J.S. Bach – St. Mark Passion
巴赫 – 聖馬可受難曲
23 June 2019 (Sunday) 8:00pm
二零一九年六月廿三日 (星期日) 晚上八時正
Hong Kong City Hall Concert Hall
香港大會堂音樂廳
Program 曲目
J.S. Bach’s St. Mark Passion (reconstruction by Robert Koolstra)
Artists 演出者
Soloists 獨唱
Soprano 女高音
Stefanie Quintin
Mezzo-Soprano 女中音
Samantha Chong 張吟晶
Tenor, Evangelist 男高音, 傳道者
Stephen Ng 吳智誠
Bass, Jesus 男低音, 耶穌
Caleb Woo 胡永正
Conductor 指輝
Jerome Hoberman 何博文
Assistant Conductor & Choirmaster 助理指揮兼合唱指導
William Chung 鍾偉亮
The Hong Kong Bach Choir 香港巴赫合唱團
The Hong Kong Bach Orchestra 香港巴赫管弦樂團
Introduction 簡介
BACH’S ST. MARK PASSION
A “Lost” Work by J. S. Bach Receives its Hong Kong Première
It isn’t often that performers get to premiere a work by Johann Sebastian Bach, but The Hong Kong Bach Choir and Orchestra, under the direction of Jerome Hoberman, will do just that on Sunday, 23rd June 2019 at 8:00 p.m. at City Hall Concert Hall, in Central.
Bach’s Passion According to St. Mark, long thought to be lost and unrecoverable, will be given its Hong Kong premiere in a reconstruction by Dutch harpsichordist Robert Koolstra.
Bach’s St. Matthew and St. John Passions are considered among the greatest masterpieces of this great master – sometimes called “the father of classical music” – and are frequently performed. But it turns out that Bach may have composed as many as five Passion settings. The music to the St. Mark Passion was lost, but its libretto survived, enabling scholars to embark on a musical treasure hunt, based on a little-known feature of Bach’s compositional method.
At the time when the St. Mark Passion was first performed – Good Friday 1731 – Bach had begun to re-use earlier music of his as the basis for new works. The words of the libretto fit the music of one particular cantata, the so-called Trauerode, which Bach wrote for a memorial service for the wife of the Elector of Saxony and King of Poland – obviously, a one-off performance. Scholars were able to form a consensus that this cantata was the basis of the St. Mark Passion.
Using similar techniques of fitting the rhythms of the words to possible musical sources among earlier Bach works, they came up with conjectures about the music – by Bach himself – of all the remaining movements, leaving only the prose narrative from chapters 14 and 15 of the St. Mark’s Gospel to be newly composed. This is where most of the various available editions differ from each other.
The Bach Choir performance of the St. Mark Passion is part of a unique dual event: one month later, the same work will be presented, using a different reconstruction and in a different format, by another leading Hong Kongensemble: SingFest.
The two productions will enable the Hong Kong audience to experience this major work by a composer often thought of as the “Father of Classical Music” in two very different ways: the Bach Choir and Orchestra presentation will be a concert version using a relatively large choir and orchestra, with modern instruments playing at modern pitch, while the July offering by SingFest will be staged and will employ a chamber choir and instrumental ensemble playing on “period” instruments, using lowered pitch.
Each performance has some claims to “authenticity,” as Bach’s own performances of his Passions were unstaged “dramas of the imagination” given in churches, but used small ensembles (perhaps even only one or two singers per part) and, obviously, instruments of his own day.
Soloists in the Bach Choir performance are tenor Stephen Ng as the Evangelist, baritone Caleb Woo as Jesus, as well as soprano Stefanie Quintin and mezzo-soprano Samantha Chong.
Tickets 票務
Tickets Available: 7 May 2019 門票開售日期：二零一九年五月七日
Online Booking 網上訂票: www.urbtix.hk
Ticket Reservation 電話訂票: 3761 6661
Credit Card Booking 信用卡訂票: 2111 5999
Discounts 訂票優惠
10% off 九折:
Members of the Law Society of Hong Kong 香港律師會會員
Members of the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers 香港工程師學會會員
Members of the Hong Kong Institute of Architects 香港建築師學會會員
Members of the Hong Kong Institute of Surveyors 香港測量師學會會員
Members of the Hong Kong Arts Administrators Association 香港藝術行政人員協會會員
15% off 八五折:
Friends of the Hong Kong Bach Choir 香港巴赫合唱團之友
50% off 半價:
Full-time students, senior citizens, people with disabilities and the minder, and CSSA recipients
全日制學生、六十歲或以上高齡人士、殘疾人士及看護人、及綜合社會保障援助受惠人士
Group Discount schemes 團體優惠
5% off 九五折: Purchase of 6 to 9 standard tickets 六至九張正價門票
10% off 九折: Purchase of 10 or more standard tickets 十張或以上正價門票
