Johann Sebastian Bach Brandenburg

Johann Sebastian Bach ~ Best of Bach (12CD Set) (2006)
Classical | Easy CD-DA / Flac & Cue, No Log | Covers included | 5 % recovery | 4,5 GB | RS.com
Audio CD: November 6, 2006 | Label: Warner Classics

Warner Classics presents Best of Bach, a spirited selection of works by Bach, both choral and instrumental, performed by some of Warner Classics's most highly acclaimed artists…

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Many fine recordings over the years have taught me that they know Bach in Leipzig, so I expected a lot from this recording, and wasn’t disappointed. These are possibly the best, or at least equal to the best, performances of these frequently performed works I’ve ever heard. They are very fast, but there is no sense of the music being rushed; it simply erupts at this tempo as if it couldn’t help itself, as if this were the only way it could possibly be played. Having just finished reading and reviewing a book on the origins of our ideas of original performance practice, this recording is a perfect example of what it was all about, Bach’s music pretty much the way he played it and heard it himself.

Johann Sebastian Bach and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin go back a long way together. This recording, made with the welcome participation of Isabelle Faust and Antoine Tamestit, follows the complete violin concertos (2019), which left a lasting impression. Ever since a memorable first recording in the late 1990s, the Berlin musicians have returned regularly to the inexhaustible source of the Brandenburgs. They have achieved a sovereign mastery of what is not a single work, but six. In their hands, they become successive episodes of a piece of musical theater in love with dance, transparent sound and freedom.

Johann Sebastian Bach is one of the most prolific composers in the history of music – also literally, with his twenty children, but mainly in terms of his exceptional output. In spite of this, those of his works which appeared in print during his lifetime are less numerous than the proverbial tip of the iceberg. This does not imply that his music did not circulate: indeed, at his time, the favourite means of dissemination of musical works was through manuscript copies. Printing was reserved for works which were considered as particularly meaningful, and which represented the composer at his or her best; for works which had, therefore, also a “promotional” dimension, and which could foster the composer’s career by obtaining him or her fame, reputation, and possibly also a prestigious post.

Johann Sebastian Bach - 6 Brandenburg Concertos - Jean-Francois Paillard (1974) {Erato-Warner Classics 0825646138654 rel 2015}
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© 1974, 2015 Erato / Warner Classics | 0825646138654
Classical / Baroque / Concerto

Released in 1974, this 2-LP set devoted to the 6 Brandenburg Concertos supplanted the old Erato reference by Kurt Redel – the stereophonic version of 1962. It remains precious testimony to the art of Jean-François Paillard, a musician who assuredly deserves to be re-evaluated, like Louis Auriacombe, who had, with the Toulouse Chamber Orchestra, made magnificent recordings devoted to 18th-century music for Le Club Français du Disque. With their intimate chamber tone, these Bach recordings celebrated the 20th anniversary of Erato (founded in 1953) and also remain an example of the achievement of a performing aesthetic that has now become marginal.

Brilliant Classics embarked on a daring project in the year 2000, the year of the 250th anniversary of Johann Sebastian Bach's death: this budget label decided to release a complete set of Bach's works. They were not the only label to do so - Teldec and Haenssler both did as well - but the Brilliant Classics set stands out for several reasons. First, they attempted (though did not fully succeed) to create a complete set entirely recorded on period instruments, using historically informed performances.