Hardly had I penned my regrets (September 1987, page 427) at the disappearance of a recording of Wieland Kuijken and Gustav Leonhardt playing these sonatas than it landed on my doormat in its CD metamorphosis. And that, I may say, is a considerable improvement on the older Deutsche Harmonia Mundi LP mastering which though excellent in sound-quality, had a serious tape fault in the G minor Sonata. As I implied in my review of the fine new performances of these works by Laurence Dreyfus and Ketil Haugsand on Simax, their only other serious rivals were Leonhardt and Kuijken. Hearing them again now, I find nothing at all to change my opinion. Kuijken draws a marginally less plaintive sound from his instrument than Dreyfus who also just has the edge over Kuijken in technical finesse; but Kuijken is a poet, sometimes passionate, sometimes tender in his expression and these are feelings which we know Leonhardt, too is supremely well able to convey. It is these qualities, above all which place them comfortably alongside Dreyfus and Haugsand.
In third place come Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Herbert Tachezi. I have never seen Harnoncourt play the bass viol but to me this sounds like a cellist's account of the music which makes me wonder how he holds his bow. His is the least gamba-like sound of the three I've mentioned so far, though even so there are some beautiful things to be found here. Slow movements fare best with Harnoncourt since often in the allegros detail in dense passages is a little sketchy. Tachezi is a fine partner and his playing impressed me throughout. I feel that both artists are inclined to hurry the sublime Adagio of the G minor Sonata and here both Kuijken and Dreyfus give wonderfully poised, lyrical accounts.
Very much in the rearguard are Siegfried Pank and Isolde Ahlgrimm, whose performances I reviewed as part of a survey of the 1985 Bach Edition from Capriccio. These are, to my ears, harsh and seemingly unsympathetic readings which seldom attain either the musical or technical level of the other three. The choice, therefore, is fairly clear cut. Anyone who loves these sonatas will, I think, eventually want to have both the Kuijken/Leonhardt and the Dreyfus/Haugsand versions, but Harnoncourt and Tachezi are worthy contenders and may be appealing for extra-territorial reasons, since their CD at mid price is not only considerably less expensive than the others but also contains an excellent performance of the probably earlier version for two flutes and continuo (BWV1039) of the Sonata in G major BWV1027 for harpsichord and viola da gamba. The flautists here are Frans Bruggen and Leopold Stastny.'