Soft-spoken, self-effacing, shy-to-a-fault Helmuth Rilling is a walking,
amazing contradiction.  One moment, he blends into the landscape so that
you can't spot him at all; the next, he presides effortlessly over 200
musicians at a Mahler Second Symphony rehearsal as they play through
enormously difficult dynamic changes.

At 66 (young for a great conductor), he is constantly on the move, with
the Stuttgart-Oregon-Caracas circuit just one of his appointed rounds.

But most notably, this man who is genuinely uninterested in publicity or
"fame," is engaged in projects that boggle the mind.  While in the middle
of a 160-CD recording project of all of Bach's 1,126 catalogued works
(including hundreds to be recorded for the first time), Rilling is...
commissioning new works!

And his new project is not just a work here and something new there: it's
a big, comprehensive, bold venture.  For the European Music Festival of
Aug. 27 - Sept. 10, next year, Rilling will celebrate "Passion 2000" with
his Bach Collegium Stuttgart performing four newly-commissioned, major
works telling the story of Christ:

* Tan Dun -- St. Matthew Passion
* Osvaldo Golijov -- St. Mark Passion
* Wolfgang Rihm -- St. Luke Passion
* Sofia Gubaidulina -- St. John Passion

Bach's own St. Mark and St. John Passions will frame the new works.

It is also known at this point that Rilling will present the St. John and
St. Matthew Passions (along with the B Minor Mass) here, at the Oregon
Bach Festival, next June-July, but the intriguing possibility is a "way
out of town" preview or at least rehearsal in Eugene for the Stuttgart
celebration.

But right now, Rilling is concentrating on the "Resurrection" Symphony so
much that he is even conducting choral rehearsals himself.  And then he'll
receive a honorary degree from the picky University of Oregon, only the
third one in its 123-year history.  (An eclectic bunch: the other honors
went to Mark Hatfield and Cory Aquino.) The recognition is for Rilling's
work in founding the festival and sustaining it each and every season, for
30 years.

Janos Gereben/SF
(in Eugene to 7/11)
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