“Music in Heaven’s Castle” reviewed by Julia W. Rath

*** One of Chicago’s newest musical ensembles is called Bach in the City. Their debut concert season opened on Friday, October 3rd with a program called “Music in Heaven’s Castle.” Taking place at the gorgeous St. Vincent de Paul Church, adjacent to the De Paul University campus, this was meant to be an authentic musical presentation from the Baroque era. While the music itself is immortal, this style of performance takes us back 350 years to experience the way that concertgoers first heard Johann Sebastian Bach’s compositions. Even with the use of professional musicians, this concert has an amateurish feel, because the execution of the music lacks the precision that modern audiences have come to expect. To put this another way, we have become accustomed to hear Bach’s music in the way that most contemporary orchestras play it today as compared to the way that it was originally written and performed during the Baroque period.

When Bach and other Baroque composers wrote their compositions in the 17th and 18th centuries, it was the musicians themselves who led the chamber orchestra, with the concertmaster (first chair violinist) who usually took control and often shared this role with the harpsichordist/pianist. But in the early 1800s, a revolution took place with the introduction of the conductor, the podium, and the baton. As a consequence, orchestras could become larger, orchestrations could become more elaborate, and the execution of musical compositions could become increasingly more exact. The beat became steadier, while entrances and exits were made more precise through cueing when the conductor did not otherwise have to play an instrument. This could also allow the basso continuo (which was a common characteristic of Baroque music) to become more of a stylistic adornment rather than an essential element.

In today’s concert, violinist and concertmaster Emily Nebel led the chamber orchestra with her chemistry and body movements as she and most of the strings performed while standing. Nebel took control of the ensemble using her bowed arm in exaggeration and especially her full body movements. In part, her mission was to get the violinists and violists and others to “dance” at the same rhythm as she was so that they could keep time more accurately. At other moments, it was harpsichordist Jason Moy who took the lead. The two would switch off bringing the musicians “back to the beat”, for example, when the orchestra was rushing portions of the music or when the rhythm lacked crispness. The lack of coordination from time to time was in no way a fault, since this is endemic to the structure of the Baroque chamber orchestra!

Nebel not only served as concertmaster but also as soloist for Bach’s “Violin Concerto in A Minor, BWV 1041.” Similarly, Moy was one of three featured harpsichordists in Bach’s “Concerto in C Major for 3 Harpsichords, BWV 1064”: the other two players being Jacob Reed and music director Richard Webster. While most of the program made use of two harpsichords, with Moy seated towards the front of the stage (and facing to the back) and Reed seated towards the back of the stage (facing to the front), the rearrangement of the stage with the three harpsichords was very different: now they were in parallel with each other horizontally across the stage, with Moy and Reed facing stage left and Webster between them facing stage right. But something didn’t feel right about this particular piece. It felt like the musicians were on autopilot and didn’t have enough control over the music, and the balance seemed off. Was it that they could not all face the concertmaster? Did the addition of the third harpsichord create some amount of muddiness, perhaps because it might have been tuned to a different pitch than the others?*

The program began with Georg Philipp Telemann’s “Overture-Suite in D Major, TWV 55:D7”, which showcased Ryan Berndt, who played the natural trumpet (common to the Baroque era). It’s a lot longer than today’s trumpet and has a unique sound, one that Telemann and Bach were writing for. Berndt gave a very competent performance, with articulation and phrasing in a different style than what one might hear out of the modern trumpet. After intermission, we heard Bach’s “Widerstehe doch der Sünde, BWV 34”, highlighting countertenor Marco Rivera Rosa who wore a sparkling light blue suit jacket and sang with a warm and expressive voice. What I liked best about this portion of the concert was the choice of this blunt piece of vocal music having to do with sin. I felt that the composition was quite relevant for our times with its essential line: ”Do not let Satan bedazzle you.” The program ended with the other Georg, French-born German composer Georg Muffat, with his Sonata Nr. 5, from Armonico Tributo, which starts with the Allemanda, one of the most common instrumental dance styles in Baroque music, and ends with the Fuga, Adagio, and Passacaglia segments being played as one.

Other musicians included: Sallynee Amawat (violin), Amelia Sue (violin), Rachel Smith (violin), Melissa Kirk (viola), Beatrice Chen (viola), Ana Kim (cello), and Ian Hallas (contrabass).

You might wonder way the program was called “Music in Heaven’s Castle.” According to the playbill, the title was inspired by “the breathtaking features of the Himmelsburg (Heaven’s Castle) chapel in Bach’s Weimar, Germany, and our home, St. Vincent de Paul Church.” So while the underlying theme of the music was not about heaven per se, it had more to do with the experience of listening to the concert inside a beautiful church setting. This was a perfectly lovely presentation that lifted us out of the mundane.

“Music in Heaven’s Castle” by Bach in the City launched its debut concert season at 7:30 p.m. on October 3, 2025, at St. Vincent de Paul Church, 1010 W. Webster Avenue, Chicago.

Tickets were $45 each.

Note: We were told just after intermission that those who parked in the De Paul parking lots should go up to the people handling the box office at the end of the concert. Then they will receive a voucher so that their parking will be fully paid for.

*I am far from being an expert on this subject, but I wondered if two of the harpsichords were tuned to A4=440HZ (called “concert pitch”, today’s standard used by major orchestras) as compared to A4=435Hz (called “Diapason Normal”) or “Baroque pitch”, which is A4=415Hz. Basically, the pitch standard for Bach’s music in his time period was roughly a semitone lower than the modern standard, and his compositions were written with this manner of “low tuning” in mind.

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