JS BACH Complete Works for Keyboard, Vol 8: Köthen, 1717-1723 (Benjamin Alard)

Record and Artist Details

Genre:

Instrumental

Label: Harmonia Mundi

Media Format: CD or Download

Media Runtime: 203

Mastering:

DDD

Catalogue Number: HMM90 2469-71

HMM90 2469-71. JS BACH Complete Works for Keyboard, Vol 8: Köthen, 1717-1723 (Benjamin Alard)

Tracks:

Composition Artist Credit
Sonata Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
(3) Sonatas and 3 Partitas, Movement: Partita No. 2 in D minor, BWV1004 Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
Preludes and Fugues, Movement: Prelude and Fugue in D minor, BWV539 Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
Adagio Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
Pedal-Exercitium Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
Fantasia and Fugue Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
(15) 2-Part Inventions Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
(15) 3-Part Inventions ,'Sinfonias' Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Clavichord
(L') Art de toucher le clavecin, Movement: Prelude No. 2 in D minor François Couperin, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Harpsichord
(6) French Suites Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Harpsichord
(L') Art de toucher le clavecin, Movement: Prelude No. 3 in G minor François Couperin, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Harpsichord
(L') Art de toucher le clavecin, Movement: Prelude No. 6 in B minor François Couperin, Composer
Benjamin Alard, Harpsichord

Benjamin Alard has arrived at the eighth volume of a projected 18 of all Bach’s keyboard works. As he explains in the booklet note, this instalment assembles ‘works connected with Bach’s inner circle and his moments of solitude and sadness following the death of his first wife, Maria Barbara (1684-1720)’. Alard plays two instruments. The first is a 2018 clavichord by Émile Jobin after a 1773 Friederici, equipped with a modern pedalboard. The second is an antique harpsichord by Couchet (c1645) restored by Blanchet (c1720) from the collection of the Musée Instrumental de Provins. We know very little about Maria Barbara, the mother of Bach’s first seven children. We do know, however, that in the summer of 1720 when Bach left with his patron, Prince Leopold of Cöthen, for a journey of two months, his wife was in good health. Bach only learnt of her illness and death when he returned to Cöthen.

The probity of Alard’s interpretations is bolstered by the intelligence of his programming. Bach completed his cycle of solo violin works in 1720 and often demonstrated them on the keyboard, his preferred instrument. The D minor Sonata, BWV964, based on the A minor Solo Violin Sonata, is a case in point. An arrangement of the famous D minor Chaconne is also included. Rather than two discrete sets of 15, Alard presents the Inventions and Sinfonias together, C major two-part Invention followed by C major three-part Sinfonia, and so on. And given Bach’s admiration for Couperin and their purported correspondence, Alard prefaces each of the six French Suites with a Prelude from L’art de toucher le clavecin.

Alard’s approach is cantabile above all. This is not to say that kinaesthesia is lacking; dance movements are lively and evocative. These affects are achieved of course by varieties of attack and release, an extraordinary range of which Alard has at his command. There is also a centredness to his interpretations, so that while listening to them it is difficult to imagine alternative approaches. It’s the sort of music-making that, its intellectual grasp notwithstanding, clearly emanates from the heart.

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