I Barocchisti
Coro della Radiotelevisione svizzera
Diego Fasolis, conductor
Marie Lys, soprano
Lucia Cirillo, mezzosoprano
Margot Oitzinger, contralto
Bernhard Berchtold, tenor
Klaus Mertens, bass

Johann Sebastian Bach
Mass in B minor for soloists, choir and orchestra, BWV 232

Watch the video
I Barocchisti, Fasolis, Vivaldi Stagioni Seasons Autunno

The B minor Mass is among Johann Sebastian Bach's most legendary masterpieces. It is an impressive and unique work, almost entirely built by salvaging and reworking earlier works: certainly thirteen, but probably practically all of its twenty-six numbers are not original compositions but adaptations and parodies. This work accompanied Bach for twenty-five years, from 1724 to 1749, the year before his death.

It was not presented to the public in its complete form until 85 years later, in 1834. In the "Great" B minor Mass, themes and musical motifs borrowed from works dating back to different periods merge and find new coherence. Music and text influence each other and gain new expressive power; the distinction between musical genres linked to the Catholic or Lutheran rite is overcome in this masterpiece which draws its intensity from the conciliation of opposites. The arduous interpretation of this essential "spiritual testament" – as it has been repeatedly defined – could only be entrusted to Diego Fasolis and his Barocchisti, who are back in Lugano to pursue, after the Christmas Oratorio, their performance of Bach's sacred music.