For lovers of Johann Sebastian Bach’s music, and that means us: Ilze Grēvele – Skaraine (soprano), Ieva Nīmane (baroque oboe, recorder), Māra Botmane (baroque cello), Ilze Reine (organ), or anyone else who feels that this outstanding composer and his music has to be treasured and performed to bring us closer to God himself.
In this program primarily we perform arias from Bach’s Leipzig period cantatas, as well as fragments from solo suites for cello and music for keyboard instruments, as it was the Master’s own instrument. Indeed, each of us has our own reasons why Johann Sebastian Bach’s music is especially dear to us. Cellist call solo suites for cello their “Bible”. The oboe is an instrument that Bach, along with the singer, most frequently used as an obligatory instrument – moreover, all types of instruments, including the oboe da caccia – the one Bach created together with the Leipzig instrument makers and used exclusively in his scores.
And, of course, the Word – many scholars believe that Johann Sebastian Bach’s music is the most beautiful attire for God’s message to people. To our opinion, we have chosen the most beautiful arias from the Leipzig period works, as well as a fragment transfer from an earlier, Mühlhausen period cantata, which concludes with a charming, quite unusual soprano cadenza.
It is currently impossible to imagine the history of music without Johann Sebastian Bach, unless Felix Mendelssohn had not rescued this score from oblivion 100 years after the St.Matthew’s Passion was written. One of the emotional peaks in our concert program is aria “Aus Liebe” from Passion mentioned above, where Bach uses a very transparent musical language – in the original accompaniment for two oboes da caccia and soprano with solo flute. It is remarkable how in a piece involving soloists, a double choir, and a double orchestra, this aria emotionally reveals the main message we read in the Gospel: For God so loved the world he gave his one and only Son…
This concert program is about love – it is our acknowledgment of love for Johann Sebastian Bach’s music; it is the composer’s expression of love for his Creator; it is the outpouring love of God over all humanity, that we may enjoy this genius masterpiece of art.
Ieva Nimane 