J.S. Bach
MASS in B Minor
“Transcendent” – Apollo’s Fire and Jeannette Sorrell’s performance of Bach’s B Minor Mass chosen for the “Best 10 Concerts of 2025” in Chicago.
Forthcoming CD recording and full concert video will be released internationally in October 2026 on the AVIE label.
Watch our video of BACH St. John Passion
Ensemble size: 22 singers + 23 instrumentalists + Ms. Sorrell (conductor) = 46
REVIEWS
“Transcendent… easily one of the most memorable musical evenings of recent years… Sorrell began with her chorus extended down the aisles, enfolding the first few rows of the audience in the expansive chords that open the Kyrie. The singers proceeded up the aisles during the first instrumental ritornello, conveying the tense, searching quality of Bach’s sighing lines…. Under Sorrell, the 20-member vocal ensemble was inspired throughout the performance. The instrumental consort was in brilliant form, playing with unimpeachable balance and intonation….
“There was a fundamental lightness and grace to even the most powerful moments that showed a collective sensitivity to the dancelike elements of the mass. The three burnished trumpets gleamed in the exultant choruses. Presiding over it all was Jeannette Sorrell, who with understated grace led her charges on a moving traversal of Bach’s unsurpassed canvas.”
— Chicago Classical Review, 2025 [read the full review]
“Grace and Glory… What is so revelatory about Jeannette Sorrell’s pilgrimage through this Mass is how light and graceful her steps are…. sculpting phrases…. Sorrell’s experience and insight into the music is such that she knows where to provide the moments of heft essential to a piece that surveys spiritual beliefs. On the other hand, she constantly keeps one eye on the monumental architecture of the piece. If there are better conductors of the big choral compositions of the Baroque repertory, I would like to hear their work….
Key to Sorrell’s achievements are musicians able to realize her vision. The orchestra excelled throughout… the brass and percussion added a gleaming edge to the ensemble sound. With the world outside the walls of the church churning with political and social unrest, the value of this music and these performers became all the more resonant. While con men and demagogues show the worst side of society, this music reminds us of humanity’s potential to embrace beauty and grace.”
— Seen & Heard International [read the full review]
“A sublime performance… At Trinity Cathedral, the consoling final notes of the ‘Dona nobis pacem’ — Bach’s ‘vision of peace,’ as AF artistic director Jeannette Sorrell has described it — seemed to linger in the stone vaulting long after the music had died away. The effect was a sublime example of the ensemble making the most of the space, the combined period-instrument forces of woodwinds, brass, strings, and organ supporting the uplifting message sung by the chorus. Sorrell’s flair for the dramatic was apparent right from the start…”
— ClevelandClassical.com [read the full review]
Top 10 Performances of 2025
Chicago Classical Review – December 2025
”A luminous account… a highlight of the ensemble’s five-year presence in Chicago. Jeannette Sorrell led a performance imbued with spiritual grace and gravitas that had the full measure of Bach’s transcendent statement of belief.”
REVIEWS of Bach’s St. John Passion
Sorrell and Apollo’s Fire released their St. John Passion album in 2017. It was chosen as #1 by the Sunday Times’ Hugh Canning in his survey of Best CD Recordings of the St. John Passion (London, March 2020).
“Perhaps the most remarkable version of all is by the U.S. group Apollo’s Fire, directed by Jeannette Sorrell as a gripping, intimate drama, and wonderfully sung. For me, this performance brings Bach’s Passion to life.”
– The Times (London)
“This admirable St. John Passion has dramatic tautness tempered by musical finesse nurtured by Sorrell. Instrumental playing of elegant refinement, polished choral singing, and communicative delivery of the text… sculpted with deft shapeliness. Hits the sweet spot time and again.”
– Gramophone
“Sorrell’s direction produces a lively account… the chorus is impeccably disciplined and incisive.”
– BBC Music Magazine
