“Play Bach!” – that is our primary request to artists whom we invite each year to our Festival. This goes without saying for a Bach festival but it is also encouragement for all the musicians since playing Bach importantly requires discipline and technique, depth and interpretation. Coming to terms with these is always demanding, for which the Thuringia Bach Festival gladly provides the occasion.

Yet with the call to “play Bach” comes not only the instruction. Time and again we encourage people to play with Bach, in improvisations, in new compositions or in dance interpretations. These interpretations guarantee the variety in our Festival programme and also demonstrate that Bach is still alive and able to inspire us today. For even if we have access in the Bach country of Thuringia to a number of historical locations in which Johann Sebastian Bach and his family worked we in no way want to insist on preserving historic monuments: Bach and his music are so varied and inexhaustible and for our artists serve as continuous reference points providing both happiness and expectation. We hope that this will also be the case for you, our visitors.