Passiontide

Reading Bach Choir

Musical Director - Matthew Hamilton

The Reading Bach Choir continue their 50th anniversary celebrations with three moving insights for Passiontide in the magnificent Douai Abbey on 8th April at 7.45 p.m.

Schutz is generally regarded as the most important German composer before Johann Sebastian Bach. He is often considered one of the most important composers of the 17th century. The Cantiones Sacrae is a collection of forty different pieces of vocal sacred music on Latin texts, first published in 1625. The counterpoint of the Cantiones has been regarded as unmatched in the sacred vocal works of the 17th century.

The four motets for a time of penitence movingly represent the twentieth-century Catholicism of Poulenc. Completed in 1939, the four motets are among Poulenc's most popular works.  The four contrasting texts allow him a variety of vocal colours and harmonies which he uses to vivid emotional and dramatic effect.

Distler was born in Nuremberg and attended Leipzig Conservatory from 1927 to 1931. He is known mostly for his sacred choral music and as a champion of Neo-Baroque music. His works are a re-invention of old forms and genres, rich with word painting, based on the music of Heinrich Schütz and other early composers.

He became increasingly depressed from the deaths of friends, aerial attacks, job pressures and the constant threat of conscription into the German Army and tragically committed suicide at the age of 34 in 1942.

Full information is at www.readingbachchoir.org.uk