Founded in 2004, Bach With Verse is a non-profit organization bringing music and laughter to those who need it most around the world.
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Featuring world-renowned double bassist Richard “Dobbs” Hartshorne, BWV has brought live concerts to schools, prisons, rehab centers and refugee camps in Afghanistan, Bolivia, Iraq, Palestine, Uganda South Africa and the U.S.
​Why is this important ? How can a concert of Bach and comic stories become a lifelong memory or even a life changing experience for refugees, incarcerated people, humans living with war, and children living with fear?
You can sample recordings of Bach and Stories which are available on all streaming sites.
The only bass player in the world to play all 6 Bach Suites just as Bach wrote them: same keys, same octave, all the notes
41 hilarious stories that have had audiences laughing in nearly 2000 performances around the world. Some of these have been told by Dobbs in 20 different languages.
My first recording of the Bach Suites came out on Opus One records in 1997.
In 2004 I played all six on a single concert in Derry Northern Ireland. I went on to do all six in Toronto Canada, New York City, Harrisville NH, Dublin Ireland, Cochabamba Bolivia, Århus Denmark, Raleigh NC and finally at Town Hall in NYC in 2019.
After the Town Hall concert I felt the need to finally say everything that I have to say about this music. It’s as close as I can come to what I feel is the core and soul of these pieces and is the culmination of everything I have learned as a bass player and as a musician. I hope they spark the feelings and emotions in you that I have felt coming back to me from kids in refugee camps, recovering drug addicts, incarcerated men women and children and all the first time Bach listeners that I have played for around the world.
Dobbs
(Richard Hartshorne)
The wonderful cover photo was taken by the late Robert Fey. Danny Solomon did the mastering.
this was a monumental project: recording, editing, mastering 41 stories from my entire career. All these stories with music were written by me to perform live with my bass, Sometimes with another instrument played by me simultaneousIy, sometimes with a back up CD recorded by me. I have performed many of them around the world in over a thousand concerts and in 20 different languages which I can pronounce without actually being able to speak. In the US I have told them in hundreds of jails and prisons. Here they are for hours of fun!
Learn about us
Hear the sound of the bass
Very short bio with selections from Bach Suitres
See some comedy
Short look at a song that ends my story in some surprising venues.
Trailer for our PBS Special "Back to Bolivia"
Trailer
Bach With Verse is supported in part by a grant from the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Bach With Verse is funded in part by a grant from the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation.