sentimental atmosphere.”
— Karen B., longtime Festival attendee
Festival Soloists
Rosa Lamoreaux, Soprano
Krisztina Szabό, Mezzo Soprano
Benjamin Butterfield, Tenor
William Sharp, Baritone
David Newman, Bass
Dashon Burton, Bass
Festival Artist-in-Residence
Eliot Fisk, Guitarist:
Performances at the 2020 Festival:
Ifor Jones Chamber Music Concert, Saturday May 9 & May 16
Concerto in E Major for Guitar and Orchestra by Luigi Boccherini
Bach’s Trio Sonata No. 5 in C Major, BWV 529 with Charlotte Mattax Moersch
Guitarist Eliot Fisk is known worldwide as a charismatic performer famed for his adventurous and virtuosic repertoire. After nearly 50 years before the public he remains as his mentor Andres Segovia once wrote, “at the top line of our artistic world.” In the 2017-18 season Fisk performed his transcriptions of all six Bach solo cello Suites.
He has performed as a soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Houston Symphony, Rochester Symphony, Orchestra of St. Lukes, Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, Pro Arte Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP) and many others. He returns regularly to major concert series such as Stanford Lively Arts, Spivey Hall (Atlanta), Duke University Performances, Newman Center for the Performing Arts in Denver; Lincoln Center, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the 92nd Street Y in NYC, Da Camera Society of Houston, Da Camera Society of Los Angeles, San Francisco Chamber Music; Segovia Series at Pick-Staiger Hall at Northwestern University and many others overseas.
The repertoire of the classical guitar has been transformed through Fisk’s innumerable transcriptions (including works by Bach, Scarlatti, Haydn, Mozart, Paganini, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Granados, Albeniz and many others). Eliot Fisk was the last direct pupil of Andres Segovia and also studied interpretation with the legendary harpsichordist Ralph Kirkpatrick at Yale University. Directly following his own graduation in 1977, he founded the guitar department at the Yale School of Music.
Eliot Fisk is Professor at the Universität Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, where he teaches in 5 languages. He is the Founder and Artistic Director of Boston GuitarFest (www.bostonguitarfest.org) an annual cross-disciplinary event co-sponsored by the New England Conservatory and Northeastern University. In 2017 he created and served as Artistic Director of the first ever and immensely successful Salzburg Guitar Fest at the Universität Mozarteum in Salzburg.
First Weekend (May 8 & 9, 2020)
We hope you’ll join us for the opening weekend of our 113th Bethlehem Bach Festival! We look forward to sharing this glorious music with you in 2020!
Second Weekend (May 15, 16 & 17, 2020)
Our 113th Bethlehem Bach Festival continues — join us for the second weekend of music and friendship! This year’s Festival includes the biannual Young American Singer’s Competition on Sunday, May 17
