Oregon Bach Festival (OBF) is an annual celebration of the works of

Johann Sebastian Bach Johann Sebastian Bach (28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the '' Brandenburg Concertos''; instrumental compositions such as the Cello Suites; keyboard wo ...

and his musical legacy, held in

Eugene, Oregon Eugene ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Oregon. It is located at the southern end of the Willamette Valley, near the confluence of the McKenzie and Willamette rivers, about east of the Oregon Coast. As of the 2020 United States Census, ...

, United States, in late June and early July.

About the festival

The festival's programming is three-fold. It presents a diverse slate of concerts and guest artists, which in recent years has included non-Bach-related programs by

Garrison Keillor Gary Edward "Garrison" Keillor (; born August 7, 1942) is an American author, singer, humorist, voice actor, and radio personality. He created the Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) show ''A Prairie Home Companion'' (called ''Garrison Keillor's Radi ...

Bobby McFerrin Robert Keith McFerrin Jr. (born March 11, 1950) is an American folk and jazz singer. He is known for his vocal techniques, such as singing fluidly but with quick and considerable jumps in pitch—for example, sustaining a melody while also rap ...

, Frederica von Stade and

Yo-Yo Ma Yo-Yo Ma ('' Chinese'': 馬友友 ''Ma Yo Yo''; born October 7, 1955) is an American cellist. Born in Paris to Chinese parents and educated in New York City, he was a child prodigy, performing from the age of four and a half. He graduated from ...

; it maintains a focus on choral-orchestral repertoire, including commissions and premieres; and it undertakes extensive educational activities, including the Stangeland Family Youth Choral Academy, directed by conductor Anton Armstrong of

St. Olaf College St. Olaf College is a private liberal arts college in Northfield, Minnesota. It was founded in 1874 by a group of Norwegian-American pastors and farmers led by Pastor Bernt Julius Muus. The college is named after the King and the Patron Saint Olaf ...

. The ''

Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'' has called OBF "one of the world’s leading music festivals". Oregon Bach Festival is a donor-supported program of the

University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc Nike, Inc. ( or ) is a ...

. The activities of the festival are concentrated at Eugene's

Hult Center for the Performing Arts The Hult Center for the Performing Arts is a performing arts venue in Eugene, Oregon. The Hult Center is located downtown on Willamette Street between 6th & 7th Avenues, adjacent to the Graduate Eugene (previously Hilton Eugene) and Conference ...

and at the University of Oregon's School of Music & Dance, primarily at Beall Hall.

History

The festival was founded in 1970 by German conductor

Helmuth Rilling Helmuth Rilling (born 29 May 1933) is a German choral conductor and an academic teacher. He is the founder of the Gächinger Kantorei (1954), the Bach-Collegium Stuttgart (1965), the Oregon Bach Festival (1970), the Internationale Bachakademie ...

and the former president of the American Choral Directors Association, Royce Saltzman, as an informal series of classes and concerts at the

. By the late 1970s, the roster had expanded to include full-scale choral-orchestral performances. Although originally inspired by the music of Bach, the festival quickly moved beyond a strict boundary of repertoire. Bach, however, remains a centerpiece of the festival via Helmuth Rilling's conducting master class, which leads students through Cantatas, Masses, Passions, and other such choral works. Additionally, the festival frequently performs the largest Bach works with full forces; for example, in the 300th-anniversary year of Bach's birth in 1985, the festival performed the ''St. John Passion'', ''St. Matthew Passion'', ''B-minor Mass'', and all six ''Brandenburg Concertos'', culminating in an appearance at the

Hollywood Bowl The Hollywood Bowl is an amphitheatre in the Hollywood Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. It was named one of the 10 best live music venues in America by ''Rolling Stone'' magazine in 2018. The Hollywood Bowl is known for its distin ...

. The success of the Bach Festival model and structure led Helmuth Rilling to create the

Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart is a foundation in Stuttgart, founded by Helmuth Rilling in 1981 to foster international concerts and workshops, namely Musikfest Stuttgart, dedicated especially to the music of Johann Sebastian Bach in relati ...

and several other Bach Academies around the world. In addition to the leadership of Helmuth Rilling, many other musicians have developed long-term relationships with the OBF. Conductor and pianist

Jeffrey Kahane Jeffrey Alan Kahane (born September 12, 1956) is an American classical concert pianist and conductor. He was music director of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra for 20 years, the longest of any music director in the orchestra's history. He is ...

has been performing at the festival for over 20 years, and musicologist Robert Levin has also been a frequent participant. Baroque specialist Monica Huggett has appeared as an ensemble leader in 2009 and 2010. Baritone

Thomas Quasthoff Thomas Quasthoff (born 9 November 1959) is a German bass-baritone. Quasthoff has a range of musical interest from Bach cantatas, to lieder, and solo jazz improvisations. Born with severe birth defects caused by thalidomide, Quasthoff is , and has ...

made his American debut at the OBF in 1995 and has returned several times since. Recent appearances have also been made by Midori,

Sarah Chang Sarah Chang ( ko, 장영주; born Young Joo Chang; December 10, 1980) is a Korean American classical violinist. Recognized as a child prodigy, she first played as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic and the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1989. ...

, the

Kronos Quartet The Kronos Quartet is an American string quartet based in San Francisco. It has been in existence with a rotating membership of musicians for almost 50 years. The quartet covers a very broad range of musical genres, including contemporary classic ...

, The Five Browns, and a variety of other classical stars. The festival also hosts "cross-over" or popular acts like Garrison Keillor,

Savion Glover Savion Glover (born November 19, 1973) is an American tap dancer, actor, and choreographer. Early life The youngest of three sons, Glover was born to a white father, who left the family before he was born, and a black mother. Glover's great grand ...

and

Pink Martini Pink Martini is an American band that was founded in 1994 by pianist Thomas Lauderdale in Portland, Oregon. Group members call it a little orchestra that crosses several styles, such as classical, latin, traditional pop, and jazz. The co-lead vo ...

The festival in the 21st century

Royce Saltzman retired in 2006 and was replaced as Executive Director by John Evans, a former BBC producer and published

Benjamin Britten Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other ...

scholar. With Evans's arrival in 2007, the festival expanded to include concerts throughout Oregon, including at Portland's Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall and Bend's Tower Theatre. Recent seasons have also included collaborations with other regional arts organizations, including the

Oregon Shakespeare Festival The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) is a regional repertory theatre in Ashland, Oregon, United States, founded in 1935 by Angus L. Bowmer. The Festival now offers matinee and evening performances of a wide range of classic and contemporary pla ...

, Portland Baroque Orchestra, and

Eugene Ballet Eugene Ballet is an American ballet company based in Eugene, Oregon. A resident company of the Hult Center for the Performing Arts, it performs a repertoire of full-length classical ballets, and operates a ballet academy. For more than 20 years, ...

. The Festival has also completed its first endowment campaign, raising over $10 million. The 2010 festival, billed as a 40th-anniversary gala year (the 41st), included appearances by Thomas Quasthoff, Pink Martini, Bobby McFerrin, Robert Levin and Ya-Fei Chuang, and the Portland Baroque Orchestra. It also featured a Bernstein celebration featuring a residency by Jamie Bernstein. Phyllis and Andy Berwick donated $7.25 million to the festival in 2014, which is the largest gift in the group's history. Subsequently, Berwick Hall was christened as the first permanent home of the Festival in October 2017.

Milestones

The festival has commissioned, co-commissioned, or presented premieres of numerous musical works, including: *

Felix Mendelssohn Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 18094 November 1847), born and widely known as Felix Mendelssohn, was a German composer, pianist, organist and conductor of the early Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositions include sym ...

, '' The Uncle from Boston'' (world premiere of rediscovered manuscript) *

Stephen Paulus Stephen Paulus (August 24, 1949 – October 19, 2014) was an American Grammy Award winning composer, best known for his operas and choral music. His style is essentially tonal, and melodic and romantic by nature. His best-known piece is his 1 ...

, ''Symphony for Strings'' (world premiere) *

Arvo Pärt Arvo Pärt (; born 11 September 1935) is an Estonian composer of contemporary classical music. Since the late 1970s, Pärt has worked in a minimalist style that employs tintinnabuli, a compositional technique he invented. Pärt's music is in pa ...

, ''Litany'' (world premiere) *

Osvaldo Golijov Osvaldo Noé Golijov (; born December 5, 1960) is an Argentine composer of classical music and music professor, known for his vocal and orchestral work. Biography Osvaldo Golijov was born in and grew up in La Plata, Argentina, in a Jewish family ...

, ''Oceana'' (world premiere) *

Krzysztof Penderecki Krzysztof Eugeniusz Penderecki (; 23 November 1933 – 29 March 2020) was a Polish composer and conductor. His best known works include ''Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima'', Symphony No. 3, his '' St Luke Passion'', '' Polish Requiem'', ' ...

Credo In Christian liturgy, the credo (; Latin for "I believe") is the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed – or its shorter version, the Apostles' Creed – in the Mass, either as a prayer, a spoken text, or sung as Gregorian chant or other musical sett ...

(world premiere) *

Tan Dun Tan Dun (, ; born 18 August 1957) is a Chinese-born American composer and conductor. A leading figure of contemporary classical music, he draws from a variety of Western and Chinese influences, a dichotomy which has shaped much of his life and ...

, ''Water Passion'' (American premiere) *

Sven-David Sandström Sven-David Sandström (30 October 1942, in Motala – 10 June 2019) was a Swedish classical composer of operas, oratorios, ballets, and choral works, as well as orchestral works. Life and career Sandström studied art history and musicology at ...

, ''Messiah'' (world premiere) * Sir James MacMillan, ''A European Requiem'' (world premiere) * Kim André Arnesen, ''Falling into Mercy'' (world premiere) *

Philip Glass Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer and pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century. Glass's work has been associated with minimalism, being built up from repetitive ...

, Piano Concerto No. 3 (regional premiere) * Richard Danielpour, ''The Passion of Yeshua'' (world premiere) The festival has also released or participated in 12 commercial recordings since 1990, with the recording of Penderecki's ''Credo'' winning the 2001

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pr ...

for

Best Choral Performance The Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance has been awarded since 1961. There have been several minor changes to the name of the award over this time: *In 1961 the award was known as Best Classical Performance - Choral (including oratorio) *Fro ...

References

External links