Bach Birthday Concert

On Thursday evening, March 21^st at 7:30pm the Gloucester Meetinghouse Foundation will host its annual concert celebrating the birthday of Johann Sebastian Bach performed by The Bach Project at Ashmont Hill Chamber Music, Andrew Sheranian, Artistic Director. The program features the Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 (BWV 1050), the Prelude and Fugue in B minor for organ solo (BWV 544), and the humorous Coffee Cantata, ‘Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht’ (BWV 211).

Ah, coffee! … but how much would you be willing to give up for your daily cup? In Bach’s delightful Coffee Cantata, Dana Whiteside, Elise Groves, and Andrew Bearden Brown will find out how far a devoted coffee lover will go to maintain their habit! Also on this program of Bach’s secular music is his thrilling 5th Brandenburg Concerto, written for flute, strings, and featuring Sylvia Berry playing the sumptuous harpsichord solo! Between the Concerto and the Cantata, conductor and organist Andrew Sheranian will ascend into the choir loft and perform one of Bach’s greatest organ works, the Prelude and Fugue in B-minor on the magnificent 1893 Hutchings/Fisk pipe organ.

PERFORMERS

Andrea LeBlanc, flute
Keats Dieffenbach, violin
Adriane Post, violin
Joy Grimes, viola
Judah Coffman, cello
Pablo Kennedy, bass
Sylvia Berry, harpsichord
Elise Groves, soprano
Andrew Bearden Brown, tenor
Dana Whiteside, baritone
Andrew Sheranian, conductor and organist

FROM THE CONDUCTOR

I am really excited about this upcoming concert with The Bach Project at Ashmont Hill Chamber Music. If you've wanted to come to one of our concerts in the past but didn't want to sit through a bunch of dour religious music, this concert is for you! We are doing a concert of completely secular music this time around. When I was a small child, my dad bought me a cassette tape recording of the Brandenburg concertos, and I played it so many times that the tape broke! The Fifth Brandenburg is so exuberant and it really captured my imagination as a child. And, the Coffee Cantata is as close as Bach ever got to writing an opera. So please mark your calendars!

GUARANTORS OF THIS CONCERT: H. Woody Brock & Scobie Ward