Christmas Oratorio: Johann Sebastian Bach at Festspielhaus Baden‐Baden

One of the finest orchestras playing today, the BFO is a much‐loved institution in its home city and a regular guest in the world's greatest halls and theatres. Led by founder, Iván Fischer, the Budapest Festival Orchestra is acclaimed for its exceptional range, winning multiple awards for recordings and performances from across the musical spectrum. The orchestra has also received praise for its educational programmes and outreach work, with multiple smaller ensembles from within the orchestra offering jazz, traditional folk music, authentic baroque performances, and concerts for children, families, and students.

One of the great musical polymaths of our era, the Hungarian conductor Iván Fischer founded the Budapest Festival Orchestra in the mid‐1980s. His work as the orchestra's Musical Director and chief conductor over the decades has established it as one of the world's premiere symphonic ensembles. A regular and much‐loved guest conductor with many of the leading European and American orchestras, Fischer is conductor laureate of Berlin's Konzerthausorchester and honorary guest conductor of the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam. An active composer, his works have attracted international attention, as has the successful launch of his opera company, IFOC, which seeks to create an organic unity between music and theatre, with stagings that frequently spatially link singers and instrumentalists.

Collegium Vocale Gent was founded in 1970 on the initiative of Philippe Herreweghe.

It was one of the first ensembles to use the then‐new ideas about baroque practice in vocal music performances. Musicians such as Gustav Leonhardt, Ton Koopman and Nikolaus Harnoncourt immediately took an interest in the Flemish ensemble’s fresh, new approach, which led to intensive collaboration.

In the mid‐1980s the ensemble acquired international fame and was invited to all the major concert halls and music festivals of Europe, Israel, the United States, Russian, South America, Japan, Hong Kong and Australia.