The Bach Festival Society of Winter Park will present its 75th Annual Festival in February 2010. Here are some facts from the Society’s history that we’d like to share with you!

FACTS
•    Each choir member donates approx 150 hours of time over a complete performance season—with over 160 Choir members, that totals over 24,000 hours
•    12% of choir members travel more than 50 miles round trip to sing with the Choir
•    A book published in 1942 was titled The Bach Festival Murders.
•    Fred Rogers of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood sang with the Choir while he was a music student at Rollins, and he frequently attended performances later in his life
•    Conductor Dr. John Sinclair is the longest-serving conductor in the BFS history. He is celebrating his 20th anniversary this year.
•    In the 1940s and 1950s local Boy Scouts ushered at Bach Festival performances
•    1940—First full performance of Bach’s Mass in B minor. The 2010 performance will be our 25th performance of this work.
•    1960—Haydn’s Coronation Mass was performed on the Bach Festival’s Silver Anniversary—the first time the work of another composer was performed.
•    In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the Annual Bach Festival was broadcast on national radio.