Bach’s “St Matthew Passion” with Simon Rattle and Peter Sellars

“Not all musicians believe in God, but they all believe in Johann Sebastian Bach,” said Mauricio Kagel, who grappled intensely with the life of the cantor at St Thomas’s Church, plagued by bureaucratic city fathers and unmotivated Latin pupils, when he composed his own Passion. The term “Passion” is inextricably linked with the name “Bach”, first and foremost due to his St Matthew Passion, already a work of superlatives in terms of its external dimensions.

That’s because the oratorio of the suffering and death of Christ, which in Bach’s lifetime eclipsed anything conceivable in the field of music, consists of no fewer than 68 individual movements (formerly counted as 78), which include, among others, the monumental opening chorus, the chorale setting “O Mensch, bewein dein Sünden groß” and the epic final chorus. Already in the first version of the work from 1727 an extensive double choir setting of choir and orchestra is also required: the impressive stereophonic effects have lost none of their fascinating impact. (Bach himself demonstrably dared at a 1736 performance to separate the ensembles completely, enabling the real-spatial differentiation of the dialogue between the two vocal-instrumental ensembles.)

Together with the Rundfunkchor, the boys of the Staats- und Domchor and a first-class ensemble of soloists, Sir Simon Rattle presents Bach’s greatest Passion music, a work with addictive potential in which something new can always be discovered, even after repeated listenings. This concert is also a feast for the eyes: as in April 2010, the St Matthew Passion is performed in Peter Sellars’s unforgettable staging.

Berliner Philharmoniker

Sir Simon Rattle

Camilla Tilling

Magdalena Kožená

Mark Padmore

Topi Lehtipuu

Christian Gerhaher

Eric Owens

Boys of the Berlin State and Cathedral Choir

Rundfunkchor Berlin

Simon Halsey

Peter Sellars