Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra
J. S. Bach: The Circle of Creation

Hailed as “one of the world’s top Baroque orchestras” by a Gramophone critic, Tafelmusik returns with its latest multimedia work, J. S. Bach: The Circle of Creation. Tafelmusik is German for “table music” or “music for the feast.” It’s an apt moniker for Toronto’s Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, which has produced a feast of firsts and bests in the music world. The award-winning ensemble, created in 1979, performs historically informed musical experiences on period instruments. Through extensive tours, renowned recordings, television broadcasts, and new media initiatives, Tafelmusik is one of the most prolific orchestras on the planet. The orchestra’s independent music label, Tafelmusik Media, features new digital, live performance, and studio CD and DVD recordings. It also re-releases previous Tafelmusik recordings from Sony Classical and CBC Records.

“When the big names of the Baroque era composed their masterpieces 300 years ago, they must have dreamed about their hits sounding this good,” writes a reviewer for The Royal Gazette. “Tafelmusik was a time machine last night, sweeping the audience out of its seats and back to that magic period between 1650 and 1750.”

Tafelmusik performs its most recent creation by the orchestra’s double bassist Alison Mackay. Using text, music, and projected video and images, J. S. Bach: The Circle of Creation explores the world of the artisans—performers, papermakers, violin carvers, and string spinners—who aided Bach in realizing his genius. Tafelmusik musicians perform the all-Bach program from memory. Like its predecessors, House of Dreams and The Galileo Project: Music of the Spheres, which Tafelmusik performed at Penn State in 2013 and 2014, respectively, The Circle of Creation invigorates the concert experience. “In these hands,” writes a reviewer for The Globe and Mail of Toronto, “Bach’s music feels more alive than ever.”

Artistic Viewpoints will not be offered before the concert.