Pennsylvania · Nonprofit
BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM
BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM (Pennsylvania) receives grants from 37 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,112,868 to it, the largest being LEHIGH VALLEY COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($364,550). 27 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $1.7M
- Funders on record
- 37
- Grants received
- $2.1M
- Net assets
- $11M
What Bach Choir of Bethlehem does
Mission
The mission of the Bach Choir of Bethlehem inspires and enriches people through the transformative power of the music of j.s. Bach and composers who influenced or were influenced by bach, by pursuing excellence in performance and education to build, strengthen, and sustain communities, and to foster a life-long passion for the choral arts.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Concert season - ticketed concerts: founded in 1898 and under the direction of christopher jackson 2023-2024, the bach choir, bach festival orchestra and distinguished soloists, present a concert season of 24 ticketed concerts for more than 7,000 people across the united states. Concerts include the bethlehem bach festival over two weekends in may as well as christmas, family, spring, bel canto youth chorus, and gala concerts. The 2023-2024 concert season included in person concerts and livestreaming performances. The season also included touring performances including a bach choir tour to europe including a featured performance at the leipzig bachfest.
$1,031,133 spent$210,432 earned by the program67% of program spendingEducation & community engagement: the bach choir presents 18 free educational concerts with informal talks about the music by conductor christopher jackson. Eight of these concerts entitled "bach to school" are presented for more than 5,000 students (grades 3-12) each year in diverse school districts throughout the lehigh valley region along with activity books and additonal online content. We presented our ten bach at noon concerts to live audiences at central moravian church in historic downtown bethlehem and at st. John's lutheran church in allentown. More than 6,000 audience members attended these concerts. In 2022-2023, the bach choir established "a musical heart" music in hospice program in collaboration with 2 hospital hospice centers.
$264,849 spent$14,388 earned by the program17% of program spendingRecordings, research, and preservation: to enhance achievement of its mission, the bach choir is heard in recordings and live broadcasts around the world, most recently in a cd recording of mendelssohn/bach matthus-passion (2024), dvd co-produced with classical kids - "mr bach comes to call" (2007) and five new recordings on the analekta label " magnificat and gloria" (2009), "songs of hope" (2011), "saint john passion"(2012), " a child's christmas in bethlehem" (2013) and "bach and handel" (2018). The work of the bach choir is also enhanced by research, scholarship, and archival preservation.
$231,939 spent$4,821 earned by the program15% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2023 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $1,527,921.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2020 to 2021, from $8.4M to $11M (+27%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 4% · 2018 3% · 2019 3% · 2020 2% · 2021 5% · 2022 9% · 2023 13% · 2024 6% · 2025 4%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
53% of BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (63% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Chief executive
Leela Breithaupt
Executive director
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2021 and FY2022 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 11 funders to 16 funders, grant income rose $115k → $228k.
9 of 37 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 30% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 37 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 17% of grant income, and it takes 5 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 5 funders to its left
35% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 23% · 2018 17% · 2019 17% · 2020 15% · 2021 18% · 2022 19% · 2023 19% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
65% of BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 73% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
74% of BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM's grant income comes from Pennsylvania funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $630k arriving through sponsors registered in 7 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM runs a healthier operating margin than half of the 3,430 arts & culture nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 3,430 arts & culture nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Government funding BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $170k on record.
- National Endowment for the Arts$170k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Pennsylvania
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
68% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
74%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 24 states
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM?
- BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM (Pennsylvania) receives grants from 37 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,112,868 to it, the largest being LEHIGH VALLEY COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($364,550). 27 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM have?
- IRS filings report 37 organizations giving $2,112,868 in grants to BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM, 27 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM?
- LEHIGH VALLEY COMMUNITY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $364,550 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like BACH CHOIR OF BETHLEHEM find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Pennsylvania. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 37 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing