35 YEARS STRONG.

Byline: Fred Crafts The Register-Guard

When German organist and conductor Helmuth Rilling came to Eugene in the summer of 1970 to teach conducting and organ master classes, perform an organ recital and conduct a choir program, little did he realize he would be spending the next 35 summers here.

But that's how casually the Oregon Bach Festival was born.

Rilling and then-University of Oregon music professor Royce Saltzman had met in Stuttgart, Germany, the year before while Saltzman was teaching a course there.

They immediately hit it off. Saltzman invited Rilling to visit Eugene - and the rest is history.

"When we started this, we did not think of creating a Bach Festival; we just wanted to do a nice workshop on the campus of the University of Oregon," Rilling says by phone from his home in Stuttgart. "This proved to be such a high-level musical event and such a beautiful human experience with many people participating. To think back today to that is something very special."

The highly decorated festival the two musicians spawned has risen through the years to rank among the world's elite festivals.

This year it expects to draw 35,000 patrons from more than 30 states and at least five countries, and to have an indirect economic impact estimated at more than $6 million.

This year the attraction is not only well-tempered Bach masterworks such as his Mass in B Minor and his St. Matthew Passion, but towering artists such as bass Thomas Quasthoff, pianist Jeffrey Kahane, composer and conductor Krzysztof Pendericki and the Gaechinger Kantorei.

At 35, the festival is a bona fide hit and one of the state's cultural gems.

It has drawn critical praise, top international artists and a Grammy Award.

Rilling and Saltzman, now 71 and 75 respectively, couldn't be happier.

"I remember those first years in Eugene fondly," Rilling says. "The people from the school of music and the friends from the community of Eugene created an ambiance of music-making and good understanding.

``But later on we could expand it and bring in people from other places in the United States, especially from the Los Angeles area - musicians and singers - and later on we could open it to international forces and students who would experience (Eugene residents') hospitality and their openness to new ideas."

As Rilling's fame grew over the years, so did his opportunities to conduct throughout the world. Even so, he has steadfastly carved out about a month each year to come to Eugene to bask in the warmth of old friends here - particularly his buddy Saltzman - and to conduct exemplary forces in breathtaking concerts.

"For me, Eugene has become something like a second home," Rilling says.

Rilling recently totaled up the time he has spent in Eugene during the past 35 years and figured that, if the chunks of time were placed back to back, it would amount to at least two years.

"There's no other place in the world, except my home here in Stuttgart, Germany, where I have been such a long time," he says.

Rilling's life in Eugene is simple. He stays in a hotel room near the concert hall, works hard, lives well and makes beautiful music. Yet, for him, the attraction comes down to the little things.

"I like it when I walk on the street of Eugene and someone walks up to me and says, `Helmuth, how are you? It's nice to have you back.' This is something very special. This will happen nowhere else in the world."

For his part, Saltzman, who eventually quit teaching to run the festival, has been `amazed' at the way their dream has grown.

`No way could Helmuth and I have imagined back at the beginning that anything of this proportion would be in place 35 years later,' Saltzman says.

How did this happen?

Saltzman credits the `very, very supportive' Eugene-Springfield community, Rilling's `continued commitment' to come to Eugene year after year, the institutional ties with the UO and the `incredible' festival staff.

To go forward, though, Saltzman says the festival needs the financial stability only a sustaining endowment can bring.

In truth, the festival and UO have been quietly formulating a plan for such a fund-raising campaign that likely will be announced later this year.

`What has been a hallmark of the Bach Festival is a commitment to excellence, whether it be performance, education or administration," Saltzman says. "In order to continue that in the future, we need an endowment - particularly so as we think of transition in the future, both in terms of administration and in terms of the artistic director.'

That brings up a sensitive subject Saltzman and Rilling talk privately about.

It will happen someday, but both insist that day is a long way off.

Both men remain vigorous and passionate about the festival and show no signs of being anywhere near ready to step down. Both say they are having too much fun.

`Along with fun there is stress,' Saltzman says, `but I think I handle the stress maybe in a better way perhaps because of age and having gone through the fire many times before.'

So, after 35 years together, Rilling and Saltzman are still best friends, still making music and still dreaming of things to do.

`It says somewhere in the Old Testament that old men dream dreams and have visions," Saltzman says. "I think that's where I am.

`Great performances are done in many places - and we have great performances here - but there's another dimension to this festival that perhaps is more important than great performances, and that is, we're involved with changing people's lives.

``Music can do that. Maybe that's what keeps me going more than anything else.'

FESTIVAL PREVIEW

Oregon Bach Festival

What: The J.S. Bach-focused annual music festival draws top international musicians and far-flung audiences; conducted by Helmuth Rilling

When: June 25-July 11

Where: Chiefly at the Hult Center's Silva Concert Hall, Seventh Avenue and Willamette Street, and at Beall Concert Hall, 961 E. 18th Ave., on the University of Oregon campus 

Tickets: Available through the Hult Center box office (682-5000)