Goldberg

Among the great cycles of keyboard works by Johann Sebastian Bach, the Goldberg Variations are undoubtedly those which most immediately bring us into the richness of his universe. An unequaled science of counterpoint (what a tour de force are these canons which punctuate the work!), a breathtaking virtuosity using the two keyboards of the harpsichord like never before, a journey which takes us from the desperate depths of the human soul to its transcendent heights, this is what this recording invites you to experience. All this made eminently accessible by the disarming beauty of an initial Aria which we find, transformed by the path of thirty variations, at the end of this cycle - one of the summits in the history of music.

For her second Warner Classics release, young Italian pianist Beatrice Rana turns to a pinnacle of the solo keyboard repertoire and a composer she has described as "my first love": Johann Sebastian Bach. Her interpretation of his epic Goldberg Variations bears out Le Monde's judgement that "Beatrice Rana certainly has nothing left to prove when it comes to technique, but what makes an impression are her calm maturity and her sense of architecture," and Gramophone's that she is "a fully developed artist of a stature that belies her tender years." Bach was the composer who most obsessed Beatrice Rana as a child, and in a recent interview with Pianist magazine, she confessed that it would be his music, and above all the Goldberg Variations, that she would choose if she had to devote her life to a single composer.

The Goldberg Variations, BWV 988, is a musical composition for keyboard by Johann Sebastian Bach, consisting of an aria and a set of 30 variations. First published in 1741, it is named after Johann Gottlieb Goldberg, who may also have been the first performer of the work.

In the realm of music criticism and scholarship, Bach’s music is often hailed as the epitome of functional musical logic. Every note has its place, every chord has its function, and all musical elements are combined in a masterful display of contrapuntal craft with few recognised rivals. But despite the intellectual reverence to which Bach’s music is subjected, musicians are still able to find themselves intimately and affectively involved with his compositions.