Saint Matthew Passion

Please join conductor Paul McCreesh for a three-night event exploring Bach’s monumental work.

Tuesday | October 6 | 6:00pm
Landmark Center
Discussion with conductor Paul McCreesh hosted by SPCO musician Charles Ullery
Refreshments and hors d’oeuvres provided

Learn about the unique and historically appropriate one-to-a-part vocal arrangement of this work.

Thursday | October 8 | 7:00pm
Ordway Concert Hall
Open Rehearsal

Observe the SPCO musician in collaboration with Paul McCreesh and singers from the Gabrieli Consort.

Saturday | October 10 | 7:30pm
Ordway Concert Hall
Performance*
Paul McCreesh, conductor
Singers from the Gabrieli Consort

Watch it all come together!

Three-night event tickets – $100/person

Tickets for discussion and open rehearsal only – $50/person

Purchase tickets by following the links above
or contact Ashley Sondergaard at 651.292.4314

*Best available seating.
Alternate concert dates available upon request.
Please contact Ashley at  [email protected]

Parking and Directions

Ordway Concert Hall
345 Washington Street
Saint Paul, MN 55102
Click here for more information on parking and directions

Landmark Center
75 West Fifth Street
Saint Paul, MN 55102
Click here for more information on parking and directions

Suggested Readings

Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician by Christoph Wolff
Bach’s Dialogue with Modernity: Perspectives on the Passions by John Butt
The Essential Bach Choir by Andrew Parrott

About Paul McCreesh

Paul McCreesh is the founder and Artistic Director of the Gabrieli Consort & Players which he established in 1982 and with whom he has toured world-wide and made many award-winning recordings. In 2013 he begins his tenure as the Principal Conductor and Artistic Adviser of the Gulbenkian Orchestra (Lisbon).

McCreesh is well-known for the energy and passion that he brings to his music-making, and he has guest conducted many of the major orchestras and choirs across the globe including the Budapest Festival, Spanish National, Danish National Symphony, Bergen Philharmonic and Hong Kong Philharmonic orchestras. In 13/14 McCreesh makes significant debuts including the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchester in Schubert, Schumann and Mendelssohn, the Berlin Konzerthaus Orchester in Mozart and Britten, and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Choir with Mendelssohn Elijah. He will also return to the St Paul Chamber Orchestra in the USA and to the Basel Chamber Orchestra on tour in Switzerland and Italy.

With the Gulbenkian Orchestra, McCreesh will conduct a wide range of music from the classical period through to the nineteenth and twentieth century; he will focus in particular on symphonic repertoire, oratorio, and opera in concert, working closely with the world-renowned Gulbenkian Choir. Highlights of his inaugural season include performances of Mozart’s late symphonies, Schubert Symphony No.9, Tchaikovsky’s lesser known Suite No.3 and Mahler’s Lieder eines Fahrenden Gesellen, and in autumn 2013 he will conduct the orchestra on tour in China.

McCreesh has established a strong reputation in the opera house and has conducted productions at the Teatro Real Madrid, Royal Danish Opera, Vlaamse Opera and at the Verbier Festival. Future projects include Hérold’s Le Pré aux Clercs at Opera Comique, Paris and a return to Vlaamse Opera for a new production of Le nozze di Figaro.

Building on his large catalogue of recordings with Deutsche Grammophon, which includes the Gramophone Award-winning Haydn The Creation, in 2011 McCreesh launched his own label, Winged Lion, in collaboration with the Gabrieli Consort & Players, Signum Classics and the Wratislavia Cantans Festival – where McCreesh was Artistic Director between 2006 and 2012. To date they have made six recordings, which reflect the breadth of McCreesh’s musical interests: Berlioz’s gargantuan Grande Messe des Morts (BBC Award 2012), Mendelssohn Elijah and Britten War Requiem, two acclaimed choral albums of Renaissance and contemporary music, and a reworking of his earlier Gabrieli disc, A New Venetian Coronation 1595 (Gramophone Award 2013).

McCreesh is especially passionate about working with young musicians and broadening access to classical music; he works regularly with youth orchestras and choirs and is active in building new educational initiatives whenever possible.