Music from Bach’s Mass in B Minor
Summer 2026 brings an exciting new project for Essenza – our first encounter with Bach’s magnificent Mass in B minor! We know it as a work of epic proportions that Bach wrote at the end of his life, but Bach in fact composed versions of many parts of it earlier on – like the ‘Sanctus’, adapted from a ‘Sanctus’ performed in Leipzig on Christmas Day 1724, and the 1733 Missa consisting of a ‘Kyrie’ and ‘Gloria’, parts of which found their way into Mass in B minor. The full Mass was never performed – perhaps because it was simply too vast a work for a single mass celebration.
We at Essenza have long dreamed of reworking the piece as one of our projects. This year we finally pay homage to one of Bach’s greatest works, with reduced forces and with the music carefully adjusted to last just one hour, and with many chances for our audiences to join us and sing some of the best-known Gottesloblieder – come, celebrate with us!
