Latest in the Catholic Herald: ‘Truly this was the Son of God’ (Guttenberg's Passion)

‘Truly this was the Son of God’

Jens F Laurson

 4 April, 2019

The Crucifixion (1635-1665), by Alonso Cano

I was moved to tears by a visionary approach to Bach's great Passion, says Jens F Laurson

It was a little before Easter 2008, and I had only just begun to grasp that my life in the United States, where I had spent the previous dozen years, had come to an end. Back in my native but estranged Munich I was: lonely, though still writing for Washington’s Classical Music radio station.

It was then that my boss at WETA 90.9FM reached out and asked if I wanted to join him on a cross-European train trip. The goal was to see in performance as many of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Matthew Passions and productions of Richard Wagner’s Parsifal – traditionally an Easter opera for its prominent Good Friday music episode – as possible; all within the space of a fortnight. It turned into two of the most memorable and cherished weeks of my life. Fascinating in its own right, this is not that story.

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