![Isabelle Faust - Bach : Sonatas & Partitas for solo violin, vol. 1 (BWV 1004, 1005, 1006) (2010) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/0794881943821_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Isabelle Faust – Bach : Sonatas & Partitas for solo violin, vol. 1 (BWV 1004, 1005, 1006) (2010)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:08:55 minutes | 1,13 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © harmonia mundi
“Clapton is God!” was the well-known graffiti scrawled across 20th century London, praising the Englishman’s fiery guitar playing. Based on Isabelle Faust’s blazing accounts of Bach’s sonatas and partitas on this 2010 Harmonia Mundi disc, one might expect to see the graffiti “Faust is God!” scrawled across 21st century Paris. Rather than play all six of these canonical works of the solo violin literature, Faust has chosen the D minor and E major partitas and placed the C major Sonata between them. All three are tremendously difficult both technically and expressively, but starting with the D minor Partita with its celebrated Chaconne was particularly audacious. Faust rises to the challenge with an utterly devastating account of the work. Playing with only a dab of vibrato but a boatload of virtuosity, she overcomes every technical hurdle in this surpassingly difficult work. She saves the best for last, and her Chaconne is stunningly powerful, as well as amazingly nuanced and profoundly moving. Her other two performances are equally impressive, especially the opening Adagio and Fugue from the C major Sonata, which builds from a whisper to a shattering contrapuntal climax. There have been other great recordings of these works, but Faust’s surely belongs among the best. Harmonia Mundi’s sound is close but not overly intimate.
Review by James Leonard
(more…)
![Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch - Johann Sebastian Bach : Sonates et Partitas, BWV 1001-1006 (2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/0761195124123_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch – Johann Sebastian Bach : Sonates et Partitas, BWV 1001-1006 (2013)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 02:27:40 minutes | 2,74 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Ondine
Ondine proudly presents a release of Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin with Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch.
Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch is an unusually versatile violinist, predominantly known for her performance of period music but also excelling in many other styles and genres. Her position as concertmaster in the orchestra of Philippe Herreweghe is testament to her skill as an early music performer.
On the present disc Kaakinen-Pilch performs Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas on a violin from the 17th century. This collection of works for solo violin was the pinnacle and culmination of the violin’s 200-year history in its day.
Ondine will release a disc of Orchestral Suites by Christoph Graupner (ODE 1220-2), featuring Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch as violinist and conductor.
(more…)
![Christine Busch - Johann Sebastian Bach : Sonates et Partitas pour violon seul (Intégrale) (2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/rjazbj6z8dgaa_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Christine Busch – Johann Sebastian Bach : Sonates et Partitas pour violon seul (Intégrale) (2013)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 02:25:44 minutes | 1,48 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Phi
Avec son Collegium Vocale Gent, Philippe Herreweghe a depuis quarante ans le bonheur de collaborer avec des solistes souvent extraordinaires, et avec lesquels il entretient un dialogue musical et humain fertil et stimulant. Philippe Herreweghe : « Il nous semble important de leur laisser l’occasion de s’exprimer eux aussi sur le label PHI dans des œuvres qu’ils affectionnent particulièrement. »
C’est le cas du présent enregistrement. Christine Busch, qui réalise un merveilleux travail en tant que leader de l’orchestre du Collegium Vocale Gent, a enregistré les Sonates & Partitas pour violon seul de J. S. Bach – œuvre qu’elle joue depuis son enfance et qu’elle admire énormément. Philippe Herreweghe : « Christine Busch inspire beaucoup par sa perfection technique, sa force, son humilité, son évidence, son élan poétique ainsi que par ses qualités, nécessaires pour servir le plus grand des compositeurs. »
(more…)
![Andras Schiff - J.S. Bach : Six Partitas (2009) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/0002894766991_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Andras Schiff – J.S. Bach : Six Partitas (2009)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 02:12:49 minutes | 1,77 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © ECM New Series
After completing his highly praised Beethoven cycle, pianist András Schiff returns to Bach in this spot-on live recording of the Six Partitas. Though published as his Opus 1, the Partitas were Bach’s last compositions for keyboard. Both reasons make it a keystone in the mythical Bach pantheon. Although “partita” is essentially a euphemism for “suite,” in Bach’s hands the form was opened to a freer and more complex sense of infrastructure and performative demands.
The introductions show both composer and performer at their best. The Praeambulum of Partita V is a tour de force of rhythmic urgency and dynamic control. The Fantasia of Partita III is another astounding inauguration, its resplendence cluing us into the genesis of the music to follow. The meditative Praeludium of Partita I contrasts sublimely with the Sinfonia of Partita II, the latter a stately lead-in to the courtliest of the Partitas. The accompanying Allemandes overwhelm with their sparks, conflagrating our souls into rapt attention. The pacing throughout is nothing short of extraordinary. Schiff’s sprightly Correntes glisten like rain-drenched leaves, tempering their surrounding flames with a quiet power.
(more…)
![Ricercar Consort, Philippe Pierlot - Bach : Passio secundum Johannem (St. John Passion) (2011) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/3760127221364_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Ricercar Consort, Philippe Pierlot – Bach : Passio secundum Johannem (St. John Passion) (2011)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:53:31 minutes | 1,78 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Mirare
« Il y a dans cette Passion, des moments d’une beauté déchirante, admirablement interprétés, admirablement joués. Dès le début, le choral d’ouverture « Herr, unser Herrscher » possède une cadence de battement de 150 – c’est quelque chose, suite à quoi le sportif a besoin d’endurance. Saisissante, immédiate et sans concession, cette interprétation est admirablement menée par un excellent Evangéliste. Philippe Pierlot démontre qu’il a la main heureuse lorsqu’il choisit les solistes, les tempi et du génie dans la dramaturgie. Pour résumer : ce disque est la meilleure interprétation de la Passion selon saint Jean du moment ! »
Robert Strobl
La Passion selon Saint-Jean, chef d’ceuvre universel de l’histoire musicale occidentale, créée en 1724 (1ère version) à Leipzig, a été de nombreuses fois enregistrée et c’est toujours, aujourd’hui une entreprise considérable (et admirable !) que de désirer la jouer en concert, ou la graver au disque. Philippe Pierlot et le Ricercar Consort s’attaquent à leur tour au monument de Jean-Sébastien Bach. Ils livrent une belle version qui réussit à trouver un point d’équilibre entre une nécessaire dramatisation du livret et une forme d’intimité inhérente à la méditation. Les solistes sont au rendez-vous dans les airs et les récitatifs, les affects baroques qui suivent le cycle traditionnel des stations, de l’arrestation de Jésus à sa mise au tombeau.
(more…)
![David Fray - J.S. Bach: Partitas Nos. 2 & 6, Toccata (2012) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/5099907094453_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
David Fray – J.S. Bach: Partitas Nos. 2 & 6, Toccata (2012)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:05:28 minutes | 958 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Warner Classics
David Fray, described as «perhaps the most inspired, certainly the most original Bach-player of his generation,“ launched his career with Bach and this is his third album to feature the composer’s keyboard music.
“We shouldn’t be afraid of acknowledging the expressiveness of Bach’s music,” says Fray. “The Romantics don’t have a monopoly on expressivity!”
(more…)
![Academy of Ancient Music, Richard Egarr - J.S. Bach: Orchestral Suites BWV1066-9 (2014) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/5060340150037_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Academy of Ancient Music, Richard Egarr – J.S. Bach: Orchestral Suites BWV1066-9 (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:33:46 minutes | 1,91 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Academy of Ancient Music
Announcing AAM Record’s newest release, AAM003 JS Bach Orchestral Suites, available worldwide from 4 November 2014. Bach’s Orchestral Suites are a series of grand and graceful dances, paying homage to the French baroque style as championed by the ballet-obsessed King Louis XIV. Written during Bach’s years in Leipzig, where he had a wider range of instruments at his disposal than ever before, the Suites revel in new sonorous possibilities and employ varied combinations of wind, brass, stringed instruments and timpani.
“The news of the death of Christopher Hogwood comes just as the orchestra he founded, the Academy of Ancient Music, releases a fine new set of Bach’s Orchestral Suites with his successor, Richard Egarr, repeating the one-to-a-part approach he adopted for their Harmonia Mundi Brandenburg set. The sound is consequently less expansive than other recordings but the rewards are glorious, with Egarr at the harpsichord driving the delightfully clean and springy rhythms, every detail sharply defined, each separate timbre there for us to enjoy. This intimate chamber approach allows the trumpets in Suites Nos.3 and 4 to glow rather than blast, and the exceptional flute of Rachel Brown to shine in all its woody-toned charm in Suite No.2. Highly recommended.” –The Observer
(more…)
![Freiburger Barockorchester - Bach: Orchestral Suites (2011) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/3149020211328_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Freiburger Barockorchester – Bach: Orchestral Suites (2011)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:33:39 minutes | 953 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © harmonia mundi
Called ‘Ouvertüren’ in Germany, because they began with a large-scale overture à la française, Bach’s Suites for orchestra offer a unique synthesis of the French and the Italian styles. The Leipzig Cantor did not content himself with a mere set of amiable dances for his ‘Collegium Musicum’: he revived the genre in his own manner, accenting the contrasts, refining the orchestration, and introducing a hitherto unknown contrapuntal element. Two centuries later these admirable orchestral works continue to represent an indispensable treasure of the Baroque.
(more…)
![Ricercar Consort, Philippe Pierlot - J.S. Bach - Magnificat (2009) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/3760127221029_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Ricercar Consort, Philippe Pierlot – J.S. Bach – Magnificat (2009)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:04:52 minutes | 1,13 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Mirare
Philippe Pierlot and the Ricercar Consort’s 2006 recording of Bach’s Magnificat brings back the glory days of historically informed performances, those halcyon days in the 1980s when musicians, empowered by scholarship and energized by virtuosity, were recording the Baroque repertoire with the zeal of the newly converted. Though Pierlot and his musicians are of a younger generation, they bring a missionary fervor to the music, a program of Bach’s Magnificat, BWV 243, and Missa Brevis, BWV 235, interspersed with two well-chosen organ works, the Fuga sopra il Magnificat, BWV 733, and the Präludium und Fuga, BWV 541. Pierlot’s textures are clean, his rhythms buoyant, his colors bright, and tempos brisk, but not rushed in the fast movements, and contemplative but not moribund in the slow movements. The Ricercar Consort plays with technical brilliance and manifest enthusiasm as an ensemble, and the violin and flute soloists deliver sparkling performances. But perhaps the best thing is the five vocal soloists and given that they also serve as the choir, their performances are even more remarkable. With clarion tones, gracious technique, and an effortless blend, they comport themselves with the ease and luster of the best jazz vocal groups, and the spirit they bring to their parts is infectious. Francis Jacob delivers forceful yet effervescent readings of the two organ works. Mirare’s digital sound is as clear and as real as a blue sky.
(more…)
![The Netherlands Bach Society, Jos van Veldhoven - J.S. Bach: Magnificat in D major (bwv 243) / Unser Mund sei voll Lachens (bwv 110) (2010) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/kd5wbzexxf6lb_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
The Netherlands Bach Society, Jos van Veldhoven – J.S. Bach: Magnificat in D major (bwv 243) / Unser Mund sei voll Lachens (bwv 110) (2010)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 01:04:20 minutes | 1,97 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Channel Classics
All the music on this CD is associated with the festival of Christmas. Bach wrote the cantata Unser Mund sei voll Lachens (BWV 110) for morning service on Christmas Day 1725, and the first version of the Magnificat in E flat major (BWV 243a) for Vespers on Christmas Day 1723, seven months after the Leipzig town council appointed him cantor of the Thomaskirche. It would hardly be exaggerating to say that Bach thus presented his visiting card to his new employer. According to the Bach scholar Christoph Wolff, the work is his “first really large-scale and complex piece of church music”. Christmas was not the only occasion to sing the Magnificat text, however, for it was also a standard part of the Vespers liturgy. This may explain why Bach made a second version some years later (in D major, BWV 243).
For a Christmas CD in the year 2010 it is obviously attractive to add new movements to Bach’s Magnificat, entirely in keeping with the tradition of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. His own choice, in the E flat major version, remains unsurpassed. By adding extra Christmas music to the second version in D major, however, a new and unexpected form arises which lends the performance a certain topicality. What is more, it gives us the opportunity to present Bach with several Netherlands composers of the seventeenth century. –Jos van Veldhoven
(…) The Dutch group that Jos van Veldhoven directs delivers a musical message of pristine beauty. And in the two works the solo parts transport us as fully as does the direction, with Dorothee Mields (soprano), Johannete Zomer (soprano), William towers (alto), Charles Daniels (tenor), Stephan MacLoed (bass). This is a great accomplishment, in an exemplary sound recording that respects tones and acoustics. –Opus Haute Définition
(…) This is terrific Bach singing and playing, and even if you already own one or two or three Magnificats, you won’t be sorry to add this one–so vibrant and fresh-sounding, and possessed of the hopeful, optimistic spirit of the texts and music. And the sound, well, Channel Classics has a lock on whatever combination of technical know-how and magic is involved in making consistently demonstration-quality recordings. Don’t hesitate to include this in your holiday-season acquisitions. Highly recommended. –Classics Today
(more…)
![Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki - J.S. Bach: Lutheran Masses I - Missa in G minor, BWV 235 & Missa in G major, BWV 236 (2015) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/7318599920818_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Lutheran Masses I – Missa in G minor, BWV 235 & Missa in G major, BWV 236 (2015)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:05:29 minutes | 1,20 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © BIS
By Bach’s time, the Reformation had fundamentally altered the traditional forms of church service, and in German churches Latin had yielded to the country’s own language. To a limited extent, however, the Latin mass text did remain in use in the Protestant church – in particular the Kyrie and Gloria sections, which were often set to music as an entity in their own right. Albeit incomplete, this form of mass setting was termed ‘Missa’, a name it retained even in Bach’s day. Nowadays, to differentiate them from complete settings, these pieces are often referred to as ‘Lutheran Masses’. Bach’s famous Mass in B minor, later expanded into a complete mass, began its existence as a work of this type, and four other examples from Bach’s pen have survived. They all make extensive use of earlier compositions, and the two masses on the present disc consist entirely of so-called parodies: reworkings of arias and choruses from cantatas, in which Bach demonstrates his skill in adapting existing music for new uses. Performed by Bach Collegium Japan – who under the direction of Masaaki Suzuki have already recorded the original settings as part of their acclaimed cantata series – the Missae BWV 235 and 236 are here combined with four separate settings of the Sanctus, another section of the traditional mass that in Bach’s time could be heard in the churches of Leipzig during important feast days. Two of these are original compositions, whereas BWV 241, and possibly also 240, is an arrangement of a setting by another composer. The ‘Kyrie – Christe’ BWV Anh. 26 is also an example of how Bach in his task of providing the music for church services used music by other composers. In this case he turned to a movement from a mass by his contemporary Francesco Durante from Naples, but adapted it for his own purposes by composing a new setting – a duet for soprano and alto – of the Christe eleison section, labelling it ‘Christe di Bach’ in his autograph.
(more…)
![Ricercar Consort, Philippe Pierlot - J.S. Bach: In tempore Nativitatis - Christmas Cantatas BWV 110, 151, 63 (2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/8To57ky.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Ricercar Consort, Philippe Pierlot – J.S. Bach: In tempore Nativitatis – Christmas Cantatas BWV 110, 151, 63 (2013)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 01:07:53 minutes | 1,15 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Mirare
As every year, the Lutherans celebrate Christmas with splendor as well as the two days that follow. After the “Magnificat” composed for these same circumstances, the Ricercar Consort presents three festive works by JS Bach. The whole work is an admirable achievement, right from the mosaic of highly contrasted vocal and instrumental episodes that structures the opening chorus, in which three groups are combined or set against each other: the trumpets and drums, the three oboes, and the strings, always with the support of the continuo. The first duetto sounds like a duet from a Passion, while the second, in complementary fashion, brings the comfort that will culminate in the exultation of the final chorus.
(more…)
![Jean Rondeau - Bach: Imagine (2015) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/0825646220014_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Jean Rondeau – Bach: Imagine (2015)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:24:34 minutes | 1,65 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Erato – Warner Classics
IMAGINE is the first Warner Classics release from the dynamic young French harpsichordist Jean Rondeau, who sees it as “an exploration of all the possibilities that lie in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and in the harpsichord”. Praised by radio station France Musique for his “maturity, fabulous touch and originality,” the multi-talented Rondeau feels that, as a young musician today, he has “an incredible opportunity to break out of the concert hall and meet the world”.
IMAGINE features one of Bach’s most celebrated harpsichord works, the Italian Concerto BWV 971, but it mainly comprises transcriptions of music that the composer conceived for other instruments: the violin, the lute and the flute, including the towering Chaconne in D Minor. “This isn’t a disc of transcriptions, though,” says Rondeau. “As its name suggests, it is about imagination – an exploration of all the possibilities that lie in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and in the harpsichord. And though it’s not making a direct link to John Lennon, it’s nice if the title of the CD calls him to mind.”
(more…)
![Collegium Vocale Gent, Philippe Herreweghe - J.S. Bach - Ich elender Mensch: Leipzig Cantatas (2014) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/nypp4k3shjmic_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Collegium Vocale Gent, Philippe Herreweghe – J.S. Bach – Ich elender Mensch: Leipzig Cantatas (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:08:28 minutes | 1,18 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Phi
For the second time on the Phi label, Philippe Herreweghe presents four Bach cantatas written during the first year the composer spent in Leipzig. In relation to the repertoire composed in Weimar, the instrumentarium is enlarged to adapt to the size of the churches of Saint Thomas and Saint Nicholas. But, above all, the instrumental virtuosity is much greater, as are the vocal demands confronting the choirs and solo singers, trained at the time by Bach himself. The Collegium Vocale Gent, under the direction of Philippe Herreweghe and in the company of top-notch soloists (Dorothee Mields, Damien Guillon, Thomas Hobbs and Peter Kooij), show us in dazzling fashion to what point the composer endeavoured to create veritable musical sermons going far beyond a simple musical setting of the text. By way of a bonus, the album contains a magical little piece, Komm, Jesu, komm by Johann Schelle, one of Bach’s predecessors in Leipzig.
(more…)
![Matthew Halls - J.S. Bach: Goldberg Variations (2010) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/21/pzuetzaqgzz3b_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Matthew Halls – J.S. Bach: Goldberg Variations (2010)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 02:10:25 minutes | 1,74 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Linn Records
Matthew Halls is one of the brightest sparks of the UK early music scene, who, as director of Retrospect Ensemble, has rapidly established himself as one of Britain’s most exciting young conductors as well as a leading harpsichordist. J.S. Bach: Goldberg Variations’, features Bach’s popular masterpiece for keyboard, plus Sarabanda con Partite and Aria Variata.
(more…)