The use of cameras or recording equipment during the

performance is not allowed. Please be sure that cell phones, 

pagers, and other electronic devices are turned off.

Music Department

National Gallery of Art

Sixth Street and Constitution Avenue nw

Washington, DC

www.nga.gov

The United Church

1920 G Street, nw

Washington, DC

Rev. Monroe Wright, senior pastor 

Rev. Bodo Schwabe, pastor for German ministries

Hannah Schlage-Busch, music director 

Kevin Rost, administrative assistant

www.thmnitedchurch.org

cover: Pierre-Etienne Monnot, The Virgin Mary Swooning over

the Dead Body ofChrist at the Foot ofthe Cross, 1710,

National Gallery of Art, Washington, Patrons’ Permanent Fund

The Sixty-eighth Season of

The William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin

Concerts

National Gallery of Art

2,761st Concert

Stephen Ackert, organist

Anne-Marieke Evers, mezzo-soprano

Risa Browder, violinist

Jodi Beder, viola da gambist

Music by }. S. Bach from 1710

A joint presentation ofthe National Gallery of Art

music department and The United Church, Washington, dc

January 20, 2010

Wednesday, 12:10 pm

Presented at the church

1920 G Street, nw, Washington, dc

Admissionfree
Program

Music by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

Partita: O Gott, dufrommer Gott, bwv 767

From Cantata no. 185 (Barmherziges Herze der ewigen Liebe)

Recitative: “Ihr Herzen, die ihr euch in Stein und Fels verkehret”

Aria: “Sei bemuth in dieser Zeit”

Toccata, Adagio, and Fugue in C Minor, bwv 564

From Cantata no. 132 (Bereitet die Wege, bereitet die Bahn)

Recitative: “Ich will, mein Gott, dir frei heraus bekennen”

Aria: “Christi Glieder, ach bedenket”

Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, bwv 565

The Musicians

STEPHEN ACKERT

Stephen Ackert is head ofthe music department at the National Gallery

of Art, and an adjunct teacher of organ at Northern Virginia Community

College in Alexandria, Virginia. A graduate of Oberlin College, Northwestern

University, and the University ofWisconsin, where he received the doctor

ofmusical arts degree, Ackert studied organ and harpsichord as a Fulbright

scholar in Frankfurt, Germany, where his teachers were Helmut Walcha

and Maria Jaeger-Jung.

He has performed organ and harpsichord recitals and presented lecturerecitals in many ofWashington, dc’s premier venues, including the National

Shrine ofthe Immaculate Conception, the National Cathedral, the National 

Gallery ofArt, and the German Embassy. In 1999 he was a featured performer

in the renowned “Thiiringer Orgelsommer” recital series, playing on six

historic instruments in Thuringia. In 2007 he returned to Germany for his

eighth recital tour ofhistoric concert halls and churches in that country.

In his capacity as head ofthe music department at the National Gallery,

Ackert plans and presents concerts for the public and presents lectures and

lecture-recitals on subjects that bring together the visual arts and music. He 

has served on the boards of directors ofthe Washington International Bach

Competitions and the Arlington Symphony, and is currendy on the advisory

boards ofthe Amalfi Coast Music Festival and the Westfield Center.

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ANNE-MARI EKE EVERS

Dutch mezzo-soprano Anne Marieke Evers studied at the Conservatory of

Amsterdam and the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Basel, Switzerland,

where she concentrated on music of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

In Basel she founded the ensemble Grand Desir with recorder player

Anita Orme Della-Marta. The ensemble, which made its debut at the Early

Music Festival in Utrecht, The Netherlands, focuses on late medieval and

contemporary music. In 2006 Grand Desir was one ofthe selected ensembles at the Young International Artist Presentation in Antwerp. In 2007

it performed in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and at the Melbourne

Early Music Festival. In July 2009 Grand Desir won the Friends Prize at 

the York Early Music Competition.

From 2005 to 2008, Evers was a permanent member ofthe Netherlands

Radio Choir. She currently sings with the Amsterdam Baroque Choir, directed

by Ton Koopman, and the Netherlands Bach Society, directed by Jos van 

Veldhoven. Evers has sung the role ofAeneas in Dido and Aeneas by Henry

Purcell and the Tasse Chinoise in Maurice Ravel’s LEnfant et les sortileges.

She directed and sang in a staged production ofseventeenth-century Dutch

folk music for families and children at the National Gallery of Art. Currendy

coaching with Mariette Nollen, Anne-Marieke Evers sings locally with 

the Washington Bach Consort and the choirs ofthe Washington National 

Cathedral and Saint Paul’s Episcopal Church K Street in Washington, DC.

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RISA BROWDER

A graduate ofthe Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, the Royal College

of Music in London, and the Schola Cantorum in Basel, violinist Risa

Browder is the concertmaster and cofounder, with her husband cellist John 

Moran, ofthe baroque chamber orchestra Modern Musick. The long list

of early-music ensembles with which she has performed includes die

Academy of Ancient Music, the English Concert, Florilegium, the Folger 

Consort, the Hanover Band, London Baroque, the London Classical Players, 

Les Musiciens du Louvre, rebel, the Smithsonian Chamber Players, and

the Washington Bach Consort.

JODI BEDER

Principal cellist of Princeton Symphony Orchestra Jodi Beder plays with

Princeton Pro Musica and Palm Beach Opera, as well as the National

Philharmonic Orchestra, Washington Musica Viva, the Folger Consort, the

Low End String Quartet, and other ensembles in the Washington, DC, area. 

She has been a principal member of the Berkshire Opera, the Chamber

Opera Theatre of New York, the Lake George Opera Festival, and Opera

Antica, and a member of baroque orchestras for Fuma Sacra, the National

Cathedral Chorus, the Washington Bach Consort, WolfTrap Opera, and

many other groups. She is also an improviser and a committed interpreter

of contemporary music and has performed and recorded microtonal music.

She frequently collaborates with dance and theater companies, and is a

member ofthe innovative cabaret-rock band Zen for Primates. Beder holds

a Ph.D. in music theory from the City University of New York Graduate

Center, where her studies focused on Elizabethan keyboard dances.

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Program Notes

This concert is the second in a series offive National Gallery ofArt concerts

that present masterworks from the years 1610,1710,1810,1910, and 2010.

On Sunday, January 17, the National Gallery ofArt Vocal Ensemble and the

early music ensembles artek and Piffaro performed Claudio Monteverdi s

Vespro della Beata Vergine, commonly identified as his “Vespers of 1610.” Today

organist and Gallery music department head Stephen Ackert joins mezzosoprano Anne-Marieke Evers and members ofthe National Gallery of Art

Chamber Players to perform music that would have been heard in 1710 in the

ducal chapel in Weimar, Germany. The music that the chapel organist, then

twenty-four-year-old Johann Sebastian Bach, composed and performed during

his tenure in Weimar (1708-1717) includes some ofthe most significant organ

works ever written as well as several fine cantatas. Indeed, by that time in his

career, Bach was matching and surpassing any composers who had written

music for voices and keyboard instmments up to that time. The National 

Gallery music department is grateful to The United Church for agreeing to

copresent this concert, since both the organ (built in Germany in 1980 by

Alfred Fiihrer) and the acoustics ofthe church are much like those that are 

presumed to have existed at the ducal chapel in Weimar in 1710. The chapel

was destroyed by fire in the 1780s, but a painting ofits interior survives as

well as some detailed architectural studies and descriptions ofthe organ.

On Sunday, January 24, three ofthe National Gallery’s resident ensembles

will take the stage in the Gallery’s West Garden Court to present masterworks

that Beethoven produced or published in 1810. On Wednesday, January 27, at

12:10 pm in the West Building Lecture Hall, the Auryn String Quartet will play

Alban Berg’s String Quartet, op. 3, one oftire great chamber works written in 

1910. To complete the series on Sunday, January 31, the new music ensemble

Great Noise will join the nga Vocal Ensemble and the nga Orchestra to

perform the world premieres oftwo new works, written especially for the 

occasion by Carlos Carillo and Armando Bayolo, who will conduct the concert.

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Upcoming Concerts at the National Gallery of Art

National Gallery of Art Piano Trio, String Quartet, and Wind Quintet

Music by Beethoven from 1810

January 24, 2010

Sunday Evening, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court

Auryn String Quartet

Music by Berg from 1910

January 27, 2010

Wednesday, 12:10 pm

West Building Lecture Hall

National Gallery of Art Vocal Ensemble

With Great Noise and members ofthe National Gallery of Art Orchestra

Armando Bayolo, guest conductor

Music of 2010

World premieres ofnew works by Carillo and Bayolo

January 31, 2010

Sunday Evening, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court