Sir John Eliot Gardiner & Jane Glover in Conversation, part 3

[stevenschrier]

Thank you for producing the three excellent and informative programs with Sir John Eliot Gardiner and Dame Glover. While I haven't seen Dame Glover conduct a "live" concert I have been privileged to attend an excellent Mozart choral concert at the University of Michigan conducted by Sir John Gardiner. Also, I was privileged to visit Leipzig & the extraordinary Bach Archive several years ago. There's little, or no, written documentation from Bach's church congregation in Leipzig about whether they enjoyed Bach's cantatas. We do know Bach ran into trouble with the Leipzig City Council when he had to change the performance location of the premiere of his "St. John's Passion" from the Thomaskirche to the Nikolaikirche. This was apparently because the Thomaskirche had been scheduled for another event on the same day. Bach printed posters announcing the change of the concert location and posted them around the city without first getting permission from the City to do so. He was brought before the council and reprimanded. However, the fact Bach was not replaced for 27 years might suggest the Leipzig folks generally held a favorable opinion of Bach and his music and his secular work for the City? Then again, in the 18th century there weren't many other musical styles for folks to choose from. And without modern conveniences like electricity or recording technology music was mostly experienced "live". Bach appears to have have developed a good political sense and had many friends in the upper echelon of Leipzig society which are shown in the archived Thomaskirche baptismal records of all of Bach's children born in Leipzig. What a sad story with many of Bach's children with Anna Magdalena dying as infants. The baptismal records name many of Leipzig's business and government officials as Godfathers to Bach's children. A tough, difficult life for everyone in the 18th century, imho, and a miracle to realize the extraordinary musical beauty that nonetheless emerged from that environment.

[woodwardwoodworks]

I'd love to see the JEG and Jane Glover collaborate with Julian Fellows and develop a mini series on Bach and Handel...it would be outrageously expensive but imagine what could be produced with todays musicians and film production companies

[alexluck]

I really enjoyed these three videos- thank you so much for putting them up!