In 2018, composer and lyricist Peter Sijbenga was commissioned by the Noord Nederlands Orkest (NNO) to create a Frisian version of the Matthäus Passion, the famous oratorio by Johannes Sebastian Bach. Now that there are no ‘regular’ Matthäus Passion performances for the second time in a row this year, we look back to 2018.
Bach composed the Matthäus Passion around 1736. The oratorio tells the story of the suffering and death of Jesus, as recorded by his friend and follower Matthew. Peter Sijbenga said in 2018: “I will translate and not edit or update. This does not mean that I will use Old Frisian, but that I want to stay as close to the Urtext as possible for the word picture and the content.” The German text is easily translated into Frisian. The linearity in sounds in Frisian is closer to German than to Dutch. Sijbenga: “It is also nice that there are grammatical-idiomatic similarities between Frisian and German. This is how the same word order is used in both languages.
The Frisian Matthäus Passion was performed in 2018 by the Noord Nederlands Orkest and the Noord-Nederlands Concertkoor, supplemented by Frisian singers. Marcel Mandos, artistic leader and programmer of the orchestra in 2018, said at the time: “LF2018 is a great opportunity to once again make the NNO have a Frisian ancestor, namely the Frysk Orkest”. The Frisian Matthäus Passion was part of Lân fan Taal, and thus of the main program of LF2018.
Omrop Fryslân made a FryslânDOK in 2018 about the Frisian Matthäus Passion.
