Biennial Meeting of the American Bach Society

“BACH AND THE ORATORIO TRADITION”

101st BETHLEHEM BACH FESTIVAL

May 8-11, 2008, Lehigh University, Bethlehem PA

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

[Events shown in italics are associated with the Bethlehem Bach Festival]

Thursday, May 8

From 11 a.m. Registration
1:00–2:30 p.m. Opening Session

Welcome: Gregory Butler (University of British Columbia), President and Greg Funfgeld (Bach Choir of Bethlehem)

Keynote address: Don O. Franklin (University of Pittsburgh): “Bach and the Oratorio Tradition”
2:30–3:15 p.m. Reception
3:15–4:45 p.m. Session I: Bach and the Oratorio Tradition

Kerala Snyder (University of Rochester), “Oratorio on Five Afternoons: From the Lübeck Abendmusiken to Bach’s Christmas Oratorio”

Daniel R. Melamed (Indiana University), “Johann Sebastian Bach and Barthold Heinrich Brockes“
4:45–5:00 p.m. Break
5:00–6:30 p.m. Stephen A. Crist (Emory University), “The Narrative Structure of J. S. Bach’s St. Matthew Passion”

Markus Rathey (Yale University), “Chorale-Tropus and Dramatic Coherence in Bach’s Oratorios”
7:00 p.m. Dinner on your own

ABS Advisory Board Meeting

Friday, May 9

8:00–9:00 a.m. ABS Editorial Board Meeting
9:00–10:30 a.m. Session II: Genre Studies

David Schulenberg (Wagner College, New York), “Modifying the Da Capo? Through-Composed Da Capo Arias in Cantatas and Oratorios of Bach and Handel”

Mark A. Peters (Trinity Christian College), “Considerations of Genre in J. S. Bach’s BWV 10, Meine Seel erhebt den Herren”
10:30–11:00 a.m. Coffee break
11:00 a.m.–12:00 Roundtable discussion open to the public: “21st-Century Approaches to Bach’s Music”

Moderator: Raymond Erickson (Aaron Copland School of Music, Queens College, C.U.N.Y.)

Fred Fehleisen (Mannes and Juilliard), “Thematic Transformation and the Design of Bach’s D minor Ciaccona, BWV 1004/5”

Benjamin Binder (Lawrence University), “Jonathan Miller’s Production of the St. Matthew Passion and the Limits of Representation”
12:15–1:45 p.m. Lunch on your own
2:00 p.m. Distinguished Scholar Lecture: Christoph Wolff (Harvard University): Are Bach’s Oratorios Sacred Operas?”
4:30 p.m. Concert: Bach’s Easter Oratorio
6:00 p.m. Buffet Dinner & Discussion–George B. Stauffer (Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University)
7:00–8:15 p.m. Dinner on your own
8:30 p.m. Concert: Ascension Oratorio, the “Trauer Ode” (BWV 198) and “Wer mich liebet, der wird mein Wort halten” (BWV 74)

Saturday, May 10

8:00–9:00 a.m. ABS Editorial Board Meeting
9:00–10:30 a.m. Session III: The Legacy of J. S. Bach in Leipzig

Tanya Kevorkian (Millersville University), “Echoes of J. S. Bach’s Leipzig in Johann Adam Hiller’s Wöchentliche Nachrichten und Anmerkungen die Musik betreffend”

Jeffrey S. Sposato (University of Houston), “Mendelssohn’s Oratorios and the Bach Tradition”
10:30–11:00 coffee break
10:30 a.m. Ifor Jones Memorial Chamber Music Concert: Guitarist Eliot Fisk and the Bach Festival Orchestra

Bach’s Orchestral Suites No. 1 in C and No. 4 in D, Cello Suite No. 6 in D and Vivaldi’s Lute Concerto in D
OR Chamber Music in the Saal:

Violinist Simon Standage, leader and soloist with The English Concert, associate director of the Academy of Ancient Music, and Professor of Baroque Violin at the Royal Academy of Music, performing Bach’s violin partitas and music by Bach’s contemporaries
OR Session IV: "Encoded Meaning in the Works of J. S. Bach"

Szymon Paczkowski (Warsaw University), “Sound-Encoded Politics: J. S. Bach’s Cantata Tönet, ihr Pauken (BWV 214)"

Ruth Tatlow (Stockholm University), “Bach’s parallel proportions and their implications, illustrated by the Six solos for violin, the Leipzig organ chorales and the Musical Offering”
12:15–2:00 p.m. Society Business Meeting and Banquet
2:30 p.m. Mass in B Minor, Part 1
4:30 p.m. Mass in B Minor, Part 2
7:00 p.m. Dinner on your own

Sunday, May 11

10:00 a.m.–12:00 Excursion to Workshop of Willard Martin, Harpsichord Maker, Bethlehem [to be arranged]
2:00 p.m. Finals of Competition for Young American Singers sponsored by the ABS and the Bach Choir of Bethlehem