Bach Six Partitas

[prémont]

What kind of harpischord does Richter use?

Probably Neupert model Bach two manual 16,8 - 8,4 with lute stop on lower manual.

Didn't a couple of you guys say that Staier was more of a classicist?

Yes, his Bach is mostly straight on, fast, bordering the inarticulate.

The Leonhardt DHM partitas are out of print. I've been trying to get hold of them for a while. I understand it has more of the repeats. The virgin issue is great but has no repeats, except maybe in a sarabande or two, I think.

Right. If you want I may send you a copy.

[prémont]

I noticed that the Richter set costs almost $100 used on Amazon.  Although great music-making, such a high price should be met with "no way".

Hair raising indeed. In these ears Richters Partitas and Goldbergs from the 1950es are stiff and mechanical (sewingmachine, you know).

[Clever Hans]

Right. If you want I may send you a copy.

That is very kind of you. PM sent.

[Bulldog]

Hair raising indeed. In these ears Richters Partitas and Goldbergs from the 1950es are stiff and mechanical (sewingmachine, you know).

I don't notice anything of that sort when I listen to the set.  Do you have large ears or small ones?

[mc ukrneal]

I don't notice anything of that sort when I listen to the set.  Do you have large ears or small ones?

Maybe he's a replicant? 

[Bulldog]

Maybe he's a replicant? 

Nope, he's one of our veteran members.

[prémont]

I don't notice anything of that sort when I listen to the set.  Do you have large ears or small ones?

Have you got ears at all??

[Bulldog]

Have you got ears at all??

Three of 'em.

[Mandryka]

I have written quite much about Walcha, among other this about his harpsichord recordings (from the thread:Bach on the harpsichord):

Helmut Walcha the harpsichordist is (was) not that different from Helmut Walcha the organist.



Stylistically Walcha was entirely his own. . . In practice his tempi are often fast. His playing is insistent rhythmically but also stiff and mechanical, including the metrical execution of ornamentation. And he never adds ornamentation, even when the music cries out for this. On the other hand his part playing is outstanding and very clear, - this may be the greatest force of his music making. He uses rather much 16´ in his registrations, and this is probably justified, as Bach had access to such instruments and was known to prefer Gravitas at least in organ-registration. Walcha built up his own system of articulation, which implies more legato, than now is considered decent. What e.g. annoys me very much, is his preference for overtied upbeats creating rhythmically odd syncopated effects. His touch is rather forceful  (the effect stressed by the close miking) as if he was playing on a mechanical tracker organ with a heavy action.

What stands out as being the hallmarks of his playing, is his ability to display the intellectual structure (the counterpoint at most) of Bach´s music by means of his extraordinary clear part playing. At the same time his insistent rhythm and forceful touch endows the music with very much intensity, often bordering a kind of extasy. So in addition to his intellectual approach, his music making also has got a strong physical effect. This reflects in my opinion the intrinsic nature of Bach´s music, and it is in this synthesis where Walcha may be considered unsurpassable, even if he - from a HIP point of view - got some of the details wrong. Personally I consider his EMI harpsichord recordings mandatory for every Bach-lover.

Listening to a couple of Partitas -- 4 and 6.

I thought that 6 was particularly successful -- but 4 left me a bit cooler. In 6 , in the Allemande and  Corrente especially, the machine like rhythms are irresistable, and he's very dramatic in the Sarabande. I just felt that in 4 the sewing machine never became quite so ecstatic. And in the Sarabande of 4 I am so used to more romantic style: maybe it's just a question of my own inflexibility, my own expectations. The Allenand was better.

It made me think:

Who else plays these partitas objectively? -- I see there's some discussion here  of Richter. I must try to hear that.

and

(OT in a way) Did Walcha play classical music in this way? I mean, Walcha's modernist style in Haydn and maybe even Mozart would be quite something.

[prémont]

Who else plays these partitas objectively? -- I see there's some discussion here  of Richter.

No one nowadays. You must go to the preauthentic "true to the score" age.
Karl Richter (Teldec) and Martin Galling (Vox) would be candidates, but none of them reaches Walcha´s intensity, and Galling is often rather dull and uninspired. Ralph Kirkpatrick (Archive) may be a candidate too, his style is individual, rather strict, but colourful.

(OT in a way) Did Walcha play classical music in this way? I mean, Walcha's modernist style in Haydn and maybe even Mozart would be quite something.

His repertoire was mainly made up of Bach and North German baroque organ music, and he did not record other than that, but he also knew by heart some more modern organ works (Rheinberger, Hindemith, Distler and Karg-Elert among others). He could even play a number of Mozart´s and a few of Beethoven´s piano sonatas. I have never seen anybody comment his Mozart or Beethoven style.

[mjwal]

I have taken much pleasure in Gould and Tureck, (less in Perahia - too pearly smooth for me) and last winter I discovered Kipnis's harpsichord versions, which I like a lot. I have the 2nd by  Kirkpatrick on LP and I like that too. Whether any of these are "objective" or not I can't say.

[Verena]

For those (still) looking for Zhu Xiao-Mei's beautiful Bach Partitas: They are available as (high-quality) mp3s from this shop:
http://www.admusicam.com/T%C3%A9l%C3%A9chargement-musique/Par-interpr%C3%A8tes/de-N-%C3%A0-Z/Zhu-XIAO-MEI/Bach-Partitas.html

[czgirb]

Both Schiff and Perahia do well in the Partitas but are easily surpassed by Craig Sheppard on Romeo Records.  Sheppard reminds me of Gould, but with much better sound and an absence of eccentricity and strong humming.

Don't be fooled into going with a "big name"; get Sheppard.  By the way, reviews for the Sheppard set were outstanding.

So ... Craig Sheppard's better ... but pity ... it's impossible to get that here.
So ... whose close behind him ... Piano and Harpsichord
Thank you.

[PaulSC]

So ... Craig Sheppard's better ... but pity ... it's impossible to get that here.
So ... whose close behind him ... Piano and Harpsichord
Thank you.

Personally I like Perahia's partitas better than Sheppard's, and Sheppard's better than Schiff's.

But my favorite piano versions of the partitas are Goode (Nonesuch) and Tipo (EMI).

[Mandryka]

I've been listening to Blandine Verlet's 1991 recording of Bach's E major partita.

The performance is unusual for its radiance. It's not that darker emotions aren't there, they are, it's that she resolves them always by a sense of rejoicing, even in the Allemande. I know someone who  said that he thought that her style doesn't suit Bach here, but for my part I can't imagine a more suitable approach for a man of faith, for a composer whose music reflects his trust in God.

More generally, the Colmar Ruckers is well recorded and it's good to have it tuned mean tone. Her style has now transcended the classicism of her Bach recordings of the 1980s and the emotional wildness of her early recordings for Philips.

I think this partita performance is a masterpiece, full of food for thought, and I'm looking forward to trying to make sense of the rest.

By the way, does anyone think these partitas are a cycle? If so, the sense of rejoicing seems a particularly Christian, Lutheran, dare I say Bachian, way to end.

Oh and a final question. Can someone  who has the Cd say whether she writes anything interesting in the booklet?

[Jo498]

There is a book on Bach by some Immanuel Tröster, an oddball and obscure private scholar who argued that the Art of the Fugue was the last and 5th part of Clavierübung and as far as I recall he also correlated the 6 partitas with certain christian feast days and theological contents.
I might not remember correctly or the theory might stem from someone else but as far as I recall the partitas were ordered through the church year with the e minor as the last one concerning "death and eternity" (The B flat is Xmas, the c minor probably the Passion, and so on, but as I said, I am not at all sure)

http://www.alain-gehring.de/

[Mandryka]

The incipit of this putative cycle is the B flat major suite, which I think has often been played quasi-gallantly by keyboardist. What I mean is it is voiced so as to avoid dissonance, and to bring out memorable melodies. I have sometimes even heard it played like simple domestic music, without grandiose and deeply meaningful gestures or symphonic colours.

Not so for Verlet in this her second recording.

I don't think anyone I know voices this music remotely like she does. The voices are staggered to create drama and the occasional dissonance. This is particularly effective in the heart of the music, the sarabande.  And memorable in the  closing gigue, which made me think of Haydn's clock - but unlike Haydn's clock Verlet's Bach never goes off the rails. Verlet's clock is . . . clockwork.

Her pacing tends to be slow, and her rhythms rather uninflected, and this give the impression of strength and weight.

It also gives the impression of po-faced constipation.

This is the least light, least graceful, least playful performance of the partita that I recall hearing.

Me no like.

[Mandryka]

The overture in Verlet's 1991 recording of the fourth partita made me think of a ballet, an elegant dance by Lully at Versilles in a play by Molliere perhaps, the voices are given such a strong character and seem to twerk around each other so cleverly.

Cleverly, and deliberately. There's a total absence of éclat. And that has an enormous structural consequence for the partita as a whole. In a traditional performance the Allemande offers a great contrast to the first movement, a moment of reflection and calm after the fireworks party. But in Verlet 1991, there is no party, and the Allemande's mood is not at all dissimilar from the overture - the mood of sophisticated constipated po-faced dance.

And so on and so forth for the other movements. Even the Sarabande.

I conclude that this is a most unsatisfactory performance of the fourth partita because it is uniform and linear.

Me no like.

[Mandryka]

When I listen to Verlet's Astree recording of the  2nd partita (826), I think of struggle, battle. Her voicing is extraordinary: the voices are so staggered there's no rapprochement between them, as if they are trapped in their own private and unreconciled worlds, left to fight it out. This Carteresque feeling is no doubt augmented by the tuning, which produces some interesting dissonances when the voices clash.

The result is humane, about human life, with its trials and challenges and discords, its agony and its passion. More humane than spiritual.

Also her way of playing never lets me forget the physicality of the music making: I'm aware of the performer as someone in an intense toil with both instrument and music, like Jacob with the angel. This sort of musical laboured-ness is a good thing. It's the labour of expression.

I think this a great and imaginative performance of a great and imaginative piece of music, one of the major high points of the set.

[Kontrapunctus]

I just heard Konstantin Lifschitz play all 6 in one concert--a marathon for both him and the audience! Anyway, if and when he records them, they will be a must-have unless you are a HIP purist. He made full use of a modern grand's dynamic and tonal resources, and his astounding technique allows him to bring out the voices very clearly regardless of how fast he plays.

Until he records them, I enjoy Igor Levit's and Vladimir Festsman's recordings.