The Cello Suites:
Suite No 1 in G major BWV1007
Suite No 2 in D minor BWV1008
Suite No 3 in C major BWV1009
Suite No 4 in E flat major BWV1010
Suite No 5 in C minor BWV1011
Suite No 6 in D major BWV1012
The Song of the Birds Catalan folksong, arranged by Sally Beamish
Prelude from Suite No 1from the Anna Magdalena manuscript
Prelude from Suite No 1 from the Johann Peter Kellner manuscript
Prelude from Suite No 1 from the collection of Johann Christoph Westphal

This is the finest recording of Bach’s cello suites that I’ve heard. The playing is enthralling, the production superb; nearly every detail sounds just right. Steven Isserlis has bided his time to record these suites and he comes to them with technique and sensibility finely honed, all of it is evident in his richly dark tone, fluent phrasing, lithe dance rhythms and lovingly crafted lyricism. Listen, for example, to the bite and lilt he imparts to the 3rd Suite’s Allemande and Gigue, or in the grave beauty he mines from the Sarabandes of the 2nd and 5th suites. This is music making of the highest order.

I have one reservation. He chooses not to play the sixth suite on a five-string cello, claiming that its thinner sonority would be “anticlimactic”. This makes no sense; it’s the sound that Bach wanted. Either he intended the works simply as dance suites, in which case there is no question of climax or anti climax; or, if he intended the kind of narrative sequence Isserlis implies (the cellist sees the suites as representing the life of Christ much like Biber’s Mystery Sonatas), then the changes of sonority Bach specified in the 5th suite (with scordatura) and the 6th suite (with a fifth string) must surely be integral aspects of that narrative. Nevertheless, in all other respects Isserlis’ interpretation and execution of this endlessly fascinating music is about as close to perfection as it is possible to come. One of the year’s outstanding recordings.

GRAHAM LOCK (GOLDBERG MAGAZINE)

---

dostępna w serii Hyperion 30