My Die Freudenkrone: Ehrerbietung zu J.S. Bach for Choir, Organ and Timpani will be performed August 29 at the Riga’s Dome Cathedral by the choir Intis (directed by Ilze Valce), percussionist Normunds Everts and organist Lotars Džeriņš as part of a larger, 7-concert series in the three Latvian cities of Riga, Liepaja and Jurmala devoted to the music of JS Bach and music inspired by him. Commissioned by the City of Liepāja for organist Lotars Džeriņš to premiere at the VI International Organ Music Festival in Liepāja, Latvia in 2007, the title of this work translates to The Crown of Joy: Homage to J.S. Bach. The title derives from the text from the chorale movement (verse six) of Bach’s Cantata BMV 103. For this piece, I used that chorale melody (with my own harmonization), along with fragments taken from his toccata and fugue in D dorian (BMV 538).
The program for the entire concert series (in Latvian) was uploaded here: