The Bach Choir and Orchestra, led by guest director Peter Kopp, will offer two presentations of Bach's Passion According to St. John during Holy Week. The first will be given on Palm Sunday, April 13, at 5:00 p.m., and the second on Good Friday, April 18, at 3:00 p.m.
The Bach Society will present this special event twice in order to give as many people as possible the opportunity to hear and absorb this profound music. The biblical words are sung by a tenor "Evangelist." The choir sings hymn settings and short choral settings of the words of the onlookers. Soloists sing arias reflecting on the action.
Calvin Stapert, former lecturer for the Melanchthon Institute, has cited three themes in Bach's setting of the Passion story as told by St. John: the atonement of the guiltless Christ, the "Christus Victor," for our sins, and the resultant freedom of the Christian, thus loosed from the bonds of sin; and the theme of discipleship and acceptance of our own mortality.
An offering will be received to help support the cost of the musicians. As usual, KUHF, 88.7 FM, will record one presentation for later broadcast. The nursery will be available for small children.