All of Bach

In 1977, cosmologist Carl Sagan chaired the committee that would determine what music we would introduce to the Martians. He was advised in this by the physician, poet and essayist Lewis Thomas:

I would vote for Bach, ALL OF BACH, streamed out in to space over and over again. We would be bragging of course, but is surely excusable to put on the best possible face at the beginning of such an acquaintance. Any species capable of producing the music of Johann Sebastian Bach can not be all bad.

Jos van Veldhoven:

The beginning of All of Bach

It was in the summer of 2010 that the chairman of my board, Aart van Bochove, approached me and asked if I could come up with something nice for the upcoming 90th anniversary of the Netherlands Bach Society. After thinking about it for a few days, I told him that I didn’t really like his idea. Ninety: a difficult number, old, elderly, not much more time to live.

Why not make a plan for our 100th anniversary in 2021? A plan that makes use of the expertise we have built up in the field of Bach over almost a hundred years. Why not perform everything by Bach in the run-up to the 100th anniversary of the Netherlands Bach Society? Cantatas in churches, of course, organ works on historic organs, keyboard music in salons and living rooms, secular cantatas in the open air, concerts and chamber music in castles and country houses. And all performances by specialist musicians, playing on authentic instruments and using all their knowledge of the performance practice of Bach’s music.

Around my kitchen table

On 12 September 2010, a small group of friends and I sat around my kitchen table and drew up the first designs for a large and unique project that we called All of Bach. We would perform all of Bach’s works (almost 1100 BWV numbers) live and also record them in the highest possible image and sound quality. All these works would be made available via barrier-free streaming on the internet to as many lovers of Bach’s music as possible. And on 2 May 2014, the time had finally come: we made the first recording for All of Bach in the Grote Kerk in Naarden: Bach’s unsurpassed Magnificat.

All of Bach has since taken off in a big way. More than 500 BWV numbers from Bach’s oeuvre have been recorded, more than 500,000 subscribers have signed up, and the many recordings have been viewed more than 140,000,000 times worldwide.

A gift to the world

Since the start of All of Bach, I have performed many works by Johann Sebastian Bach with the Netherlands Bach Society, all of which were recorded live. I am thinking in particular of the cherished performances of the Passions, the Mass in B minor, and the many impressive cantatas. They can all still be seen and heard on All of Bach. But we also invited guest conductors and many fantastic soloists.

All this would of course have been impossible without the creative, enthusiastic, hard-working, generous and unwavering support of musicians, organisers, staff, administrators, benefactors, technicians, advisors, filmmakers, sound engineers, designers, IT specialists, musicologists, writers and many others. We owe them our gratitude for the wonderful gift they have given to the world.

All of Bach, Behind the scenes

Find all All of Bach recordings with Jos van Veldhoven as conductor