The Ottawa Bach Choir is holding a musical fundraiser to coincide with Oktoberfest on October 5. The JUNO Award-winning Choir offers music, special performance, German-inspired hors d’oeuvres and desserts, wine, and of course, beer form local brewery Kichesippi Beer Co.
With Bach’s choral music as its heart, the Ottawa Bach Choir explores works from all periods of historical music. The Choir was founded in 2002 by Lisette Canton, and performs regularly across Canada, as well as touring in Europe, China, Mexico and the US, including performances at the Bachfest Leipzig, at Carnegie Hall, and many more.
Countertenor Daniel Taylor is among the performers in a program that will include everything from Bach to the Beatles.
Bach and Beer
Just how does drinking beer, albeit with musical accompaniment, honour Bach, you may ask? Johann Sebastian, and it turns out, was a great aficionado of the golden brew.
Christoph Wolff, a Harvard professor and musician with a penchant for historical research, and J.S. Bach in particular, wrote his well researched biography Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician in 2001. It was nominated, and became a finalist, for the Pulitzer Prize in Biography that year. Wolff’s book is exhaustive, looking at not only the composer’s music, but his lifestyle — including his drinking habits.
In 1713 Bach was invited to travel to Halle by the local church board in order to consult on the building of a new organ. The trip lasted two weeks, and the church paid all of Bach’s expenses. The receipts include a total of 18 groschen, the currency of the day, for beer.
In the book, Wolff says that the amount would have purchased about 32 quarts of beer at 1713 Halle prices.
Thirty-two quarts of beer for two weeks amounts to about one six pack each day.
Bach passed his audition in Halle for the position of director of music, but decided not to take it after all.
- Find tickets and information about Bach and Beer, Saturday October 5, 2024, at St. Stefan — Serbian Orthodox Church and Hall in Ottawa, [HERE], and the rest of their 2024/25 season [HERE].
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