TWELFTH BIENNIAL INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON BAROQUE MUSIC |
Warsaw, 26th-30th July 2006
What’s Wrong with this Picture? Confronting the Obvious in the Bach Cello Suites
When first published in 1826, the Bach cello suites were largely regarded as unplayable. Later virtuosos saw them as vehicles of self-expression. Current interest in historical performance has resulted in at least ten recent editions based on eighteenth-century manuscript copies. Lacking a source in the hand of the composer, many questions remain unanswered.
Unlike the sonatas and partitas for solo violin, the suites are widely dissimilar technically and stylistically. Bowings and articulations are inconsistent, awkward, and contrary to Baroque practice. Left-hand problems for the cellist, including large stretches and unplayable chords, demand the use of thumb position or other unhistorical solutions. For the most part, these and other ‘errors’ are found in all four extant sources. The hypothesis that Bach wrote for an arm-held instrument (Kuyken) accounts for only some of the anomalies. Accepting the Anna-Magdalena ms at face-value (Schemer/Woodfull-Harris, Grier, Bylsma) is equally unsatisfactory, particularly in light of the careful indications of the violin solo works.
Bach’s self-identity as a “learned musician” (Wolff) may provide answers. I argue that Bach did not intend the suites for performance and therefore left unidiomatic passages and ambiguities uncorrected. Like the Art of Fugue and Musical Offering, they were written to demonstrate Bach’s virtuosity as a composer and were circulated by his students (keyboardists and composers) primarily for study purposes. Once we confront the obvious deficiencies in the cello suites and accept them once again as abstract compositions, new insights into performance may guide modern interpreters of these contrapuntal masterpieces.
Last updated on 27 March 2006