As part of In search of Bach, a musical epic in the footsteps of Johann Sebastian Bach (May 20-May 30, 2026)
The final episode of this epic journey will take place on the Baltic coast, in the city of Lübeck, the destination of J.S. Bach’s journey in 1705. After crossing Lake Ratzeburg by boat, the troupe will make a final 20 km walk to enter the former capital of the Hanseatic League on foot. After a concert at St. Jacobi Church, Pygmalion will conclude these Bach Paths with J.S. Bach’s Mass in B minor, BWV 232, at the Marienkirche.
The end of this journey will coincide with the ensemble’s 20th anniversary!
“A D. Terribly high, a desperate third of the key of B minor, surpassing the peaks of the treble clef. An extreme note, screaming, strident, yet forbidden, proscribed as the opening of any work.
Which performer has not been struck, on discovering the score of the Mass in B minor, by this very first note given by Bach to the first violins? Kyrie… Kyrie… Kyrie eleison ! It is indeed with a cry already reaching the forbidden ends of the tessitura, a cry of all humanity, an exordium of purely tragic urgency, that this work-summa, unprecedented in its dimensions in our history, opens. A visionary synthesis of the art of a man who, here more than anywhere else, gives meaning to the world in which he lives, and reveals to us all that lies beyond.
Thirty years of gestation, thirty years of a laborious life at the end of which the diversity of his creations seems to have been brought together in total order. A mosaic of eclectic origins, yet with a new, luminous unity. Looking back on a life rich in a thousand languages, here is a work that is now “Pentecostal”, drawing its depth from the diversity of its languages. A true ecumenical testament, in search of a synthesis of worlds, through tolerance, assimilation and integration of all. Thirty years of obligations, constraints and servitude, from which Bach here seems to take leave to embrace the universal.” (Raphaël Pichon)
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