BACH COLLEGIUM JAPAN and MASAAKI SUZUKI, conductor
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Masaaki Suzuki, Music Director
Program Biography
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Bach Collegium Japan first came to worldwide attention through their acclaimed recordings of the complete Bach Cantatas on BIS. A BBC review said it all, "the performers live and breathe Bach's music with as much immediacy as if it had been composed yesterday." The group first came to the United States in April 2003 with inspiring performances of the Bach St. Matthew Passion and the St. John Passion and has returned regularly to the delight of devoted audiences. This season they celebrate their 30th anniversary.
Bach Collegium Japan was founded in 1990 by Masaaki Suzuki, its inspirational Music Director, with the aim of introducing Japanese audiences to historically informed performances of great works from the baroque period. Comprised of both period instrument orchestra and chorus, their activities include an annual concert series of Bach’s cantatas and a number of instrumental programs. The award-winning ensemble is now exploring classical repertoire, having released a recording of the Mozart Requiem in November 2014 and subsequent discs of Mozart’s Great Mass in C Minor, which won the Choral category in the 2017 Gramophone Awards, and the Beethoven Missa Solemnis. Their new recording of Beethoven Symphony No. 9 has recently been released.
Bach Collegium Japan has established a formidable international reputation through their acclaimed recordings on the BIS label of the major choral works of Johann Sebastian Bach. 2014 saw the triumphant conclusion of their recorded cycle of the complete Church Cantatas, a huge undertaking initiated in 1995 and comprising over fifty CDs; this major achievement was recognised with a 2014 ECHO Klassick ‘Editorial Achievement of the Year’ award. Their recording of Bach Motets was honoured with a German Record Critics’ Award (Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik), Diapason d’Or de l’Année 2010 and also in 2011 with a BBC Music Magazine Award. This season sees the release of the box set of the Secular Cantatas, a much anticipated new recording of the St Matthew Passion and a first disc of Harpsichord Concerti under the leadership of Masato Suzuki, the group’s Principal Conductor.
Bach Collegium Japan and Masaaki Suzuki have shared their interpretations across the international music scene with performances in venues as far afield as Amsterdam, Berlin, Paris, Hong Kong, London, Los Angeles, Melbourne, New York and Seoul, and at major festivals such as the BBC Proms, Edinburgh International Festival, Flanders Festival, Hong Kong Arts Festival, Bachfest Leipzig and New Zealand International Arts Festival.
In 2020 the ensemble marks its 30th anniversary with a European tour including return visits to the capital cities of Brussels, Dublin, London, Madrid and Paris as well as other major musical centres in France, Germany and Poland in addition to their regular series of concerts at Tokyo’s Suntory Hall and Tokyo Opera City, which this year includes a celebratory Beethoven concert comprising Symphony No. 5 and the Mass in C.