What are you listening to right now?

This evening I listened again to Bach's supreme late masterpiece, The Art of Fugue, and used the opportunity to remind myself of the masterly playing of Charles Rosen, who died yesterday.  A fitting memento to a great musician.

Chris

I suppose you're right Bazza, all too often anyway. Oddly though, I was listening only last week to Arabella with Lisa della Casa, and the Britten War Requiem with Vishnevskaya. Uncanny!  I'd better not mention who else I've been listening to in case it has unfortunate consequences!

Chris

I promise I wasn't listening to anything from Ravi Shankar last week.  It's not my fault!

Chris

Hi Kev!

Well, The Art of Fugue is something of an obsession for me. I have (too) many recordings of it!  The Rosen one you mention is certainly one of my favourites.

The problem of which instrument stems from the fact that Bach wrote out the work (and had it prepared for printing) in 'open' score', i.e one voice to a line. This led scholars to argue that there was no particular performance medium intended.  But the majority current view is that it is a keyboard work, mainly based on the simple observation that it is possible for a single keyboard player to perform the work. Most of the recordings I have are played on keyboard; harpsichord (Leonhardt, Moroney, Koopman), piano (Rosen, Aimard) or organ (Walcha). Leonhardt recording is masterly, but weakened for me by his omission of the final unfinished fugue.

It also sounds very well with a string quartet, though in this case the second voice sometimes goes too low for second violin, and the third too low for viola. Two recordings I have (Emerson, Keller) get over this by using alternative instruments where needed.  There is also a version by the Delme, using Robert Simpson's edition. He solves the instrument problem simply by transposing the whole work up from D minor to G minor.  I hate this upward transposition though many others are not bothered by it. It has to be in D minor for me! (You may have seen some discussion on another thread - people have strong views on this). Simpson's version also omits the canons. Of the string quartet versions I now find the Emersons a little too 'glib' and prefer the Keller (on ECM). The string versions offer some advantage in hearing the harmony, because long sustained notes cannot be sustained on the harpsichord, and not very easily on the piano. Of course the organ can do this too, but I've never felt the organ to be quite right for many of the fugues.

There are also versions with 'mixed' ensembles but I don't find these so satisfactory. We can discuss them further if you want!

There is also the question of the order in which the fugues should be played and almost every performer makes a different decision here.  Again I think Rosen has it right, going from the simplest to the most complex, with the canons as an appendix.

Is that enough to be going on with. As you see starting me off on The Art of Fugue is dangerous!

Chris

A good reference is Nicholas Kenyon's Faber Pocket Guide to Bach. Superbly written and unbelievably detailed considering it covers just about every work Bach wrote.

1st Symphony and Missa Syllabica amongst others...2cd.The Part 1st Symphony is Magnifico!

Bach Cantata BWV140 Nikolaus Harnoncourt.  Words fail me.