This week several of our board members and a group of Bach aficionados led by Dr. Robert Moore will travel to Leipzig for Bachfest 2013, and on Thursday, June 13, our sister organization in Leipzig, the Staedtepartnerschaft Leipzig-Houston, is celebrating the 20th anniversary of our sister city relationship. We’ll post a report and pictures soon.
In the meantime, take a look at our relationship with Leipzig. Vibrant from the beginning, we have witnessed amazing exchanges, and in general, had a wonderful time with each other: Houston-Leipzig: What We Do (http://houstonleipzig.org/?p=2603). Please mark your calendars for our 20th anniversary dinner that will take place on September 21, 2013, at the Junior League in Houston.
Bachfest 2013 begins on Friday, June 14, with a concert at the St. Thomas Church in Leipzig. From then until June 23 Bachfest 2013 will include 114 performances at over 30 venues in and around Leipzig. The opening concert will be broadcast simultaneously on the market square in Leipzig. You, too, can listen to the opening concert on the Bach Archives and Museum website (http://www.bach-leipzig.de), beginning at 5:00 p.m. Leipzig time on June 14 (10:00 a.m. Houston time). The closing concert on June 23 will be available on that website at 8:00 p.m. (1:00 p.m. Houston time). For those of you who can’t wait to hear a concert, take a look at our website with a video of the opening concert (http://houstonleipzig.org/?p=2607) of Bachfest 2012 from June 7 of last year that was just made available.
Staying in Houston and wondering what to do? On June 14and June 15, take in a Texas Music Festival concert at the Moores School of Music, University of Houston, featuring Conductor Horst Förster of the Akademisches Orchester Leipzig and bassoonist Jessica Findley, winner of the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Young Artist Competition, who will perform with Förster and the AOL at the Gewandhaus during the 2014 season. See the Houston-Leipzig website (http://houstonleipzig.org/?p=2618) for more information on the performances and artists. Additional Texas Music Festival concerts are scheduled for June 22 (Mahler Symphony No. 7 in E Minor) and June 29(Grand Finale, Strauss, Prokofiev).
Do visit Redbud Gallery (http://www.redbudgallery.com/) in the Heights currently showing Degenerate Art– degenerate because it was declared so by the German Nazi government in the 1930s. Please find more information on our website. The exhibit will be on view until June 30.
Our next Houston-Leipzig meeting will be on July 18, 2013, when we’ll be back to Houston-Leipzig at the Movies.
Please mark your calendars for the Thomanerchor performances at the Shepherd School of Music, Rice University, on November 9 and 10, 2013, and please like us on facebook.