Bach, J S: Cello Suite No. 5 in C minor, BWV1011

Jan Vogler is an internationally-known cellist and Echo prize-winner.

He is the General Director of the Dresden Musikfestspiele and founder and Artistic Director of the Moritzburg Chamber Music Festival.

His career has featured him with renowned conductors like Lorin Maazel, Fabio Luisi and internationally acclaimed orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic, the Chicago, Symphony Orchestra, the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra and the Vienna Symphony.

The Suites for Cello are among the most popular works by J.S. Bach and represent a challenge for every cellist.

For the first time in his career Jan Vogler has performed the Suites for Solo Cello over two evenings at the MDR Music Summer in 2012. After his brilliant performances he decided to record all 6 Cello Suites.

Bach’s writing in these suites is as varied and inventive as ever. Melodious, boisterous, amazingly delicate, expansively lyrical, then cleverly busy with detail in complicated figuration… I see my intention in arranging for a plucked instrument as a challenge to approach ‘what Bach himself might have done’ in adapting a piece from one medium to another. No one can ever know for sure, of course, but familiarity with his chamber music and keyboard works gives clues. Where the cello writing is melodious with occasional chords (places in the Allemandes and Sarabandes), the plucked instrument can provide a fuller accompaniment.”

Celebrating his 50th birthday, this recording of Bach’s Complete Cello Suites is Pieter Wispelwey’s third recording of the repertoire, but probably his most controversial!

Based on extensive research by Laurence Dreyfus and John Butt (from the Dunedin Consort), Pieter tuned his strings down to a pitch of 392 for this recording, and the resulting sound is a very rich, sonorous experience. His cello also has gut strings for this recording and is played with a short bow.

The suites are set out on disc in a chronological order, so you can listen for yourself to see if you can hear the difference in pitch and whether you prefer this recording over his others!

Beautifully packaged in a slim box set, the recording contains a double disc of the Bach Suites and also a bonus DVD where Pieter talks about the recording. Priced as a mid price double, this recording will be a must have for all fans of Bach.

Experience, virtuosity and individuality are all required when tackling J.S. Bach’s popular cello suites; Richard Tunnicliffe brings a lifetime of insight to his debut solo recording.

Richard has made a special study of Bach's cello suites and his performances of all six have been acclaimed in Europe and Australia as well as at numerous venues in Great Britain, including Wigmore Hall and the Purcell Room in London.

Richard’s recording of the complete cello concerti by John Garth with the Avison Ensemble was chosen as ‘Critic’s Choice’ by Gramophone, ‘Concerto Recording of the Month’ by The Strad and twice as ‘CD of the Week’ by Classic FM.

Richard Tunnicliffe’s broad experience and versatility mark him out amongst the best of today's impressive array of instrumentalists.

Richard has enjoyed a long and varied career at the forefront of Britain’s thriving period instrument movement and is a member of the renowned viol consort Fretwork and principal cello with the Avison Ensemble.

Richard has played with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Boston Symphony, Frankfurt Radio S.O., City of Birmingham S.O., English National Opera, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the London Mozart Players, The Gabrieli Consort and the Academy of Ancient Music.

Gérard Caussé, one of the world’s great viola players, takes on the epic musical challenge of the six suites that Bach composed for cello. Joining Caussé is another distinguished French artist, the actor Laurent Terzieff, who died in 2010. Between each suite, Terzieff reads poems by the poet Rainer-Maria Rilke, Bohemian-born, but deeply influenced by French culture.

The distinguished French viola player Gérard Caussé has made a number of appearances in the Virgin Classics catalogue, notably as a colleague to Renaud and Gautier Capuçon in music by Brahms and Schubert. Here, he is the sole musician, playing Bach’s Six Cello Suites, works of inexhaustible fascination and depth, in a version for viola. “Playing them on the viola is an almost unprecedented adventure,” he says. “My instrument, a 1560 Gaspard Da Salo, my musical companion for life, is resonating in these Bach suites for the first time.”

Caussé is, however, joined by another performer on this 2-CD set. He is the French actor and director, Laurent Terzieff, reading poems (in French) by Rainer-Maria Rilke, the Bohemian-Austrian poet (1875 –1926), who spent a highly formative period in Paris, especially notable for his contact with the sculptor Auguste Rodin.

Over the years, the Bach Suites have become a monument of the cello repertoire, to which all cellists return regularly. Some of the greatest did not record these works until they reached their years of maturity (Casals was over 60, Rostropovich was 63), while others have not hesitated to present several versions (Yo-Yo Ma, 1990, 1998; Janos Starker, 1957, 1963, 1983). Ophélie Gaillard’s first recording of the Suites, released on Ambrosie in 2000, was highly acclaimed internationally by the critics and her performance earned her a French Classical Music Award (Victoire) as a "Revelation" in the Solo Instrumentalist category. Ten years later, at the request of Nicolas Bartholomée, artistic director of Aparte and indeed Ambroisie, she agreed to record a new version on a cello made in 1737 by Matteo Goffriller, a contemporary of J. S. Bach. Ophélie Gaillard had already given us a reference performance of these pieces. Now we discover a prodigiously renewed vision of this masterpiece.

Today, Bach’s suites form part of the repertoire of every distinguished cellist, and many of them have recorded the complete cycle.

Yet when sixty years ago the twenty-four-year-old Mstislav Rostropovich (1927–2007) first performed all the suites in public, it was a trailblazing act, linking up to the previous endeavour of Pablo Casals. When this live recording was made in 1955 at the Prague Spring festival, Rostropovich was 28 years of age.

He astounded the audience with his youthful verve and surprising artistic maturity. At the festival Rostropovich met his lifelong love, Galina Vishnevskaya, whom upon returning to Moscow he married after several days of acquaintance.

When in 1991 the cellist made a complete recording of the Bach suites in France, he was 64. Hence, all the more precious is this live recording from the Czech Radio archives, which waited more than half a century for its release. As a lover and connoisseur of wine, Rostropovich would certainly agree that some wines – and some recordings too – acquire a richer taste and a higher value over time. A sensational, newly discovered 1955 Rostropovich recording of the Bach suites.

The young violist Maxim Rysanov makes his debut on BIS with three of Bach’s suites transcribed for viola by Simon Rowland-Jones.

Recognised as one of the world’s finest and most charismatic viola players, Maxim Rysanov performs worldwide as a concerto soloist and chamber musician. Rysanov is a past recipient of both the Classic FM Gramophone Young Artist of the Year and the BBC New Generation awards and is a prizewinner of the Geneva International Music Competition and Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition among others. Originally from the Ukraine, he studied with Maria Sitkovskaya in Moscow and with John Glickman in London, his adopted home town.