A Bach Party: The Weekend at the Lake No Northern Minnesotan Man Will Want to Miss

My brain played a kind of fun trick on me last night.  Can you imagine a bunch of Northern Minnesota "Good Ol' Boys" getting together for a weekend of fun at the lake.  Yeah, that's not hard to imagine.

But let's take this a step further.  These Northern Minnesota "Good Ol' Boys" call this annual tradition the Bach Party.  As in, they get together for a fun filled weekend of listening to the musical genius of Johann Sebastian Bach.  Or better yet, somebody might go all out and bring a clavichord so they can all try out their fingers playing his works on an authentic instrument.  Or maybe the owner of the lake cabin has a full set of pipes on which all these "Good Ol' Boys" take turns showing off their prowess.

Kind of strange?  Yeah, I thought so too.  Although I can think of a handful of men who would go in for this sort of thing, it's not the sort of occasion that I would expect to trip the trigger of most Northern Minnesota "Good Ol' Boys.

But everyone has some hidden part of their personality that only those close to them know about, right?  I mean, some do Civil War re-enacting; some play D&D (or Magic the Gathering, these days, I suppose); a person might collect shot glasses; or attend Star Trek fan conventions.  Everyone has their thing.  Whose to say there isn't a group of Northern Minnesota "Good Ol' Boys" who enjoy a little Toccata and Fugue every now and again?


This is the train of thought that went through my head when I read my friend, Allie's Caring Bridge site last night.  She mentioned she was spending the weekend at her folks' house with her young son, since her husband and her daughter were both away from home, "Aaron is at the lake for Casey's Bach party all weekend."

Wow!  Aaron likes Bach.  That's so cool!  And there must be others around, too, who do, if they have a whole weekend to do this Bach party thing, right?  Wow, who would have thought?  This Bach lovers club must be a little known local tidbit.

Now, Aaron, please forgive me if I've wrongly stereotyped you as a Good Ol' Boy.  For all I know you listen to MPR classical station while on all your road trips for work.  Or perhaps I've wrongly stereotyped all the local men.  Maybe they all throw Bach, Beethoven, or Mozart into their CD player while spending the day planting soybeans or cutting hay. 

But even so, even if I've vastly misinterpreted the local taste in music, the idea of a group of Northern Minnesotan guys spending a weekend at the lake, having a party dedicated to the music of J.S. Bach was a little surprising to me.  It stretched my credibility just a wee bit.

Now all these thoughts that have taken several paragraphs to explain, flitted through my head in a few very short seconds, you understand.  That's the way minds work.  They can be amazingly fast sometimes.  (You notice that I have those little uncertain indicators in that last sentence?  "can be" and "sometimes".  Yeah, well, I had to add those since I am very well aware through vast personal experience that minds can also very often be incredibly sluggish and move with cumbersome slowness.) 

But as I was saying, this all flitted through my head even before my eyes jumped ahead to the next sentence, "Next weekend is Case and Jess's wedding." 

Oh, duh, wedding,... not Bach but bach,...as in bachelor party.  OK, that sounds a little bit more in line with the local cultural heritage.  Yeah, I'm good with that.  That's a much more comfortable fit.

I hope you are enjoying your bach weekend, Aaron.  And Allie, I hope today is better than the last few for you.  Hannah, I hope you are having an excellent adventure in Texas.  And Nolan, always keep your gun pointed in a safe direction, keep your finger off the trigger until you're ready to shoot, treat every gun as if it's a loaded gun, and be sure of your target and what's beyond.

A Treat for Lovers of Bach

As I was driving home today from Grand Forks I was flipping through stations, trying to find something that made me happy.

What a delight to find the classical MPR station was in the middle of an hour and a half of Bach. The host had taken requests from around the state and assembled a somewhat eclectic presentation, which combined into a veritable auditory and emotional feast.

When I first tuned in it was during an Aria from St. Matthew's Passion, that was followed by an orchestral arrangement of Bist du Bei Mir, Cantata 143, and a 1950s recording of Wanda Landowska on the harpsichord.

Then I was home and had to eventually get out of the vehicle, get sleeping kids unbuckled and hauled in, all the wares into the house and supper on.  But Joe had a nice hot chicken soup simmering on the stove, so we just needed to put on bowls.  The soup didn't, however, make leaving Bach any easier.

Back in our college days in Madison, there was always a Bagels and Bach event on Sunday mornings in the atrium of the museum formerly known as the Elvehjem Museum of Art.  I never went, since I worshiped at church instead of at the altar of Bach, but it always sounded fun.  I often wished they had scheduled it at a different time.

I'm disappointed that the Classical Music public radio apparently does not have the little "listen later" option that the non-music public radio does.  But if anyone wants to purchase any of the tracks, you may do that on their site.

Here is the playlist.  It is in backwards chronological order, since that is how they display it on the website.

6:30	JS Bach - Orchestral Suite No. 1 La Stravaganza Denon 78965

6:26	Johann Sebastian Bach - Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 Wendy Carlos, moog synthesizer Sony 42308

6:17	Johann Sebastian Bach - Sleepers Awake Nikolaus Harnoncourt, conductor Concentus Musicus Vienna Teldec 92626

6:11	JS Bach - Aria from Goldburg Variations Yo-Yo Ma Sony 60681

6:02	JS Bach - Prelude and Fugue No. 9 Wanda Landowska RCA 7825

5 - 6 PM

5:47	Johann Sebastian Bach - Cantata No. 143: Lobe den Herrn, meine Seele: Du Friedefurst, Herr Jesu Christ Gustav Leonhardt, conductor Leonhardt Consort Roger Cericius, boy soprano Teldec 42630

5:42	Johann Sebastian Bach - Bist du bei mir Eugene Ormandy, conductor Philadelphia Orchestra Sony 38915

5:36	Johann Sebastian Bach - St Matthew Passion: Blute nur, du liebes Herz Herbert von Karajan, conductor Berlin Philharmonic Gundula Janowitz, soprano DG 419789