• Jack Edwards reader
• Claire Tomlin soprano
• Janet Bullard alto
• Patrick McCarthy tenor
• Eamonn Dougan bass
• Psalmody
• members of Essex Baroque Orchestra
• directed by Peter Holman

The Bach family played a leading role in the musical life of central Germany during the Baroque period, supplying more than fifty town musicians and church organists between middle of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. According to J. N. Forkel, J. S. Bach’s first biographer, members of the family were accustomed to meet once a year to perform a mixture of sacred and secular music for their own amusement.

This programme evokes one of these meetings, during which there is a family wedding. It includes music by two cousins of Johann Sebastian, a Missa Brevis by Johann Nicolaus Bach (1669-1753) and a suite for solo violin and strings by Johann Bernhard Bach (1678-1749) – the model for one of Johann Sebastian’s own suites. The wedding cantatas are Johann Sebastian’s youthful ‘Der Herr denket an uns’ BWV196 and ‘Mein freundin du bist schön’ by his uncle Johann Christoph Bach (1642-1703), a colourful and witty setting of words from the Song of Songs with a spoken commentary.

The programme also marks the 300th anniversary of the death of Johann Pachelbel with the famous Kanon and Gigue – back by popular demand!