Yesterday, New Orleans's Trinity Episcopal Church hosted their annual
Bach-a-thon, this year titled "Bach Around the Clock." It ran from 12
midnight Friday to 12 midnight Saturday.  People bring sleeping bags.
There are only so many classical performers capable of decent Bach here,
so a lot showed up several times.  There was even a little girl violinist
who did two pieces from the Anna Magdalena Bach notebook, one of which was
the ubiquitous minuet just about every beginning piano student learns ("dum
da-da-da-da, dum da da, dum da-da-da-da, dum da da" etc.).  A friend of
mine sang Bach duets (at 2AM), the Haydn Missa in tempore belli at 8PM, and
the Bach Cantata 131 "Aus der Tiefe" at 9:30.  Her duet partner matched
her, except at 5PM she sang some Swingle arrangements of Bach.  I sang the
Swingle and the cantata.  The real endurance man was the Trinity organist,
Albinas Pritzgintas, who played from 12 midnight to 5AM, without a break
(just switching from organ to harpsichord to piano), then came back at 12
noon to play a little organ, direct the Haydn, and accompany the Bach
cantata.  Wonderful day.

Steve Schwartz