Hear the words “world premiere,” “Bach” and “long-lost masterpiece” in the same sentence, and you might picture a dusty score rescued from an attic in Düsseldorf after being inadvertently consigned to oblivion three centuries ago.
But the story behind Johann Sebastian Bach’s “Markus Passion” and how it actually came to Pittsburgh’s Chatham Baroque is both more complicated and more interesting, if a bit less dramatic.
In brief, the work — a musical setting of sufferings of Jesus as told in the Gospel of Mark — has been performed before, though not for some 300 years. The original score seems genuinely lost, so what’s premiering Fri., April 11, at Oakland’s Carnegie Music Hall is instead a staged reconstruction based on scholarly detective work. (All the music in it is Bach’s, though it’s likely not all of those compositions were in the original Markus Passion).
And while it’s not the first such reconstruction ever, one thing that is brand new is the staging, which turns this Passion into something like a small opera, complete with period instruments and 19 performers including a well-known actor as The Evangelist.
That which is lost
The story begins in 1731 in Leipzig, Germany, where Bach lived and worked much of his life. The historical record indicates the "Markus Passion" he composed that year was performed at least twice. And after he died, in 1750, his son C.P.E. Bach delivered the work to his music publisher.
It was never seen again.
In fact, it was only a century later — after a Bach revival, and amidst plans to publish a centennial edition of his work — that it was discovered to be missing. All that remained aside from the title was the libretto (written by the professional librettist Picander) and a list of the instruments required to play it.
Thus began some 170 years of efforts to recreate it, motivated in no small part by the fact that Bach’s earlier Passions — Matthew and John — rank among his greatest works.
“Think of an archeologist going to a Greek island and finding there was a temple there,” said Malcolm Bruno, the American scholar, based in Wales, who crafted this most recent Markus reconstruction. “You can see the columns, some of them, and then you can an arch and you begin to see, imagine what this temple was like, but it's not all there.”
That list of instruments for the "Markus Passion" included two lutes and two viola da gambas — stringed instruments of the day, though in an unusual combination. A scholar in the 19th century saw that the listed instruments matched those for Bach’s “Trauerode,” a funeral ode from 1727. And that’s been the basis of every attempt to reconstruct this Passion since.
There have been about 20, says Bruno, who started work on his own reconstruction after seeing an earlier attempt performed in Germany, in 1995. More than 20 years of work followed, much of which Bruno spent trying to figure out what music Bach used for the arias and other components listed in the libretto but lost to history.
Passion puzzle
The key here is that scholars believe Bach’s "Markus Passion" is a “parody” — not a spoof, in the modern sense, but a work built from parts of other compositions. Chatham Baroque co-artistic director Scott Pauley said the practice was “very common” at the time, especially when passages were borrowed from works like Bach’s “Trauerode,” which as a funeral piece got limited play.
Some reconstructors use Bach’s own works to fill in the gaps, but others have borrowed pieces from composers who work in a similar style, or even compose their own original pieces. The main thing, Markus says, is that the musical pieces chosen fit the poetic meter of the texts.
Bruno’s edition of "Markus Passion," which he finally published in 2019, is unusual in that it consists entirely of pieces Bach composed, including at least one Bach likely recycled himself — the cantata “Widerstehe doch der Sünde,” used for the alto aria “Falsche Welt” — and others that Bruno says Bach probably didn’t reuse here, like the cantata Bruno recycled as the soprano aria “Welt Und Himmel.”
Among other deviations from convention, Bruno also replaced the sung recitative — the narrative text taken from the gospel — with Biblical text spoken in English by an actor. (The songs will be sung in the libretto's original German.)
“That smelled to me like concert theater, which is my genre,” said Bill Barclay, artistic director of Massachusetts-based Concert Theater Works, to whom Bruno brought his new edition. “I combine music with story, and give the audience drama so that they can really appreciate and dive into the music all the more.”
The project was commissioned by the Oregon Bach Festival.
“A pocket Passion”
Bruno’s reconstruction runs about 80 minutes, much shorter than Bach’s Matthew or John Passions.
“I call it a pocket Passion because it's very condensed, it's small, it is intimate, and it's personal,” Barclay said. “So this is like people gathering around in someone's living room and worshiping the passion among them.”
To play the Evangelist, Barclay recruited Joseph Marcell, the classically trained St. Lucian-British actor he’d worked with at Shakespeare’s Globe. In the U.S., Marcell is best known for playing Geoffrey the butler on the hit ’90s Will Smith sitcom “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.”
“The actor is in the middle of the stage at a desk with some props and is telling the story to us of Christ's passion,” said Barclay. “It's his story as the evangelist, as someone who has been dyed in the wool of Scripture and wants us all to understand what the majesty is within Christ's suffering.”
It was also Barclay who recruited Chatham Baroque as a group that had experience with the instruments — the lute, or theorbo, and the viola da gamba — Bach used in the “Trauerode.” The production will feature Chatham Baroque’s Pauley on theorbo, Patricia Halverson on viola da gamba and Andrew Fouts on violin.
Additionally, Barclay brought in the acclaimed New York-based classical music group The Sebastians, whose 11 pieces for this show include organ, harpsichord, flute, oboe d’amore, violoncello and contrabass.
The 19-piece ensemble is rounded out by four singers: Pittsburgh-based soprano Pascale Beaudin, countertenor Cody Bowers, tenor James Reese and bass-baritone Jonathan Woody.
The troupe convened to rehearse in New York City this week.
After the new staged version premieres April 11, in Pittsburgh, it heads to New York’s Corpus Christi Church for a performance April 13. In June, it will play the United Kingdom’s Aldeburgh Festival before heading back to the U.S. for July dates in Portland, Ore; Eugene, Ore.; and Seattle.
"You know, we don't get an opportunity as artists to introduce everyone to a new masterpiece by the greatest composer who's ever written music," Barclay said. "So this is that opportunity."
