Conductor

"Handel's Messiah in Grace Cathedral" (complete) • Beautiful HD • American Bach Soloists

Celebrate the 300th anniversary of the creation of this masterwork!

The great Passions of J. S. Bach remain unparalleled in their dramatic impact and universally experienced emotional effects. Bach took the genre to new worlds of expression, incorporating new Italianate operatic elements with the Lutheran tradition of sung chorales. The result is a powerful force of rhetoric that tells the Passion story reinforced by personalized illuminations.

This is music that transcends cultural, religious, and theatrical boundaries between performers and audience members, drawing in listeners as historical participants. Maestro Thomas, one of the Baroque music world’s most celebrated Bach specialists, brings his unique and insightful perspectives to the podium in definitive performances that are profoundly beautiful and moving.

EPSG:4326

Saint John Passion 300th Anniversary

St. Stephen's Episcopal Church

Saint Mark's Episcopal Church

Davis Community Church

St. Mark’s Lutheran Church

No other Bay Area performances come close to offering the visual, aural, and emotional qualities that have made ABS’s Messiah in Grace Cathedral so superlative. Featuring a stellar cast of vocal soloists, American Bach’s annual tradition of performing Handel’s Messiah in San Francisco’s historic Grace Cathedral perennially provides a treasured December holiday event to capacity audiences.

Handel's Messiah in Grace Cathedral

Grace Cathedral

In this special abridged evening performance, perfect for the whole family, you’ll hear the Christmas portion (Part I) of Handel’s Messiah along with music of the season by Baroque composers including Michel Richard de Lalande and Marc-Antoine Charpentier. The finely tuned voices of the American Bach Choir and the polished sheen of sonorities brought by ABS’s period-instrument orchestra soar within the majestic interior of San Francisco’s Nob Hill landmark. Together with the best highlights of Handel's peerless composition, ABS will perform Charpentier's Messe de Minuit (“Midnight Mass”), one of the most treasured Christmas compositions from the Parisian Baroque.

A Baroque Christmas 4545

One of J.S. Bach’s most joyous and universally popular works, the Magnificat in D Major, brings trumpets, timpani, oboes, flutes, and strings together in a glorious celebration of sound.

The source of one of Bach's most popular duets is a cantata that includes a choral passacaglia, an entrancing aria for tenor and flute, and a flawlessly composed aria for bass and solo oboe.

Bach's tribute to a beloved heroine of Saxony, the Electress Christiane Eberhardine, stands uniquely among his most extraordinary works. The rich orchestration, including two violas da gamba, supports the distinguished poetry of one of the greatest reformers of the German language of all time. Each group of instruments is featured in movements that include an astonishingly pictorial recitative depicting bells.

Magnificat in D Major

San Francisco Conservatory of Music

Bach’s Mass in B Minor is the pinnacle of Baroque repertoire and ABS’s now renewed annual performances draw audiences to San Francisco from around the world.

Under the meticulous and insightful direction of Jeffrey Thomas, these performances of the Mass in B Minor — Johann Sebastian Bach’s consummate masterwork — bring eye-opening revelations of Bach’s score that draws upon 35 years of his compositions.  

Recognized worldwide as one of the foremost interpreters of the music of Bach and the Baroque, Maestro Thomas continues to inspire audiences and performers alike through his keen insights into the passions behind musical expression. Fanfare Magazine proclaimed that “Thomas’ direction seems just right, capturing the humanity of the music… there is no higher praise for Bach performance.” 

Mass in B Minor

St. Mark's Lutheran Church, San Francisco

Handel's glorious music for a lavish barge expedition on the River Thames and one of Bach's most treasured orchestral compositions create the pillars that surround a pair of imaginative works by Telemann: an Oboe Concerto that begins with a stupefying introduction and a sweetly sensitive musical characterization of "The Ingenious Gentleman Sir Quixote of La Mancha."

Bach, Barges, and a Burlesque

War Memorial and Performing Arts Center

A dramatic account of the fall of Babylon at the hands of Cyrus the Great, the founder of the first Persian empire, and the ensuing freeing of the Jewish nation as told by Daniel, the noble youth of Jerusalem, is the subject of Handel's oratorio, composed during the peak of his creative life. After falling into neglect after Handel's death, 21st-century revivals of this splendid music have been presented in Zurich and Aix-en-Provence. A central and guiding character of Queen Nitocris, the mother of Belshazzar, encourages the story's triumphant ending.

Belshazzar

The galant styles of High Baroque and Rococo music join hands in the mature works by Bach and Rameau. The Missa in A Major is a curious amalgam of the traditional and contemporary, featuring a pair of a relatively “new” instrument on the scene, the flauto traverso. And the ornate wizardry of Rameau's theatrical Dardanus brought the opera acclaim as one of his greatest compositions. A glance back to the Italian roots of the Baroque is revealed in Handel's and Vivaldi's concertos.

Barococo

Locatelli's rarely performed concerto "The Harmonic Labyrinth" is named after its extraordinarily expansive cadenza. YuEun Gemma Kim will bring her dazzling technique to this piece, equally matched by ABS flutist Sandra Miller's definitive performance of Bach's Orchestral Suite for flauto traverso and strings. Elegance is at the foreground of Telemann's Concerto and Quartet. And Bach's merry and bright Wedding Cantata sets the stage for this Sunday matinée.

The Harmonic Labyrinth

Soprano Mary Wilson's scintillating vocalism will captivate your ears in performances of two of Handel's most beautiful secular cantatas. Viola da gamba and recorders are at the core of the instrumental ensemble sonority, and two tour-de-force concertos for virtuoso violin bring excitement and palpable bravura to the stage.

Jeffrey Thomas

Conductor

Events

8 - 11 Mar, 2024

Saint John Passion 300th Anniversary · American Bach Soloists

14 - 15 Dec, 2023

Handel's Messiah in Grace Cathedral · American Bach Soloists

Dec 13, 2023

A Baroque Christmas 4545 · American Bach Soloists

Aug 13, 2023

Magnificat in D Major · American Bach Soloists

Jul 30, 2023

Mass in B Minor · American Bach Soloists

About

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