The Significance of Bach

The reason for the style of Bach interpretation characterized by von Karajan, Masur, and many others seems to lie in the established circumstance of today's concert life. There is hardly a symphony orchestra concert series that does not incorporate choral works. The fact that Bach's oratorios have a place here seems to be an expression of tradition, and perhaps convention as well. Their worth is seen less in the context of Bach's work overall than in isolation and is defined as the expression of a "greatness that transcends time."

The artistic stance of the self-declared "historically authentic" performers seems at first to us today to be a form of alienation. The music of Bach sounds different than we as listeners to so-called classical music first expect. It is supposed to reach our ears in its original form, like a painting freed from the layer upon layer of varnish that has built up on it over the centuries. For the subscribers to this interpretive approach, it is precisely the fault of the Bach tradition that has developed progressively over the centuries and of its conventions, that to present Bach's works without distortion should be viewed as alienating.

The church's music-oriented stance is completely different: Bach's music is performed here because it fits the particular theme of a worship service or the shifting focus of a particular time of the church year (such as Christmas, Passiontide, or Easter), but primarily because it has something to say above and beyond that which is simply musical.

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