15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Best Bach interpretation, May 15, 2002
By A Customer
This is the best recording of the Lute Suites hands down. Stephan Schmidt play a ten string instrument with tremendous sound that simply must be heard to be believed. They are played in the original key. He plays these pieces with amazing passion and feeling yet still preserves the beautiful structure and clarity of these pieces. Check out the marvelous preludes to BWV 995 and BWV 1006. The vitality of the pieces is stunning; they really spring to life. No one has recorded these better.
I have listened to nearly all of the Lute Suite recordings by various artists: John Williams is clean, but a little too dry/stale; Segovia is simply way off mark with inarticulate and romantic phrasing(AVOID); Sharon Isbin has some good stuff but the way she plays the 1006 prelude is lacking in joy and passion; Paul Galbraith has awesome technique that yields some great interpretations but the sound engineering is less than his violin sonatas/partitas disc--(nonetheless EXCELLENT though). Eduardo Fernandez also has some good stuff but his guitar (Paul Fischer?) is so dry that it is irritating. Kevin Gallagher has recorded the best Prelude, Fugue, & Allegro interpretation (BWV998) but has not recorded the other Suites, unfortunately.
This is by far the best recording of these pieces. I only wish I knew who made his guitar. Everything on this recording sounds so beautiful. Stephan Schmidt is an artist of the highest caliber. Very impressive indeed.
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13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A step back into the reality of yesteryear, April 12, 2003
This review is from: Bach: Complete Lute Works arr. 10-string guitar (Audio CD)
The guitar as we know it today featured 10 strings, not the 6 or 12 we are accustomed to. It was an evolving instrument ranging from a few strings to many, and in Bach's time, the standard was 10. Since then, artists have rewritten and arranged the Lute Suite to accomodate their version of the guitar, with its non-ten strings. While the results were delightful and lovely in their own way, the public has been prevented from hearing these wonderful works in their own "language".
Stephan Schmidt took it upon himself to study and learn how to produce these historical works in their original form, with the 10 string guitar, and the results are - to use an overworked phrase - AWESOME. I feel like I'm sitting in an ancient palace or theatre, the smell of candle wax and dust in the air and the feel of marble or wood planks beneath my feet. The rustle of women's long gowns and the slight clearing of men's throats seems might even be heard in the distant background. The music is haunting and transforming.
For anyone who is a history buff, classical or guitar music lover, or just someone who wants to sit back and relax for the several hours of these two discs....buy this set now. You will not be sorry. Living in a time when people have the ability to create clones, which might lead to restoring dinosaurs and other extinct creatures into the world through science, Mr. Schmidt has left science behind and recreated a lost world by going back through history the old fashioned way. Thank you, Mr. Schmidt, for restoring the history to us.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
My favorite recording of Bach's lute works, April 21, 2005
This review is from: Bach: Complete Lute Works arr. 10-string guitar (Audio CD)
I have a number of recordings of Bach transcriptions for classical guitar, but this is one of my favorite. Schmidt is an unusually nuanced player whose interpretations demand the listener's full attention to really appreciate. I highly recommend this recording to anyone who likes to listen to various interpretations of the same work by different artists because I think Schmidt has a unique level of detail to offer. Because of Schmidt's limited recordings, I will also recommend Tilman Hoppstock's Bach interpretations in addition to Schmidt.
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