Bach’s Angels

Solomon’s Knot

J.S. Bach Es erhub sich ein Streit BWV 19

J.S. Bach Herr Gott, dich loben alle wir BWV 130

J.S. Bach Man singet mit Freuden vom Sieg BWV 149

J.S. Bach Magnificat in D, BWV 243

How do you evoke angels in music? Even for Bach, as he composed music for the yearly Feast of St Michael and all Angels, it must have been a challenge, but it was one that inspired some of his greatest sacred works. Bach’s angels are mighty creatures, battling Satan in apocalyptic battles, but they are also gentle souls who teach us how to sing. To open their festival residency, the inspirational group Solomon’s Knot draws together three of Bach’s great Michaelmas cantatas and performs them alongside the famous Magnificat, in which the Virgin Mary responds to the message brought by the angel Gabriel.

‘Time and again zig-zagging choruses, lightly accompanied, sprang into fire almost as if by spontaneous combustion. Most exciting.’ – The Times

 ‘a sense of warmth, of inclusion, of shared wonder…intimate, uplifting and simultaneously persona and universal…great musicianship allied to unaffected communication.’ – The Observer

Pre-concert and interval bar

Described by The Observer as ‘organic music-making at its most sophisticated’ and championed by Sir John Eliot Gardiner, the baroque collective Solomon’s Knot are one of the freshest and most exciting of baroque groups, and artists in residence at this year’s Ryedale Festival. Performing without conductor, and often from memory, they describe themselves as ‘a group of singers and players who are prepared to take risks in order to communicate more directly with their audience’ and have rapidly established a reputation for inspirational and revelatory performances