BACH FESTIVAL HAS A BRAVURA BACKSTORY

The Bach Festival Society of Winter Park, founded in 1935, sprang from a Vespers service presented that year on the Rollins College campus at Knowles Memorial Chapel. The event was organized by Christopher Honaas, dean of the college’s whimsically named Division of Expressive Arts.

Today, what started as a single Sunday performance has grown into a full-fledged festival with a 160-member choir, a permanent orchestra and a packed schedule of concerts, many of which feature internationally renowned guest soloists.

By the time John Sinclair became conductor and artistic director, the society and its annual Bach Festival had for decades been the personal domain of John Tiedtke, a shrewd businessman who had made his fortune growing sugar, citrus and corn in South Florida.

Hugh McKean, then president of the college, had asked his boyhood friend to take charge in 1950, when founding society President Isabelle Sprague-Smith died and the organization’s future seemed in doubt.

The no-nonsense Tiedtke proved a fortuitous choice. He loved music — he played piano a bit — but mostly enjoyed listening and was a consistent and generous donor to community-based arts organizations. At Rollins, he had been treasurer and chairman of the board of trustees.

McKean, an iconic Winter Park figure, had been an art professor at Rollins before his elevation to the presidency. He had also married Jeannette Genius, granddaughter of Charles Hosmer Morse, a benevolent industrialist who had helped shape modern Winter Park.

“Mr. Tiedtke and Dr. McKean understood that with great wealth comes responsibility,” says Sinclair, who was hired in 1985 as chair of the college’s music department and, he assumed, artistic director of the festival. “They would have lunch together every Saturday. They started inviting me to come along, and those lunches were hugely interesting.”

The Missouri-born Sinclair, who says he sometimes felt “a little like a third wheel,” would listen in awe as the old friends discussed art, philosophy and the events of the day. They would even spar over who should pay the tab. After 40 years of lunches, McKean would joke, he remembered only a handful of times when Tiedtke picked up the bill.

But when the subject of the society came up, it was clear that Tiedtke, the society’s primary funder as well as its hands-on boss, called the shots. There would be a new artistic director only when Tiedtke decided that there ought to be.

After nearly five years passed with Murray Somerville still ensconced in the artistic director’s position, Sinclair felt that an impasse had been reached. He and his wife Gail had two children and loved Rollins and their comfortable home in Maitland. Still, several high-profile institutions, including Penn State, were making overtures — and Sinclair was tempted to explore them. At Tiedtke’s request, McKean persuaded Sinclair to stay put and counseled patience. Shortly thereafter, Somerville left for a position as organist and choirmaster at Harvard University’s Memorial Church and Sinclair finally took up the baton — which he has kept for 31 seasons and counting.

“Mr. Tiedtke knew I had strong opinions,” recalls Sinclair. “But he could be persuaded in some instances. Basically, he said, ‘You pick what you want to do, and I get veto power.’” The music-loving philanthropist remained very much in charge of the society until the year before his death, at age 97, in 2004.

Living up to the examples set by Tiedtke and McKean has been a continuing priority for Sinclair, who earned his master’s and doctoral degrees from Kansas City’s Conservatory of Music and Dance and has been dubbed “Central Florida’s resident conductor” by the Orlando Sentinel.

Tiedtke believed that well-run, well-supported arts organizations were integral to any enlightened community, and McKean believed that any academician worth his salt was first and foremost a classroom teacher.

Eric Ravndal, society chairman since 2004, is a retired Episcopal priest and a Tiedtke cousin. Under his leadership, the organization was revamped as a more traditionally structured nonprofit, with a diverse board and a paid staff. (Despite all outward appearances and a myriad of connections, the society is a separate organization from the college.)

Although Ravndal’s collaborative management style is a departure for the organization, he, like his legendary predecessor, recognizes that the artistic director brings more to the position than an unerring ear for music.

“John is a natural educator,” says Ravndal. “I attend nearly every rehearsal. And I can tell you that the musicians never leave a rehearsal without having learned more about the music they’re performing. It’s an incredible gift.”

Sinclair is indeed an engaging teacher and a superb conductor. But he’s also innovative and unstoppable.

After a season of presenting superb music despite uncertainty caused by COVID-19, the Bach Festival Society of Winter Park is coming back

COURTESY OF THE BACH FESTIVAL SOCIETY OF WINTER PARK

John Sinclair, conductor and artistic director of the Bach Festival Society of Winter Park, is excited about the organization’s 2021-22 season, which will include a memorial concert for the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, a mother-and-son piano duo and music from two African American composers. Many Bach Festival performances are held in Knowles Memorial Chapel at Rollins College.

When the entire Bach Festival Choir and Orchestra is assembled, they provide a feast for the eye and the ear in a magnificent setting.

for its 87th season ready to present its usual soaring classical music while wading into issues of racial justice.

The society has announced a full slate of shows for the 2021-22 season, which will include a memorial concert for the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, a mother-and-son piano duo and music from two African American composers.

Expect the latter program to pack an emotional punch, given the times in which we live. It encompasses an oratorio that tells the story of Moses’ leading his people to the Promised Land juxtaposed with a searing choral composition that incorporates the final words of unarmed young Black men who have been killed by police officers.

As always, the season consists of sometimes overlapping themed segments including Choral Masterworks, Insights & Sounds, the Visiting Artist Series and the Bach Festival itself. In addition, the festival’s choir and orchestra headline several community events.

The first event of the new season will be an Insights & Sounds concert featuring organist Colin MacKnight and a brass ensemble (September 23). Next in that series will be Exploring African American Composers (January 22, 2022) and Commemorating Brahms’ 125th Anniversary (March 31, 2022).

Insights & Sounds is usually held in the Tiedtke Concert Hall on select Thursdays at 7:30 p.m. A highlight, in addition to the music, is a discussion led by Sinclair on the fascinating backstories of the composers and their work.

Choral Masterworks, featuring large-scale works combining the full choir and orchestra, is usually held in Knowles Memorial Chapel. First up is Mozart, Barber and Lauridsen (October 23 and 24), followed by A Classic Christmas (December 11 and 12) and a program featuring Order of Moses by Nathaniel Dett and Seven Last Words of the Unarmed by Joel Thompson (April 23 and 24).

Dett, born in 1882 in Ontario, Canada, to formerly enslaved parents, became the first African American to receive a bachelor’s degree in music from Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio. He later earned a master’s degree from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York.

At Oberlin, Dett became fascinated with traditional Negro spirituals: “Suddenly it seemed I heard again the frail voice of my long-departed grandmother calling across the years; and in a rush of emotion which stirred my spirit to its very center, the meaning of the songs which had given her soul such peace was revealed to me.”

He later became a prolific composer and arranger and chaired the music department at Hampton University (then called the Hampton Institute), where the choir he directed toured the world presenting sacred music.

Thompson, age 24, is an Atlanta-based composer, conductor, pianist and educator best known for the choral work Seven Last Words of the Unarmed, which was premiered in 2015 by the University of Michigan Men’s Glee Club and won the 2018 American Prize for Choral Composition.

Seven Last Words of the Unarmed uses the dying words of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Trayvon Martin and, most memorably, George Floyd’s “I can’t breathe” as Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck.

The 87th annual Bach Festival runs From February 4 through 27, 2022. Among the offerings will be a concert by organist Ken Cowan (February 6, 2022), Spiritual Spaces (February 6, 2022), a concert by organist Cowan and violinist Lisa Shihoten (February 6, 2022), Concerts by Candlelight: Sebelius and Grieg (February 11 and 12, 2022), Mendelssohn’s Elijah (February 19 and 20, 2022), Mozart’s Requiem and Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy (February 25 and 26, 2022), and J.S. Bach: A Brandenburg, an Orchestral Suite and Two Cantatas (February 27).

Most Bach Festival events are held in Knowles Memorial Chapel. Additional programs, master classes and community events will be announced in January 2022.

The Visiting Artist Series will feature the a cappella group VOCES8 (October 31), a piano concert by the mother-and-son duo Olga Kern and Vladislav Kern (date TBD), a concert by the Juilliard String Quartet (March 12, 2022) and concert by Norwegian trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth (April 3, 2022).

Community Events include the City of Winter Park’s Olde Fashioned 4th of July Celebration in Central Park (July 5), a presentation of Fauré’s Requiem to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks (September 11) and Christmas in the Park (December 2), a Central Park holiday tradition presented by the Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art.

Call 407-646-2182 or visit bachfestivalflorida.org for more information. n