CHORAGE® #3
Bachchor goes Jazz!

Jukka Linkola (*1955) 
The Fullfillment of Love (World premiere)
Commissioned by the Bach Choir Salzburg

I The Blazing Fire
II Let Us Hurry
III Arise, My Darling

Christoph Pepe Auer (*1981)
Serenity’s Harmony (World premiere)

Duke Ellington (1899–1974) 
Sacred Concert 
(Arr.: John Høybye, Peder Pedersen) 

After Bruckner's 200th birthday, the Bach Choir also commemorates the 50th anniversary of the death of jazz legend Duke Ellington in CHORAGE® 2024. Together with the Mozarteum University Big Band, the choir explores the jazzy sounds and rhythms of Ellington's "Sacred Concert".

Ellington, who himself was very devout, did not conceive his Sacred Concert as a complete work, but rather wrote individual parts for various occasions, so that the work was reassembled again and again. On tour, he played the various "Sacred Concerts" with his band, sometimes together with local church choirs, which made the works widely popular. Three "Sacred Concerts" have been handed down by Duke Ellington, and the Danish choral composer John Høybye and big band leader Peder Pedersen have combined the different versions into an integral version with some new arrangements, which today enjoys great international popularity. The Bach Choir and Mozarteum Big Band will sing a rousing hymn of praise to the divine as equal partners.

Two works by Finnish composer Jukka Linkola, who brings a wealth of jazz experience to his compositions as a big band leader, will also be performed. In his a cappella choral work "Mieliteko" (= lust, desire), Linkola turns his attention to interpersonal idolatry, which he illuminates with groove and exciting jazz harmonies. The Finnish text is by no means dry, but rather extremely lively.

In addition, Jukka Linkola has been commissioned by the Bach Choir to compose a new work: taking up the common thread of the spiritual and personal idolatry, Linkola uses old poetic texts from Nordic mythology to search for a musical bridge between the two worlds, oscillating between God and the individual, between classical music and jazz, between archaic myth and modern jazz sounds. 

In any case, this concert will bring spirituality and jazz together with relish!