Bach Partitas and Sonata for Solo Violin, Vol 1
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Johann Sebastian Bach
Label: Channel Classics
Magazine Review Date: 7/1999
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 76
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: CCS12198
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
(3) Sonatas and 3 Partitas, Movement: Sonata No. 1 in G minor, BWV1001 |
Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer Rachel Podger, Violin |
(3) Sonatas and 3 Partitas, Movement: Partita No. 1 in B minor, BWV1002 |
Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer Rachel Podger, Violin |
(3) Sonatas and 3 Partitas, Movement: Partita No. 2 in D minor, BWV1004 |
Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer
Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer Rachel Podger, Violin |
Author: Lionel Salter
Hitherto we have heard Rachel Podger only in early chamber works and as Andrew Manze’s partner in Bach double concertos (Harmonia Mundi, 4/97): here now, at last, is an opportunity to hear her on her own. And you couldn’t be more on your own than in Bach’s mercilessly revealing Solo Sonatas and Partitas, perhaps the ultimate test of technical mastery, expressiveness, structural phrasing and deep musical perception for a violinist. Playing a baroque instrument, Podger challenges comparison with the much praised and individual reading by Monica Huggett: she has many of the same virtues – flawless intonation, warm tone, expressive nuances, clear understanding of the proper balance of internal strands – but her approach is sometimes markedly different. This is most obvious in the great D minor Chaconne, in which Huggett’s rhythmical flexibility worried some people, but in which Podger, here as elsewhere, while fully characterizing the varied repetitions of the ground, is intent on building up the cumulative effect. One pleasing general feature of her playing, indeed, is her firm but unassertive rhythmic sense; others are the absence of any suspicion that technical difficulties exist (instead a calm control, as in the G minor’s Siciliano), her subtle phrasing (as in the B minor Corrente, with the fleetest of doubles), the cross-rhythms of her G minor Presto and, most strikingly, the sheer poetic feeling with which she imbues the initial Adagio of the G minor Sonata. She touches in chords lightly: occasionally it crossed my mind that some might have been split downwards rather than upwards so as to preserve the continuity of a lower part (for example, in bar 5 of the B minor Allemande, bar 10 of the Chaconne and in the 18th and 19th bars of its major section), but these are personal views. Her D minor Giga is stunning. Altogether a most impressive and rewarding disc.'
Discover the world's largest classical music catalogue with Presto Music.
Gramophone Digital Club
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Full website access
From £8.75 / month
SubscribeGramophone Full Club
- Print Edition
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Full website access
From £11.00 / month
Subscribe
If you are a library, university or other organisation that would be interested in an institutional subscription to Gramophone please click here for further information.