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Soli Deo Gloria

by Paolo Bordignon on April 12, 2024

This Sunday at 11am, St. Bartholomew's Choir, together with a Baroque orchestra and our Choristers, will offer music of Johann Sebastian Bach. In any list of the greatest composers of all time, it would be impossible not to include Bach near the top.

Our services called A Choral Feast highlight a major work, composer, or theme like this. This Sunday will include a Bach Cantata, his Sanctus in D (BWV 238), Jesus bleibet meine Freude (a.k.a Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring) and organ music, of course. On May 5 we'll feature Mendelssohn and, on June 30, music for Pride Sunday.

This Sunday kicks off our With Hearts and Hands and Voices, our Sacred Music Campaign which you'll be hearing about over the next few weeks. I hope you will consider giving to the campaign, which supports not just A Choral Feast but all aspects of our music program.

It's hard to fathom the quantity and quality of Bach's oeuvre: over a thousand compositions, including 200 sacred cantatas. When performed in concert, these works astonish, impress, and delight. But it's crucially important that these be offered as Bach intended: in the liturgy, with the instrumentalists and soloists and choir offering their very best on behalf of us all, in prayer and to the glory of God. Bach himself reminded us of this when he wrote into the manuscripts of all his sacred compositions: to God alone be the glory. Soli Deo Gloria!

Paolo Bordignon,
Organist and Choirmaster

About the Author
Paolo Bordignon

Paolo Bordignon is Organist & Choirmaster of St. Bartholomew’s Church and harpsichordist of the New York Philharmonic. He previously served St. Bart’s as Associate Director of Music and Director of the Choristers for eight years.

In 2019-20, he performed with Camerata Pacifica, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Boston Symphony Chamber Players, the MET Orchestra Musicians, the All-Star Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony, the Florida Orchestra, and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. 

Festival appearances include Aspen, Bard, Bridgehampton, Grand Tetons, Mostly Mozart, and Palm Beach, as well as New York Fashion Week. He has collaborated with Renée Fleming, Sir James Galway, Wynton Marsalis, Bobby McFerrin, Midori, and Itzhak Perlman. He has appeared on NBC, CBS, PBS, CNN, NPR, the CBC, and on Korean and Japanese national television.

Paolo has performed organ recitals at venues such as St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue and St. Eustache in Paris, and he has been a frequent recitalist at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, including a 10-recital residency.

Born of Italian heritage, Paolo’s early musical training was at St. Michael’s Cathedral Choir School in Toronto. He studied at Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute of Music before earning a doctorate from the Juilliard School. He is an Associate of the Royal Conservatory of Music and a Fellow of the Royal Canadian College of Organists. 

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