Have I become a Bach Passion groupie? The symptoms are difficult to ignore. This year I've seen two - Matthew and John - in the space of five days, and for the past while that's been pretty much average. One year I did three Matthews in a row: once standing up in the chorus (my turn as First Priest brought new substance to the role, I feel sure); twice sitting in the audience. You don't go to a Passion expecting to be surprised by the outcome, it's true, but that year Jesus's death seemed, well, especially unavoidable.
But if audience members keep returning year after year, what about those who make their bread and butter from Bach, the professional soloists for whom this is a boom time? One of the tenors at yesterday's lunchtime concert in Blythburgh couldn't stay for any of the others because he had too much work on this weekend; Easter, he whispered manically on the way to the car, wouldn't be over until at least next Thursday.
From the audience's perspective, as a result, it isn't just the music that gets familiar. At last night's performance of the John Passion in Aldeburgh I recognised no fewer than three soloists who I'd seen do the piece before, several of them more than once.
Lord knows how many Bach Evangelists James Gilchrist has performed in his time (and he's only just turned 40, so must have plenty still to go), but here in Aldeburgh it was his craftsmanship that shone through, a finely shaded performance that nevertheless managed to startle and, ultimately, humble. In the hectic, fragile world of today's music industry that kind of relationship with a single part - a single set of notes - sounds near-mythical, the kind of thing that accountants and suits would long since have banned if only it were possible.
In the end, I guess I'll keep coming back to Bach, in the hope that everyone else does too.
