The Bach Players

The Bach Players is a collective of like-minded musicians who are drawn together by their passion for the music of J.S. Bach: our enduring inspiration and the apotheosis of the Baroque. We play on original instruments and all vocal music is sung in its original language. We play without a conductor, and with forces that are as small as possible (mostly single strings and single voices). A genuine spirit of enquiry and reassessment pervades all aspects of our performance.

Founded in 1996 by Nicolette Moonen, we established a series of programmes of Bach cantatas in St John’s Wood Parish Church in London. There we began to introduce some of these lesser-known works to a wider audience. As a result of this we have been invited to play all over Britain and have built up a faithful following. In 1999 we were invited to perform the St John Passion for the opening of the Berliner Bachtage.

In 2007 we launched a new series from St John’s Downshire Hill, in Hampstead. This is a recently restored church of 1818–23; we feel that it is an ideal venue for both Bach cantatas and chamber music. From September 2009 we are twinning each of these concerts with one, usually the day before, in Norwich.

Our programmes now focus on themes that connect music from different parts of Europe in our period. Bach is there in some, but not all our concerts, and is often related to other composers of his times. We are also developing links between programmes, over several years. Details of all our concerts are in the diary.

In 2008 we started a series of CD recordings: four have now been released.

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