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Rilling started the festival in 1970 with the late UO music professor Royce Saltzman, and it grew into one of the world’s leading classical music festivals.
Helmuth Rilling, who co-founded the Oregon Bach Festival in Eugene and led it for more than four decades as its artistic director, died Wednesday, Feb. 11, at age 92, festival officials announced Friday.
Sabrina Madison-Cannon, dean of the University of Oregon’s School of Music and Dance, said the legacy Rilling left is “immeasurable.”
“Through his profound musicianship and deep humanity, he transformed the Oregon Bach Festival and the city of Eugene into a beacon of artistic and educational excellence,” Madison-Cannon said in a statement.
Dave Goudy, who led education programs at the Bach Festival from 2008 to 2023, echoed the sentiment, and said Rilling was loyal to Eugene.
Rilling made the Bach Festival an “international star in the classical musical world. The fact that we still have this incredible festival is a total testament to him,” Goudy said in an interview with Lookout Eugene-Springfield.
Rilling was born in Stuttgart, Germany, in 1933 and was internationally known as an organist, conductor and teacher.
In 1970, Rilling and the late University of Oregon music professor Royce Saltzman founded the festival. That first year, the festival was a series of modest summer workshops and an informal concert, but it grew quickly. Today, its primary stages are at UO’s Beall Concert Hall and the Hult Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Eugene.
Rilling worked as the festival’s artistic director until he retired in 2013. Festival officials said he helped expand the festival’s global reputation, turning that modest summer workshop into what’s now considered one of the world’s leading classical music festivals.
In 2001, under his leadership, the festival won a Grammy Award for best choral performance for its recording of Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki’s “Credo.”
The festival is known not only for its performances but also for its educational programs, according to the UO School of Music and Dance. More than 1,200 conductors from around the world have trained in the festival’s master classes on conducting.
The festival plans to honor Rilling during its 2026 and 2027 seasons.
Rilling’s vision for integrating scholarship with performance and pedagogy influenced the creation of Bach academies across Europe, Asia and the Americas, festival officials said. They said he also founded the Gächinger Kantorei and the Bach-Collegium Stuttgart, establishing ensembles that would become widely celebrated.
Internationally, Rilling was regarded as among the foremost interpreters of Johann Sebastian Bach’s music. He recorded Bach’s complete works, including all of the composer’s nearly 200 sacred cantatas. Rilling’s discography exceeded 200 recordings.
He died at home in Leonberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany, near Stuttgart, according to the UO School of Music and Dance.
Rilling is survived by his wife, Martina Greiner, three grandchildren and his two daughters — Sara Maria Rilling, a violist, and Rahel Maria Rilling, a violinist, according to The New York Times.
