Bach Violin Concertos

There is no shortage of good Bach violin concerto recordings, nor even of those played by historical-performance groups, yet this one has several distinct attractions. First, is simply the presence of violinist Kati Debretzeni, long a violin section leader of Gardiner's English Baroque Soloists but rarely heard as a soloist in her own right. She's one of the few historical-performance specialists to have emerged from Eastern Europe, and she deserves wider exposure.

Bach's three well-known Violin Concertos are paired here with a splendid concerto for three violins, reconstructed from the surviving version for three harpsichords, BWV 1064. The composer's fascination with the Italian solo concerto, which resulted in numerous arrangements and compositions, dates to his second Weimar period from 1708 to 1717. However, current research has revealed that Bach wrote the violin concertos around 1720, during his engagement as Kapellmeister in Cöthen. On this recording, soloists Petra Mullejans, Gottfried von der Goltz, and Anne Katharina Schreiber are backed by the matchless Freiburger Barockorchester in dazzling readings of these evergreen favorites.

After the double album of the violin and harpsichord sonatas with Kristian Bezuidenhout, a bestseller in 2018, here is the next instalment in the Bach recording adventure that began nine years ago with a set of the sonatas and partitas now regarded as a benchmark. Isabelle Faust and Bernhard Forck and his partners at the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin have explored patiently a multitude of other works by Bach: harpsichord concertos, trio sonatas for organ, instrumental movements from sacred cantatas… All are revealed here as direct or indirect relatives of the three monumental concertos BWV 1041-43.

Shunske Sato, one of the world’s most distinctive Baroque violinists, joins Il Pomo d’Oro – an ensemble as imaginative as he is – for Bach.

This release of Bach's well-explored violin concertos (plus a couple of arranged keyboard concertos) by Italian violinist Giuliano Carmignola delivers truth in advertising on its back cover: the violinist, playing a 1739 Guidantus and leading the historical-instrument ensemble Concerto Köln, "seems to cast fresh light on these much-loved masterpieces by imbuing them with all the joyfulness of his Venetian sound."

Akiko Suwanai (born in 1972) is one of the brightest violinists to have emerged in the late 20th century, winning the Tchaikovsky International Competition, the youngest person to do so, in 1990. She has gone on to an impressive concert and recording career that encompasses both traditional repertoire and world premieres. Her 2006 album J.S. Bach: Violin Concertos was an instant success. Her performance is impressive: incisive, nuanced, and idiomatic. Her tone has an appealing warmth, but she remains true to the character of the music and doesn't lapse into Romantic tone quality or interpretations.