Yesterday’s mail brought the annual announcement of the concerts planned by American Bach for the 2025–2026 season (which, as can be seen above, is its 37th). All the San Francisco venues will be familiar to those that have attended performances in the past: St. Mark’s Lutheran Church at 1111 O’Farrell Street, on the southwest corner of Franklin Street, Grace Cathedral, which is located at the top of Nob Hill at 1100 California Street, and Herbst Theatre, which is entered on the ground floor of the Veterans Building of the San Francisco War Memorial at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. Also as in the past, Jeffrey Thomas will conduct all performances. Specific dates, in chronological order, are as follows:
Poster design for the beginning of the American Bach season (from the Web page for all ticket purchases)
Sunday, October 26, St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, 4 p.m.: The season will begin with a program entitled A Grand Tour. As can be seen in the above poster design, it will begin in London with George Frideric Handel’s HWV 74 secular cantata, the Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne. As might be expected, Handel will be followed by Johann Sebastian Bach with a performance of the BWV 1066 orchestral suite in C major, which was first performed in Leipzig. The journey will continue south to the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice for Antonio Vivaldi’s RV 589 setting of the “Gloria” portion of the Mass. The program will conclude with one last move south to Rome with another Handel composition, this time sacred, the HWV 232 psalm setting “Dixit Dominus” in nine movements, requiring five vocal soloists (SSATB) and a five-part chorus. Over the course of the entire program, there will be six vocal soloists and the Cantorei vocal ensemble performing with the American Bach Soloists (ABS) ensemble.
Thursday, December 11, and Friday, December 12, Grace Cathedral, 7:30 p.m.: This year there will be two performances of George Frideric Handel’s HWV 56 oratorio Messiah in its entirety with four vocal soloists, the American Bach Choir, and ABS.
Wednesday, December 31, Herbst Theatre, 4 p.m.: As in the past, the year will conclude with A Baroque New Year’s Eve at the Opera. The vocalists will be mezzo Sarah Coit and tenor Matthew Hill. Once again, most of the selections will be taken from Handel operas; but this time there will be only four. (Some readers may recall that last year there were seven!) There will also be excerpts from two Vivaldi operas, as well as music from Jean-Philippe Rameau’s one-act acte de ballet “Pygmalion” and Christoph Willibald Gluck’s three-act opera Orfeo ed Euridice.
Sunday, March 1, St, Mark’s Lutheran Church, 4 p.m.: The title of this program will be The Harmonic Labyrinth. This is taken from the subtitle of the last of the twelve violin concertos (in the key of D major) in Pietro Locatelli’s collection, L'arte del violino. The soloist will be violinist YuEun Gemma Kim. There will also be two vocal soloists, soprano Maya Kherani and mezzo Sarah Coit. The vocal selections will be Giovanni Battista Pergolesi’s setting of the “Stabat Mater” sequence, the first recitative-aria coupling in Johann Sebastian Bach’s secular cantata Non sa che sia dolore (he knows not was sorrow is), BWV 209, and Alessandro Scarlatti’s setting of the “Salve Regina” hymn.
Sunday, May 3, St, Mark’s Lutheran Church, 4 p.m.: The season will conclude with a program entitled Bach’s Harpsichord. Two harpsichordists will contribute to the program, Gabriel Benton and Corey Jamason. It will begin with a solo performance of BWV 903, the “Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue,” composed in the key of D minor. This will be followed by the BWV 1019 sonata in G major, the last in a set of six violin sonatas with keyboard accompaniment. The remainder of the program will consist of three concertos: BWV 1050 in D major, the fifth of the sixth “Brandenburg” concertos, BWV 1044 in A minor for flute, violin, and harpsichord, and BWV 1061, the C major concerto for two harpsichords.
American Bach has created a home page for the new season for the purchase of both subscriptions and single tickets.
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