The 2025 Festival Edition: Transformation

Mr. Maul, the title of the 2025 Bachfest is »Transformation«. It sounds as if you’re bent on addressing a certain very topical subject ...
MM (laughs): Of course we’re aware that transformation, in the sense of the urgently needed change of paradigm in the global economy away from the use of fossil energy sources and towards renewable energy sources, is a number one subject of conversation. But for me, the crucial reason for this choice of title was something else: many of Johann Sebastian Bach’s works are also characterised by transformation processes. The Latin »transformare« means »to reshape«, and indeed, Bach subjected some of his works to a many-layered »reshaping« process. And that’s what we want to show at the Bachfest, with his Passions, for example, or the B Minor Mass.

But that alone won’t make for a very varied Bachfest programme!
You’re absolutely right. With Bach, the transformations go much further. It’s also fascinating to hear the metamorphoses that many of Bach’s scores underwent with his parodying technique – for example, when Bach transformed the music for his homages to the elector of Saxony’s family into the Christmas Oratorio. Or when movements from the St. Matthew Passion served as the framework for the funeral music for his beloved Prince Leopold. But it’s also enlightening to see that Bach, although he never left Germany, systematically explored the musical map of all Europe by constantly studying the music of his contemporaries. In other words, he copied down and wrote his own arrangements of works by the French organ school or leading Italians, for example, and in doing so perfected his own style. That’s how Pergolesi’s »Stabat Mater« became the German-language psalm concerto »Tilge, Höchster, meine Sünden« – a piece in which Bach surprises us not only with a new text, but also with a new viola part woven into it. We’ll be hearing all these fascinating aspects during the festival.

Does that mean we’ll be hearing far less of Bach’s sacred cantatas, which have played such a pre-eminent role in the festival programmes of recent years?
Not at all. Because even the cantatas underwent transformations. Ultimately, besides Bach I know of no other composer who in his sacred works so intensively explored how it might feel when the soul is ›transformed‹ from the mortality of this world into the immortality of the hereafter. In short, it was easy to weave a many-faceted Bachfest programme with »transformation« as the common thread and once again to attract top-class artists – including quite a few who, over the past few decades, have themselves initiated transformation processes in the way Bach is interpreted.

And yet the word »transformation« also suggests not just looking back at Bach, but to a certain extent bringing him into the here and now and experimenting with his music. Will you also be fulfilling this expectation?
Of course. At the Bachfest we always have formats focused precisely on that – our open-air BachStage, for example. In those concerts during the first weekend, we’ll be hearing once again how Bach inspires musicians across genres, from the Romanticism to jazz and rock. We’ll even be hearing »The Arabian Passion« – a look at Bach’s Passions through the musical lens of the Middle East.
And on the subject of Passions: I’m delighted that in addition to Bach’s own, initial transformation of the St. John Passion (the 1725 version) we’ll also be hearing a bold and very topical version of that epoch-making work: the »QueerPassion« – a new libretto by Thomas Höft, who uses Bach’s deeply moving music to address past and present crimes against queer people, that is, people who do not conform to heterosexual gender norms.
For my part, I couldn’t let the 500th anniversary of Auerbach’s Cellar pass without ›marrying‹ Bach and Goethe. With »Bach’s Faust«, I’ve created a kind of singspiel which uses Bach’s music to illustrate and comment on Goethe’s Faust. I’m looking forward to it immensely, especially with Burghart Klaußner in the role of Doctor Faustus and performed in a truly original venue. I’m also very happy that in the »About Bach« series we’ve managed to book some of the greatest thinkers of our time – including two Nobel Prize for Literature winners – who have accepted the challenge of putting the phenomenon that Johann Sebastian Bach is into words.
Incidentally: the theme of transformation is already evident in the illustration on our cover page, by Ritchie Riediger Using the Braun tube, he transforms sound into graphic form. Our cover page shows his transformation of Bach’s unfinished B-A-C-H fugue – in other words, the legendary work in which Bach himself transformed his name into music Riediger has now transformed into image form. A double transformation!

Ritchie Riediger »B-A-C-H / THE LAST MINUTE« / 2024 / erscheint 2025 als Graphik, die käuflich erwerbbar ist

We’re told that Bach himself is going to be appearing at the Bachfest. You’re joking – aren’t you?
Yes and no. The magic formula is »augmented reality«. Because several times a day starting at the Bachfest, in the historic Summer Hall of the Bach Archive, the Bach we know from the famous portrait by Haussmann – which we’re quite simply going to bring to life – will be giving a kind of lecture-recital. It will be amazing and spectacular – book your seat early because space in the Summer Hall is (unfortunately) limited!

Is the title »Transformation« also a promise that the whole festival is going to be more sustainable?
We’re striving towards that at every level of planning, design and organisation. Of course, one of our central concerns is to reconcile the international nature of the Bachfest – which attracts participants and visitors from all over the world – with the sustainability imperative. As part of that effort, we question our own processes very carefully. We have artists appearing several times whenever possible and we’ve found great partners thanks to whom we’re greener in terms of mobility and supply. And of course, we simply have to do something to offset the unavoidable CO2 footprint that the extraordinary international nature of the Bachfest entails. That’s why for the past four years now, we’ve been planting a »Bach Forest« south of Leipzig. It’s a cherished project of ours, for which we collect donations on a continuous basis and hold an annual climate concert. In 2025, we’re going one step further: with a new rebate, we want to encourage our visitors to buy a »Climate Pass« – to offset together the Bachfest’s footprint, the full price goes towards saplings for the Bach Forest. That will help the Bach Forest to grow even faster. And in the best possible scenario, we’ll have succeeded in making our audience aware that they’re contributing to their own transformation!