Orgelkonzert am Deutschen Orgeltag

With the best recommendations

On July 12, 1908, Georg Senfter, the master of the Oppenheimer Sparrhof, opens a letter addressed to him. It states:  
“Dear Sir! Your young lady daughter has been my pupil for some time now and has made such extraordinary progress during this time that it is a duty of necessity to complete the education of your young lady daughter. Therefore, considering the excellent musical and compositional talent of your young lady daughter, I can only give you the following advice: that your young lady daughter enters my theory, respectively composition class at the local royal conservatory of music on the coming October 1 and enjoys my instruction there for another year (…) As I said: considering the extraordinary talent of your young lady daughter, it would be a sin not to fully and completely develop this talent (…)

With the most courteous recommendations
Your most devoted Professor Max Reger


She was the best! And here it sounds: The highest appreciation from one who was already highly regarded in his lifetime as a composer and organist.
Johanna Senfter and Max Reger – on Sunday, September 13 at 6 p.m., Dr. Katrin Bibiella and Provost Kantor Ralf Bibiella will present a program featuring works by the Leipzig organ composer and his “master pupil” in the context of the German Organ Day at the Woehl organ of the Katharinenkirche. For Georg Senfter allowed his highly gifted daughter – at a time when women still depended on the tolerance of their husbands or fathers – to “complete” her studies with Reger. Today she is regarded as one of the most interesting composers of late Romanticism. Her works have been rediscovered and performed with great interest, piece by piece, over the past few years.  

In the Oppenheimer Katharinenkirche, one is just a stone's throw away from the Sparrhof, where the well-off Senfter family lived. Here, one walks over the pavement that Johanna Senfter walked throughout her life, often with her teacher and later also the family friend, Max Reger. They must have visited the Katharinenkirche together many times, having played music at the Walcker organ – of which 19 stops are still preserved in today’s Woehl organ.
Although the focus of Senfter's oeuvre does not lie in the area of organ music  – she composed 9 symphonies, 26 orchestral works with vocal and instrumental solos, chamber music in various combinations, organ works, choirs, and songs. However, she also left exceptional pieces in this field and connects, as an example, the ten chorale preludes composed in 1930, to the contrapuntal, chromatic compositional technique of her teacher.

Her highly complex works require from the performer both the highest technical brilliance and the deepest emotional empathy.
When Dr. Katrin Bibiella and Provost Kantor Ralf Bibiella take their place at the Woehl organ in Oppenheim, both are present.

Sunday, September 13, 6 p.m.
German Organ Day
Organ concert
Katharinenkirche Oppenheim
Works by Johanna Senfter and Max Reger
Organ: Dr. Katrin Bibiella and Provost Kantor Ralf Bibiella

In cooperation with the Johann-Senfter-Society, Oppenheim

Tickets: 18.00 € p. person   / reduced 12.00 €

Registration required:
Protestant Church Community Oppenheim
kirchengemeinde.oppenheim@ekhn.de
(06133) 2381