Classical music composer Johann Sebastian Bach - Classical music Cello Suite no. 6 in D Major BWV 101

Johann Sebastian Bach

(1685-1750)

Johann Sebastian Bach  (31 March 1685 [O.S. 21 March] – 28 July 1750) (often referred to simply as Bach) was a German composer, organist, violist, and violinist whose ecclesiastical and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity. Although he did not introduce new forms, he enriched the prevailing German style with a robust contrapuntal  technique, an unrivalled control of harmonic and motivic organisation, and the adaptation of rhythms, forms and textures from abroad, particularly from Italy and France.

Revered for their intellectual depth, technical command and artistic beauty, Bach's works include the Brandenburg concertos, the Goldberg Variations, the Partitas, the Well-Tempered Clavier, the Mass in B Minor, the St. Matthew Passion, the St. John Passion, the Magnificat, The Musical Offering, The Art of Fugue, the English and French Suites, the Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin, the Cello Suites, more than 200 surviving cantatas, and a similar number of organ works, including the celebrated Toccata and Fugue in D minor and Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor.

Bach's abilities as an organist were highly respected throughout Europe during his lifetime, although he was not widely recognised as a great composer until a revival of interest and performances of his music in the first half of the 19th century. He is now regarded as the supreme composer of the Baroque, and as one of the greatest of all time.

Baroque Classical Music

Cello Suites (Bach)

The Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello by Johann Sebastian Bach are acclaimed as some of the greatest works ever written for solo cello. They were most likely composed during the period 1717–1723, when Bach served as a Kapellmeister in Cöthen.

The suites contain a great variety of technical devices, a wide emotional range, and some of Bach's most compelling voice interactions and conversations. It is their intimacy, however, that has made the suites amongst Bach's most popular works today, resulting in their different recorded interpretations being fiercely defended by their respective advocates.

Recent research has suggested that the suites were not written for the familiar cello played between the legs (da gamba) but played rather like a violin, on the shoulder (da spalla). Sigiswald Kuijken and Ryo Terakado have both recorded the complete suites on this instrument, known today as a violoncello da spalla; reproductions of the instrument have been made by luthier Dmitry Badiarov. Variations in the terminology used to refer to musical instruments during this period have led to modern confusion, and the discussion continues regarding the instrument "that Bach intended."

The suites have been transcribed for numerous instruments, including the violin, viola, double bass, viola da gamba, mandolin, piano, marimba, classical guitar, recorder, french horn, saxophone, bass clarinet, bassoon, trumpet, trombone, euphonium, and tuba.

History

An exact chronology of the suites (regarding both the order in which the suites were composed and whether they were composed before or after the solo violin sonatas) cannot be completely established. However, scholars generally believe that—based on a comparative analysis of the styles of the sets of works—the cello suites arose first, effectively dating the suites pre-1720, the year on the title page of Bach's autograph of the violin sonatas.

The suites were not widely known before the 1900s, and for a long time it was generally thought that the pieces were intended to be études. However, after discovering Grützmacher's edition in a thrift shop in Barcelona, Spain at age 13, Pau Casals began studying them. Although he would later perform the works publicly, it was not until 1925, when he was 48, that he agreed to record the pieces, becoming the first to record all six suites. Their popularity soared soon after, and Casals' original recording is still widely available today.

Attempts to compose piano accompaniments to the suites include a notable effort by Robert Schumann. In 1923, Leopold Godowsky realised suites 2, 3 and 5 in full counterpoint for solo piano.

Unlike Bach's violin sonatas, no autographed manuscript survives, thus ruling out the use of an urtext performing edition. However, analysis of secondary sources—including a hand-written copy by Bach's second wife, Anna Magdalena—have produced presumable authentic editions, although critically deficient in the placement of slurs and other articulation. As a result, many interpretations of the suites exist, with no sole accepted version.

Recent speculation by Professor Martin Jarvis of Charles Darwin University School of Music, in Darwin, Australia, holds that Anna Magdalena may have been the composer of several musical pieces attributed to her husband.  Jarvis proposes that Magdalena wrote the six Cello Suites, and was involved with the composition of the aria from the Goldberg Variations (BWV 988). Musicologists and performers, however, pointing to thin evidence of this proposition, remain skeptical of the claim.