Living Bach

• DIRECTOR & SCREENWRITER: Anna Schmidt
• PRODUCER: schmidtFilm, Departures Film (Co-Producer)
• CAMERA: Axel Schneppat
• CUT: Martin Schröder

LIVING BACH is a production of schmidtFilm in co-production with Departures Film and Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk (MDR), in cooperation with ARTE and with the support of Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung (MDM), Deutscher Filmförderfonds (DFFF) and Sächsische Landesanstalt für privaten Rundfunk und neue Medien (SLM).

• Distributed by: Weltkino
• Distribution worldwide: EuroArts.

There are over 300 Bach choirs and Bach ensembles worldwide, most of which are amateur ensembles. For many, their lives are inextricably linked with the music of Johann Sebastian Bach.

What do people seek and find in his music? What connects them across continents? What fascination lies in the music of the famous German composer, which manages to transcend borders, cultures, religions and centuries?

The film embarks on a journey through six continents to meet amateur musicians and singers who have made Bach their “centerpiece”. They live in Japan, Paraguay, the USA, Malaysia, South Africa, Australia, Switzerland, have different cultures, religions, realities of life and yet they are all united by one great passion: Johann Sebastian Bach.

LIVING BACH tracks down these enthusiasts and reveals extraordinary, exciting and life-changing relationships with Bach’s incomparable work. We meet people for whom Bach’s music brings joy, comfort, hope or understanding. Regardless of culture, origin and financial circumstances, they are all united by an almost identical set of values. They are strong, interesting and multi-layered characters who don’t use clichés. They integrate cultural influences without denying their own. In June 2022, the protagonists will meet at the world’s largest Bach Festival in Leipzig.

“Living Bach” is a carefully composed film made up of very different voices that come together in the end to create something that humanity so often lacks – namely community, beyond language, origin, gender, religion, culture and social status. The film interweaves the modern stories of different people from all parts of the world and shows that diversity does not divide, but is a strength. With impressive images and the magical sounds of Bach, the journey becomes a unique work in search of Bach’s universal secret.

A film about people, values and cultures – and the music and magic of Johann Sebastian Bach, which has an impact around the globe.

Director’s Note

Time and again, I have experienced the connecting power of Bach’s music. Music that stirs people, that gives them faith even when they have long since lost it. Music that spreads hope and brings joy.

But it’s not only professional musicians who are moved by Bach. All over the world, people listen to Bach, sing Bach, play Bach in their free time – more or less skillfully. But all with great enthusiasm. No matter their profession, no matter their faith. That’s what I experienced while filming LIVING BACH.

When I heard that the renowned Leipzig Bach Festival had invited over 300 Bach ensembles from around the world to perform at the original sites where Bach once worked, I was blown away. I had no idea there were so many Bach choirs and ensembles, or that people on every continent sing or play Bach with such devotion.

And so I traveled around the world for a year, visiting Paraguay, Switzerland, South Africa, the USA, Japan, Australia, Malaysia, and of course the Bach Festival in Leipzig, spending a great deal of time with my protagonists, the choir and ensemble members, and immersing myself in the culture of each country. I was surprised to see how many young people sing, play, and listen to Bach. I was fascinated by how alive this old German composer is for them, and amazed to hear how different the meaning of his music is for each individual. For Thabang Modise, who lives in the South African township of Soweto and shares a ten-square-meter room with his cousin, Bach is clearly political. He says that racial discrimination would no longer exist if everyone listened to, sang, or played Bach, and he explains this through the way voices are treated in Bach’s music. Although people of Muslim faith in Malaysia can be imprisoned for performing Bach’s sacred works, Lee Hai Lin continues to play them with her “Wicked Music People.” She finds the music so beautiful that she feels compelled to share it with others. They perform in warehouses at the port of Penang or in their café. I was amazed that Aboriginal people in Australia’s Red Centre know Bach, or that the choir director of the “Sociedad Bach del Paraguay” is determined to found a Bach festival because, as he says, the continent needs Bach’s message of hope, solidarity, and faith. In 2023, he succeeded and organized the first Bach festival in South America. Bianca Porcheddu learned firsthand, after the devastating wildfires in Australia, that Bach teaches resilience and shows a way out of loneliness.

Again and again I heard sentences like: “For me, there’s nothing comparable to Bach. He’s a glimmer of hope in a turbulent world. We need him. Everyone needs him.” David Chin from Malaysia told me: “I love Bach. He’s my friend. I truly feel that his music speaks directly to me, a Chinese Malaysian living in the 21st century.”

The encounter between the protagonists at the 2022 Bach Festival in Leipzig was moving. From the very first note, they all shared a special connection and a common language: Bach. Together we experienced an exciting, moving week in which we learned a great deal from one another. They will all be back at the Bach Festival 2024, because, as Lin so beautifully put it at the closing concert in St. Thomas Church: “I don’t think it ends here. This is only the beginning.”

My film is an emotional film. Not a film that teaches or informs. It’s a film that speaks to the heart, that radiates a positive, life-affirming energy, that carries people along and shows that there is more that unites people around the world than divides them.

I wanted it to be a film that gives hope, because it shows that many people around the world share something in common: their love of music, which connects them. And in times like these, we all need hope.