Bach Collegium San Diego

09/11/2026

What's the difference between A=440 and A=415?
At Bach Collegium San Diego you may notice that the A the orchestra tunes to sounds a little different — that's because they tune to A=415, what's called historical pitch. A=440 is the modern global standard, but before the 20th century there was no universal pitch, and it varied widely by region and era. Blogger A=415 is roughly a half step lower than modern pitch, and it's probably closer to the tuning Bach, Handel, and Vivaldi wrote their music to be performed at.

09/07/2026

Next season in San Diego, the rhetorical spirit of J.S. Bach is alive and well.

According to Founder and Artistic Director Ruben Valenzuela, the ideals of the high Baroque didn't stop at Bach. Bach Collegium San Diego performs on gut strings and transitional bows — and there's a transparency and immediacy here you simply can't get from a bigger ensemble.

Want to know more about the concerts and repertoire? Check out the 2026-27 concerts on our website.

09/04/2026

Here at Bach Collegium San Diego, we love the music J.S. Bach...if you couldn't tell.

09/01/2026

Season 24 is coming — and Bach Collegium San Diego is making it count.

A second commercial album, the recording of El Mesías — Handel's Messiah in Spanish — drops this year, and the ensemble has been invited back to BachFest Leipzig for a week in Germany.

And that's not even all of it. Check out our website to learn more about the 2026-27 season!

08/28/2026

Did you guess...
Baroque flute? Here's Stephen Schultz getting ready to take the stage with Bach Collegium San Diego last March.

08/26/2026

The music of J.S. Bach has a way of bringing people together — in this case, two singers, Anne-Marie and Angie, who met in Germany in 2006 and have been making music in San Diego ever since.

08/25/2026

As kids in San Diego head back to school, we wanted to take this opportunity to say thank you to the San Diego Children's Choir () for joining Bach Collegium San Diego to sing the Dona Nobis Pacem for the performances of J.S. Bach's B Minor Mass last March. Best of luck to you all as the new school year starts!

08/21/2026

IYKYK — but in all seriousness, Bach Collegium San Diego is grateful for the partnership with All Souls Episcopal and the home base in Point Loma. 🙏

08/19/2026

Bass-baritone Enrico Lagasca and Artistic Director Ruben Valenzuela: equally focused on the music, equally focused on the hair — but Enrico wins by a hair. Double sweeps vs. single.

Enrico Lagasca, bass-baritone returns to perform with BCSD this season for our December performances of Handel's Messiah in both English and Spanish.

08/19/2026

Consider this provocative article with Cecilia Duarte Mezzo-Soprano who is featured on our upcoming Handel: El Mesías recording due to release this December.

'We have to move away from a hierarchical mindset and sing from a more humble perspective — decolonize our musical mind and approach all music with curiosity.' CD

Friends and colleagues have shared with me, and I know from experience, that vocalists with exclusively “classical” training can sometimes be blind to the richness of other music. We tend to minimize our efforts when approaching different or less “formal” genres, or even avoid them completel...