Masaaki Suzuki – J. S. Bach: Die Kunst der Fuge, BWV 1080 (2024) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki – J. S. Bach: Die Kunst der Fuge, BWV 1080 (2024)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:37:00 minutes | 2,04 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

The Art of Fugue emerges as the central instrumental project of the last decade of Bach’s life, after a gradual development over several years: the exploration in depth and with an overflowing musical imagination of the contrapuntal possibilities inherent in a single musical subject. In this work, the theoretical component of Bach’s thinking is at its clearest: theory and practice merge, old and new stylistic elements and compositional techniques are integrated and demonstrate in an incomparable way his individual approach to composition. Since Bach gave no indication of the instrument, nor does his writing shed any further light on the subject, one might even wonder whether this work is a purely theoretical work, intended solely for musical analysis. However, since the composer’s rediscovery in the nineteenth century, musicians have appropriated the work, whatever their instrument. It is now generally accepted that the work was composed for the keyboard. A second harpsichord part is added for three fugues, played here by Masato Suzuki. After several acclaimed recordings of Bach’s works for keyboard instruments, Masaaki Suzuki finally takes on this immense work, the pinnacle of the cantor’s art and one of the absolute peaks of Western music.

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Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Organ Works, Vol. 5 (2024) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Organ Works, Vol. 5 (2024)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:05:15 minutes | 1,17 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

The fifth volume of Masaaki Suzuki’s series of Bach’s works for organ features one of the most important surviving instruments from Bach’s time, made by the German organ builder Christoph Treutmann the Elder. Widely known for its extraordinary tonal quality, the instrument was built between 1734 and 1737. A recent general restoration preserved all essential structural elements or renewed them while remaining faithful to the originals, making this an ideal instrument for Bach interpreters who wish to come close to the sound world of the Leipzig Thomaskantor. Suzuki now takes up the Orgel-Büchlein (literally, “little organ book”), a collection of 45 short chorale preludes on melodies from the Lutheran hymn book, a project that came into being in connection with Bach’s appointment as organist and chamber musician at the Duke’s court in Weimar in 1708. Presenting chorales for different periods of the church year, this collection serves as a general guide to text-based composition focusing on word-sound relationships and content-specific musical expression. Three Preludes and Fugues complete the second volume dedicated to the Orgel-Büchlein, illustrating the principle of variety and structure historically practised by concert organists in order to demonstrate the tone colours and expressive possibilities of their instrument.

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Masaaki Suzuki – BACH, J.S.: Italian Concerto / French Overture in B minor / Keyboard Sonata in D minor (2006) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki - BACH, J.S.: Italian Concerto / French Overture in B minor / Keyboard Sonata in D minor (2006) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download

Masaaki Suzuki – BACH, J.S.: Italian Concerto / French Overture in B minor / Keyboard Sonata in D minor (2006)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 01:09:19 minutes | 839 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © BIS

Strong but delicate, deliberate but subtle, driven but supple, Masaaki Suzuki’s 2005 recording of Bach’s Italian Concerto and French Overture for harpsichord are quite convincing in their own distinctive way. In Suzuki’s hands, the opening crash of the Italian Concerto is as instantly arresting as the powerful opening prelude and fugue from the French Overture is immediately appealing. Yet the concerto’s following Andante is as emotionally nuanced as the overture’s Sarabande is deeply affecting and the concerto’s closing Presto is as joyfully rambunctious as the overture’s Gigue is relentlessly propulsive. Better yet are Suzuki’s performances of Bach’s own transcription of his A minor Sonata for solo violin as a D minor sonata for solo harpsichord. Here, Suzuki’s playing and interpretation are all of a piece; a deep, dark, soulful, and sometimes scary piece, true, but still one overwhelming piece. And whatever the work, Suzuki’s playing is always first rate, if not quite as strikingly virtuosic as some full-time harpsichordists – after all, Suzuki’s full-time job since 1990 has been directing the Bach Collegium of Japan, the group recording Bach’s complete cantatas for BIS. Captured in crisp sound, this recording will please Suzuki’s many fans in Japan and around the world.
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Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Organ Works, Vol. 4 (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Organ Works, Vol. 4 (2023)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:07:35 minutes | 1,18 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

The fourth volume of Masaaki Suzuki’s Bach works for organ series features one of the most important surviving instruments of Bach’s time, made by the German organ builder Christoph Treutmann the Elder. Widely known for its extraordinary tonal quality, the instrument was built between 1734 and 1737. A recent general restoration preserved all essential structural elements or renewed them, remaining faithful to the originals, making it an ideal instrument for Bach interpreters who wish to come close to the sound ideas of the Leipzig Thomaskantor.

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Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Mozart: Requiem in D Minor, K. 626 (2014) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Mozart: Requiem in D Minor, K. 626 (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:14:34 minutes | 1,29 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

Since its creation in 1791, Mozart’s Requiem has become one of the truly iconic works in the history of music. For this recording of the work, Masaaki Suzuki and the Bach Collegium Japan commissioned a new performing edition. Masato Suzuki, himself a member of the BCJ and the son of Masaaki, has based his completion on Eybler’s and Süßmayr’s work, explaining his procedure in the liner notes to the disc. The recording was made at the Shoin Chapel in Kobe, where the team has previously recorded their complete cycle of Bach’s church cantatas. A stellar cast of soloists is headed by soprano Carolyn Sampson, who also shines in the famous soprano aria Laudate Dominum – one of the highlights of Vesperae solennes de confessore which conclude the disc.

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Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Musikalisches Opfer (2017) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Musikalisches Opfer (2017)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:12:12 minutes | 1,44 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

Johann Sebastian Bach’s appearance on 7th May 1747 at the court of Frederick the Great is the best documented event in the composer’s otherwise unglamorous career. During the proceedings, Frederick provided Bach with an exceptionally difficult theme on which to improvise a fugue. The King is said to have been impressed with the improvisation, but Bach himself was less so, and announced that he intended to set the theme to paper ‘in a regular fugue’. Several months later the Musical Offering appeared in print – a collection of 13 pieces in diverse genres: fugues, canons and a trio sonata, all exploiting the ‘Royal Theme’ in various intricate ways.

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Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Toccatas, BWV 910-916 (2020) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Toccatas, BWV 910-916 (2020)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:09:04 minutes | 1,49 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

Very little is known about the origin of J. S. Bach’s seven Toccatas (BWV 910–916) or of their use. They are believed to have been written before 1717 or the end of Bach’s Weimar period – but it is quite possible that at least some of them were drafted before he arrived there in 1707, at the age of 22. The Toccatas are usually performed on harpsichord or piano – but even though they are ‘manualiter’ (intended to be played by the hands only) and do not call for pedal parts, they are also occasionally heard on the organ. In terms of style they are examples of the so-called stylus phantasticus – ‘the most free and unfettered method of composition’ – and belong to the North German organ tradition of the late 17th century.

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Masaaki Suzuki – Bach: Organ Works, Vol. 3 (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki – Bach: Organ Works, Vol. 3 (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:19:07 minutes | 1,40 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

Born within a couple of years of each other, Gottfried Silbermann and Johann Sebastian Bach were acquainted, and we know that Silbermann in 1736 invited the composer to inaugurate the new organ that he had built in Dresden’s Frauenkirche. That instrument was destroyed during the bombing of Dresden in 1945, but some thirty of Silbermann’s organs are still extant. From robust pedal stops providing a sturdy bass fundament to silvery flute stops, his instruments were famous for their distinctive sound and contemporary sources often made use of a play on the name of their maker as they praised their ‘Silberklang’. Silbermann was based in Freiberg with his workshop only a stone’s throw away from the cathedral, where he built his first great organ in 1714. One of the finest and best preserved examples of his art, this is the instrument which Masaaki Suzuki has chosen for the third installment in his traversal of Bach’s organ music, following acclaimed recitals recorded in Groningen (the Netherlands) and Kobe (Japan). The programme takes us through various forms of organ compositions, including one of Bach’s most imposing preludes (BWV 546) with its intricate fugue, the multi-sectioned Toccata in C major (BWV 546a), examples of chorale preludes and partitas. Suzuki closes his recital with the famous Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor, probably composed during the same years that Silbermann was busy building the organ on which it is performed here.

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Masaaki Suzuki – J. S. Bach: English Suites (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Masaaki Suzuki – J. S. Bach: English Suites (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 02:32:43 minutes | 3,32 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

A busy schedule as music director of the Bach Collegium Japan and sought-after guest conductor doesn’t stop Masaaki Suzuki from returning to his first loves, the organ and the harpsichord. With the present release he adds yet another chapter to his series of Bach’s works for solo harpsichord. After acclaimed recordings of the Well-tempered Clavier, the Goldberg variations, the French Suites and other works the turn has come to the English Suites. Composed while Bach were in his thirties it precedes other sets such as the French Suites and the Toccatas, and in his liner notes, Bach scholar Yo Tomita draws attention to ‘the stylistic traits of a youthful and ambitious composer wanting to make his mark through the use of counterpoint and virtuosity’.

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Bach Colegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Mozart: C minor Mass (2016) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Bach Colegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Mozart: C minor Mass (2016)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:11:17 minutes | 1,31 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS Area: Autriche

Following on the 2015 release of Mozart’s Requiem, Masaaki Suzuki and his Bach Collegium Japan has gone on to record the composers Mass in C minor, K427 – the ‘Great Mass’. As the nickname indicates it is a work of unusual proportions for a mass of the Classical period – or would have been so, had Mozart completed it. It is not known for what occasion Mozart intended the work, but a letter to his father Leopold dated 4 January 1783 indicate that he may have committed himself to writing it in connection with his marriage to Constanze and a planned visit to Salzburg.

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Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 10 (2018) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki - J.S. Bach: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 10 (2018) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – J.S. Bach: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 10 (2018)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:06:11 minutes | 1,26 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © BIS

The two cantatas recorded here conclude a project that the Bach Collegium Japan and Masaaki Suzuki started in 2004, in which Bach’s secular cantatas formed the basis of numerous concerts and recordings. As the team completed recording the church cantatas in 2013, this means that BCJ’s performances of all of Bach’s extant cantatas – sacred and secular – are now available on disc. Out of what was originally a much larger number only a little more than twenty secular cantatas have survived in performable condition. These nevertheless offer a welcome complement to our image of Bach the church musician, and reveal a composer who approached secular music with the same artistic integrity that we find in his sacred music.
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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]

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

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.
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Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Bach, J.S.: The Brandenburg Concertos & Orchestral Suites (2009) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki - Bach, J.S.: The Brandenburg Concertos & Orchestral Suites (2009) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Bach, J.S.: The Brandenburg Concertos & Orchestral Suites (2009)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 03:21:03 minutes | 2,67 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © BIS

Bach Collegium Japan was first noticed internationally for undertaking the huge project of recording the complete church cantatas of J. S. Bach. Although the ensemble’s discography consists of predominately vocal works, the participating instrumentalists have attracted acclaim ever since the outset. On the present offering, it is Bach’s two great sets of orchestral works that form the programme and the choir of the BCJ is silent. Bach Collegium Japan and Masaaki Suzuki first recorded the Brandenburg Concertos in 2000, but now return to these great works. The new recording took place in the recently completed MUZA Kawasaki Hall, a venue that is highly suitable to an approach focussing on the chamber music qualities of this music. In four of the concertos Masaaki Suzuki has chosen to replace the traditional cello with the violoncello da spalla – a smaller instrument played horizontally on the shoulder or held against the breast. The instrument has already featured in the BCJ Cantata series, and opens for new possibilities in timbre, for instance in Concerto No. 6, where the violoncello da spalla blends particularly well with the two solo violas and the viola da gambas.
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Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Bach, J.S.: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 5 ‘Birthday Cantatas’ (2015) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki - Bach, J.S.: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 5 'Birthday Cantatas' (2015) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Bach, J.S.: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 5 ‘Birthday Cantatas’ (2015)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:13:16 minutes | 1,35 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © BIS

Continuing their exploration of Bach’s vocal music, Bach Collegium Japan and Masaaki Suzuki have now reached the fifth volume of secular cantatas, with the previous instalment being ‘urgently recommended’ by the reviewer in Fanfare, and its contents described as ‘unusually colourful and vivid performances, even by the standards so far set by Suzuki’s Collegium Japan’ (International Record Review). Both cantatas on the present disc were first performed in 1733 by Bach and his Collegium Musicum at public concerts in Leipzig. They were also part of what almost appears to have been a campaign by Bach to be appointed Court Composer by the Saxon Prince-Elector Friedrich August II, something which took place three years later. Lasst uns sorgen, lasst uns wachen, BWV 213, also known as Hercules at the crossroads, was composed for the 11th birthday of the Prince-Elector’s oldest son, and Tönet, ihr Pauken! Erschallet, Trompeten! BWV 214 in a similar manner celebrated the birthday two months later of his wife, Maria Josepha of Saxony. Both works are so-called ’dramma per musica’, in which the vocal soloists are embodying dramatic characters – in the present cantatas these are taken from Greek mythology. Needless to say, Bach rose to the festive occasions, deploying trumpets and timpani (as implied in the title of BWV 214) and horns (in BWV 213) to great effect. A year later, he would reuse much of the music from the two cantatas in a similarly jubilant but otherwise quite different context – admirers of the Christmas Oratorio will for instance recognize the opening chorus of that work (Jauchzet, frohlocket) in the first movement of BWV 214 as well as the celebrated alto aria Bereite dich, Zion as an artfully transformed version of Hercules brusque rejection of Wohlust (Lust) in the ninth movement of BWV 213.
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Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Bach, J.S.: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 4 (2014) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki - Bach, J.S.: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 4 (2014) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download

Bach Collegium Japan, Masaaki Suzuki – Bach, J.S.: Secular Cantatas, Vol. 4 (2014)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:13:06 minutes | 1,29 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © BIS Records

The two works on this disc perfectly illustrate a particular type of secular cantata, the so-called dramma per musica. In such works the libretto is constructed dramatically, and the singers embody various roles, such as gods and other characters from antiquity, and allegorical figures. The parallel with opera is apparent, although the drammi per musica do without any scenic element. Bach primarily used the form in works intended for princely tributes or academic festivities: educated audiences could be expected to recognize the characters and literary traditions involved. Both cantatas recorded here are academic cantatas, composed in honour of eminent members of the faculty at the University of Leipzig. BWV 205 celebrates the name day of Dr August Friedrich Mller (3rd August 1725), and takes us to Aeolia, where Aeolus, the King of the Winds, holds the mighty autumn storms captive until it is time to let them loose on the world. To prevent any disruption of the celebrations for Dr Mller, the goddess Pallas, among others, entreats Aeolus to keep the storms in check for a while longer. Grudgingly he concedes to her wish, but only after singing an aria full of splendid bluster (Wie will ich lustig lachen). One year later, Bach composed the cantata BWV 207 for the appointment of Dr Gottlieb Kortte as professor extraordinarius. The young jurist enjoyed particular popularity among the young academics, who probably were the commissioners of the cantata. In this work it is virtues such as Diligence and Honour which take musical shape, singing the praise of the eminent academic. The cantata closes with a chorus, Kortte lebe, Kortte blhe!, wishing the new professor a long and flourishing life unfortunately to little avail, as Dr Kortte died only five years later, at the age of 33.
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