Another beautiful book from James Runcie. A fascinating look at Bach in his own time and the power that both grief and music hold over our lives.

Due to a family passing at the time, I was unable to download this in time before it was archived, and having only returned after several years away due to it severely affecting me, I am now working my way through those reviews I was unable to get to to detail the issue. Thank you for the opportunity, and I look forward to working with you in the future.

Hands up, the process of composing a great piece of music had never crossed my mind before I read The Great Passion. Now the thought won't leave me, in a good way. We see Bach composing the St Matthew Passion, through the eyes of a chorister in the St Thomas church choir. Just a magical look into the world of church music and its composition.

Proficient and moving story of a boy , bullied and lonely at school, who is taken in by Bach as he suffers his own losses and writes his great music. Readable and effective I wasn't sufficiently engaged and found it dragged for me. Very worthy ..

James Runcie has a knack for capturing a time and a place. I have enjoyed many of his 'Grantchester Mysteries', much more for the atmosphere and the morality of a lost England of the 1950s and 1960s than the crime/detective fiction ‘basis’ of these novels. "The Great Passion" is certainly quite unlike the gentle cosy mystery vibe of the 'Grantchester Mysteries' but it is similar in its sense of being very distinctly of a certain era and location. Its characters are vivid and believable and the setting is immediately almost tangible. In short, it does what the best historical fiction can do and transports the reader.

This novel is obviously a labour of love for the author and is as much an exploration of Bach’s "St. Matthew Passion" as it is an historical novel. At the end of "The Great Passion", you come away with not only a feeling of better understanding Bach and what helped to form his compositions but also deeper understanding of the music, theology, faith and worship that makes up the "St Matthew Passion" itself.

But beyond the ‘academic’ formation of the novel, "The Great Passion" touches on all of the parts that make for a truly fascinating novel: love, loss, grief, hope, joy – all components that make for a great narrative but also, the vital truth and passion of the gospel that inspired Bach’s extraordinary masterpiece.

Overall I found this book interesting. However it did tend to ramble in places and I had to make myself finish it. An interesting insight into the 18th century church.

Young Stefan Silbermann is sent to Leipzig at age 11 after the death of his mother. He is to train in the choir school but is plagued by bullying from students and teachers. He falls into the orbit of the Cantor, Bach, and soon is invited to join his family where he experiences first love but after more loss he goes back to the school. All provides the background as Bach writes his great opus, the St Matthew Passion.
This is a deep novel in which the great piece of music is almost superfluous. In considering the fragility of life in 18th Century Germany, Runcie draws on many human emotions and the approach is sensitive.

This is the story of the year which culminated in the composition of Bach’s St Matthew Passion, the Great Passion of the title, which I am listening to as I write. Events are narrated by the 35-year-old Stefan Silbermann, moved by the news of Bach’s death to look back to the year 1726 when, following the death of his mother when he was 11, his father sent him away to choir school in Leipzig. The cantor at the school is none other than Johann Sebastian Bach, a driven but kindly taskmaster who is struck by the boy’s potential. When Stefan is bullied by the other boys and suffers in the atmosphere of casual cruelty prevalent at the school, Bach takes him under his wing, introduces him to his house and family, and provides him with the opportunity to watch the master at work and help him with tasks such as copying and transcribing manuscripts. And when tragedy strikes in the Bach family, he is witness to the way Bach finds consolation in his faith and channels his grief at the loss of his youngest daughter into the composition of what is now considered to be one of the finest Baroque works in existence.

The character of Bach as portrayed here is vivid and believable - a man inspired by an unshakeable faith, an indomitable energy, a larger-than-life workaholic and a bit of a trial to his family on a day-to-day basis. He is anything but indulgent of himself and those around him, but he is loving and kind. Sadly, the other characters in the book are nowhere near as convincingly or engagingly drawn. In particular I had a problem with the narrator Stefan. It is very much not the voice of an 11-year-old telling the story - fair enough as this is a recollection from 24 years down the line, but it is a very precise and linear recollection which just doesn’t feel realistic. There are huge swathes of quotation of sermons and conversations which simply could not have been remembered in that much detail. And there really is a LOT of sermonising, which does get a bit repetitive.

The most interesting parts, at least to me as a chorister myself, are the accounts of the composition process, explaining what the music is aiming to achieve and how it does so - to explain holy events and the word of God by making the audience become completely immersed in the narrative, supported by the music itself, all for the ultimate glory of God.

Over all, this is not a wholeheartedly absorbing read by any means. It is uneven and too long, but not uninteresting. It would have benefited from a hard prune.

*Many thanks to James Runcie, Bloomsbury Publishing, and NetGalley for arc inexchange for my honest review.*
A uniquely fascinating insight into the life of Johann Sebastian Bach, his family and music genius through the eyes of a young boy whos begins to understand what music mean and how it guides us through both happy and tragic days.
The writing is quite simple and yet engaging and personally I became invested in the cantor's creating process. I have never read a biography of JSB, just have general knowledge of his personal life and his music which I have always enjoyed. This novel brings readers as close to the cantor from Leiptzig as possible.

You know a novel is an accomplished one when you can categorise it in various genres.
The Great Passion is a historical novel bringing to life Leipzig circa 1727 and in particular its vibrant spiritual music scene. It is also a biographical novel that tries to sketch Bach and his family life, but also his creative process resulting in gifts to posterity such as St Matthew Passion. And last but not least, The Great Passion is a tender coming of age, where music and an adopting family become allies in overcoming grief.

The writing style is rather simple and suffused with dialogue. While it is fitting for our young narrator and his view of life/events; I personally had a love/hate relationship with it. At times, the writing flowed nicely, while in other parts, the dialogue seemed too much to bear. I have had the same problem with the religiosity of the text and the general attitude towards God and His punishments in the form of cruel death and privations. I totally understand and appreciate the historical side of things, but I just couldn't put up with such nonsense, and with the cruelty of people being forced into a harsh life by religion.

My rating doesn't necessary reflect on the novel, in the sense that I truly believe The Great Passion is a good novel, but I guess speaks more about me as a reader. At an intellectual level I've really enjoyed it, but my emotions got the best of me. My strong feelings induces by the vivid picture of life at that time, which really is proof of Runcie's mastership as an author, shadowed some of my enjoyment and left me with a strong wish for life to have been different but also with a sense of just how privileged I am to be living in better times!

'The Great Passion' is a beautiful coming-of-age novel and a love letter to the music of JS Bach, as well as a profound exploration of love, loss and faith. The novel is set in 1726-27 and written from the perspective of Stefan Silbermann, the son of a well-known organ builder in Freiberg who is sent away to Leipzig for a year after the death of his mother. Despite his initial unhappiness because of the cruelty of his fellow pupils and some of his teachers, Stefan's fine soprano voice soon catches the attention of the cantor, Johann Sebastian Bach and he soon becomes immersed both in Bach's music and his family.

We follow Stefan through year in Leipzig as he becomes attached to Bach's eldest living daughter Catharina and also witnesses other characters (including the Bachs) dealing with bereavements of their own, which help him to make sense of his loss. The novel culminates in Bach's decision to channel these feelings into his "Great Passion", the St Matthew Passion, for which Stefan sings many of the soprano solos.

I really enjoyed Runcie's writing, which completely transports us to 18th Century Germany, a place where death is commonplace (boy choristers are summoned so sing 'Sterbelieder' not only at the deathbed of one boy's mother but also at a public execution) but also where faith is deeply engrained in daily life. Runcie's portrait of Bach is affectionate and admiring but unsentimental: he works with unwavering energy and focus, and is clearly a loving father and husband but sometimes asks too much of his family. The rest of the Bach family is also very well-drawn, particularly his second wife, Anna Magdalena, a fine musician who is not allowed to perform in church. At times the dialogue is quite wordy, and Bach in particular is rather prone to sermonising, but I felt this was in keeping with the novel's presentation of faith as an all-pervasive part of daily life - and it is his homilies that contain many of the most powerful lines about grief and healing.

There are also lots of wonderful descriptions of music, which is Stefan is able to describe from the perspectives of singer, organist and copyist. It is certainly a book that will make me listen to the St Matthew Passion with new ears, as it emphasises the personal as well as the spiritual significance of this work.

Overall, this is a fantastic and deeply moving re-imagining of the events leading up to the composition of one of the most extraordinary pieces of music ever written. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for sending me an ARC to review.

I was sent a copy of The Great Passion by James Runcie to read and review by NetGalley. This is quite an impressive novel concerning the work and methodology of JS Bach. It really gives an insight into the amazing talent of this extraordinary composer along with the religious context of the time. There were moments that were a little repetitive and there is a lot of biblical text/extracts, which is only to be expected considering the premise of the book, but even for a non-religious person such as myself I found I could imagine the power the music of Bach’s Passion both on the congregation and the people who performed it. A very enlightening read!

Was interested in/intrigued by the synopsis and the writing is beautiful but it just didn't engage me.

Considering that J.S. Bach's "St Matthew Passion" is widely regarded as a pillar of the Western musical canon, it may appear surprising that we do not really know much about the composition and first performance of the Passion. We know that Bach wrote it for St Thomas Church, Leipzig, where he served as Kapellmeister or Thomascantor from 1723 to his death. We know that, as with many of the other sacred works, mostly cantatas, that Bach composed for the edification of the Leipzig congregation, the Passion was an artistic collaboration between Bach and Christian Friedrich Henrici, known as Picander, who provided poetic meditations to complement extracts from the Gospel of St Matthew. Most sources agree that the Passion was probably first performed at St Thomas Church, 11 April (Good Friday), 1727 although the year might also have been 1729. We can hazard a guess as to the identity of the musicians who performed for the Cantor – including the oboists Caspar Gleditsch and Gottfried Kornagel who, judging by the difficulty of the oboe parts, were great players indeed. Apart from these bare facts, we do not know much else.

In The Great Passion, James Runcie makes up for this historical vacuum with a bold imagining of the months leading up to the first performance of Bach’s masterpiece. Runcie’s narrator is Stefan Silbermann, a scion of the (real-life) German organ-building family. In 1750, Stefan, now in his late thirties, learns of the death of the Cantor, which leads him to reminisce about the year he spent as a student of the St Thomas Church in his early teens. At the time, still grieving following the death of his mother, bullied by the other schoolboys for his red hair, yet showing great promise as a singer and organist, Stefan is taken in by the cantor and his wife Anna Magdalena, and practically becomes a member of the Bach household. He witnesses at first hand the composer at his work, and unwittingly contributes to the creation of what would become known as the St Matthew Passion.

Runcie adopts a traditional and direct narrative style, free of experimental flourishes, and yet particularly appropriate for the voice of the earnest Stefan. The story skilfully interweaves fictional characters with plenty of historical ones – Johann Sebastian Bach and his wife Anna Magdalena, Bach’s children including Catharina (Stefan’s ‘love interest’ in this novel), Picander, oboists Gleditsch and Kornagel, and Bach’s rivals including composer Georg Philipp Telemann. In each case, Runcie takes what we know about these historical individuals and fleshes them out into real-life characters who speak through the pages of his novel. His portrayal of the cantor is particularly convincing. Despite Stefan’s awestruck respect for his mentor, we are still shown Sebastian’s very human characteristics. JSB is a workaholic with a deeply spiritual vein, but can also be jealous, short-tempered and, on occasion, arrogant. Both the historical and musical background are well-researched, and the recreation of the the atmosphere of church and school in 18th Century Leipzig has an authentic feel to it.

But where Runcie really triumphs is in his depiction of music. Writing about music is notoriously difficult – “like dancing about architecture”, to use a much-bandied phrase. Yet, in language which largely eschews technical terms, Runcie still manages to describe several of Bach’s works uncannily well, not least the Great Passion of the title. He also expresses the excitement of a first performance, the tension of the musicians, the expectations of the audience and that sense of satisfaction and release following a successful concert which performers know very well.

Runcie’s novel is one in which tragedy, suffering and death are all-pervasive. Yet, Runcie suggests, music – like faith – can accompany us in grief, leading us on a journey of healing. This is, ultimately, the message beautifully conveyed in this novel.

Full review, with a musical postscript at https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-great-passion-by-james-runcie.html

Early 18th C Germany. After the death if his mother, Stefan Silbermann is sent from his home in Freiberg to Leipzig to study music under Johann Sebastian Bach.
When Stefan comes to stay in the Bach household, the reader is thrown into this fascinating, bustling well of creativity, filled with children, students copyists and, of course the absolute dedication by the great man himself.
The descriptions gets a bit overly sermony in places, but that is only because in Bach’s life, faith and music were of equal importance.
As the son of Archbishop Robert Runcie and his mother, a classical pianist, James Runcie must have been immersed in sacred music from a very early age and his knowledge shines like a beacon throughout the novel. A surprising development from the author of “Grantchester”.

As a musician I was fascinated by this fictional account of life in the Bach household in Leipzig. The opening third of the book is insightful and knowledgeable about Johann Sebastian and his works, and about the life of a lost boy who is sent to St. Thomas church school (where Bach was Cantor) after the death of his mother. After that, I’m afraid the book lost direction somewhat, becoming a list of Bach’s sacred works of the period and losing momentum for the reader. The author’s knowledge and understanding of his subject matter is beyond reproach, but as a reader, maintaining the will to read to the end became more of a problem as the book went on. Much to recommend here, but not an entirely convincing read overall.

I found this book quite hard going.It’s very slow and although I’m interested in music,it was a bit too technical for me. I also found the long sections about the religious views of the time ,with the emphasis on death ,a bit depressing.
Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an ARC in return for an honest review which reflects my own opinion.

I thought The Great Passion was very good in many ways, but it did drag a little in places.

Set mainly in 1727, this is the story of Stefan Silbermann, a young boy soprano whose mother has recently died, who is sent away to school in Leipzig with Johann Sebastian Bach. Narrated by Stefan himself, we hear of his grief at his loss, his loneliness at school and the bullying he receives, not least because of his red hair and his musical excellence. Eventually taken in by the Bach family, there follows a study especially of Bach and his wife Ann Magdalena; of Bach’s deep, unshakeable faith and his expression of it through music, and the family’s response to a grief of their own. There is also a fine background of life in Lutheran Leipzig and a good deal of theological discussion (which Anna Magdalena calls Bach’ sermonising), culminating in the composition and performance of the masterpiece that is the St. Matthew Passion.

Much of the first part of the book is excellent. Stefan’s situation and state of mind are humanely and convincingly drawn. The juxtaposition of both the joy and struggle of becoming a real musician with the harshness of much of the rest of life is very effective and James Runcie writes very insightfully about the music itself. There is a touching infatuation by Stefan with one of Bach’s daughters (which may be a play on the book’s title). There were some longeurs in the middle, though; Bach’s sermonising did get a bit much at times and I felt that while Runcie knows a great deal about the cantatas which Bach wrote for each Sunday service and gave a good account of what each set text really meant, they did turn into a bit of a procession. So much so that when we arrived at the sublime Ich Habe Genug, including a moving account of why it was chosen for one of the singers, what should have been a profound moment just felt a bit flat.

That said, I thought the account of the composition, preparation and performance of the Passion itself was excellent. I am no Bach expert, but I have loved his music for decades and know a bit about it; this seemed to me to be a very knowledgeable, moving and heartfelt exploration of one of music’s greatest achievements.

So, I thought this was good but not perfect. I think you need to have an interest in music, including in the details of performance, and in the history of religious thought; I do (especially in the former); I enjoyed the book and I can recommend it.

(My thanks to Bloomsbury for an ARC via NetGalley.)

This is a really extraordinarily good book..It tells the story of a young motherless boy. He is sent away from home to Leipzig to train as a singer in the church choir. The cantor of the choir is Johann Sebastian Bach who takes the boy under his wing into his warm, chaotic family, and he is a witness to further tragedy and loss but also to Bach's creation of the St Matthew Passion. I loved it, despite the difficulties caused by the typesetting.