Bach: Goldberg Variations: Handel: Suite No. 2, HWV 427

George Frideric Handel Johann Sebastian Bach (Composer), Garrick Ohlsson (piano) (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Garrick Ohlsson (piano)
• Composer: George Frideric Handel Johann Sebastian Bach
• Audio CD (May 1, 2006)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Bridge Records, Inc.
• ASIN: B000FC2HYK
• Also Available in: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #274,554 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Bridge Records is proud to announce the signing of Garrick Ohlsson for a series of recordings to be released in 2006. Bridge's first Ohlsson recording is J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations, coupled with Handel's Suite No. 2 in F major. Bach’s Goldberg Variations, BWV 988, is widely regarded as the most ambitious and monumental harpsichord composition of the baroque. In this brilliant reading Garrick Ohlsson performs the work without repeats, giving us the genius of Bach’s invention with unflagging momentum without slighting the poignantly introspective side of Bach's singular masterpiece. Garrick Ohlsson is regarded as one of the great virtuosi currently performing on the international concert circuit. With an active repertoire of more than 80 concertos and a heavy schedule of solo and chamber recitals, Mr. Ohlsson's brilliant music making has graced the world's major concert halls ever since winning the 1970 Chopin International Piano Competition. Bridge Records will be releasing Volumes 1 and 2 of Ohlsson's Beethoven Sonata cycle to coincide with the pianist's Complete Beethoven Sonata cycles at the Tanglewood and Ravinia Festivals this summer. Volume 3 of Garrick Ohlsson’s Beethoven cycle will be released in September. Garrick Ohlsson can also be heard playing the music of Charles Wuorinen on BRIDGE 9008

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This Joins Those Goldberg Recordings to Play Again and Again, August 28, 2006

By 

J Scott Morrison (Middlebury VT, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Bach: Goldberg Variations: Handel: Suite No. 2, HWV 427 (Audio CD)

This is the first Bach Garrick Ohlsson has ever recorded as far as I know. He's certainly not known for playing Bach in recital, although he did, a few years ago, have a program series that coupled the music of Liszt with other composers and I recall reading that in one of the recitals he played Liszt in the first half and the Goldbergs in the second. His way with the Goldbergs reminds me very much of that of Murray Perahia, with all the elegance and subtlety that implies, but with a greater sense of drama.

Except, and it's a big exception, he does not play any of the repeats. I gather he made this decision in order to give the set greater momentum, but I have to admit that it took me several gasps before I overcame my resistance -- I dug in my heels initially -- to this way of the doing the Goldbergs. The playing, though, won me over. He is just as good in the slower, pensive variations, e.g. No. 25, as he is in the more obviously virtuosic ones, e.g. Nos. 23 and 26. No. 26 is played as fast as I've ever heard it -- it goes like the wind -- and it's extraordinarily clear, leggiero and exciting. This is a very fine Goldbergs.

The short timing of the Goldbergs (46:20) is supplemented by one of the finest performances of Handel's Second Suite in F Major, HWV 427 I've heard since Perahia recorded it, along with all the other suites, a few years ago.

Ohlsson made his mark initially as a Chopinist -- you will recall that he won the Chopin Competition in Warsaw in 1970 (could it really have been that long ago?) -- and has made his reputation playing High Romantic music primarily, although he does have a very broad repertoire withal. Still, I would never have thought of him as a Bach/Handel player, yet here he proves he can hold his own and without romanticizing the music.

This CD is a treasure.

Scott Morrison

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ohlsson, at home with Bach, Chopin or Prokofiev!, January 7, 2009

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Piano lover Bob (Houston, TX USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bach: Goldberg Variations: Handel: Suite No. 2, HWV 427 (Audio CD)

Ohlsson is amazing! We have all heard how poetic, romantic, or grand he can play Chopin, Beethoven, Scriabin or Rachmaninoff, but once again he amazes me with the Goldberg Variations! Bach has composed music that at times conveys an almost spiritual serenity, and Ohlsson acheives that beautiful, calm feeling. In the faster, fleeting cross-handed variations his technique astounds you with its clarity and profound control. I think Ohlsson is at the peak of his enormous gifts.
In hopes that his agent of someone close to him reads this(not likely!!), I have wished for many years that he would record the Bartok 2nd Piano Concerto and the Prokofiev 2nd Piano concerto - I have heard him perform both of these monumental works, and he was overwhelming in both works.
Back to the Bach, all I can say is buy this CD, its wonderful!

5.0 out of 5 stars Bach to basics, August 9, 2010

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Steen Mencke "s.mencke dk" (Denmark) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Bach: Goldberg Variations: Handel: Suite No. 2, HWV 427 (Audio CD)

Garrick Ohlsson never quite made the international splash expected after winning the international Chopin competition in 1970, though he was at the time favourably compared to his late, great compatriot Julius Katchen. Some memorable recordings have made it into the catalogue, though, particularly the arguably most stirring of all recordings of the Busoni Piano Concerto - a work that almost begs to be botched in performance due to its excessive length and quaint structure. Ohlsson's discs of the Beethoven piano sonatas, on the other hand, somehow seem to miss out in both overall scope and originality, and to me seem a serious miscalculation on his part. With the marvelous 16 CD set of the complete works of Chopin (released earlier this year), however, Ohlsson really scrambled back in my favour - and this time, I think, to stay.

Garrick Ohlsson never recorded much by J. S. Bach, so frankly one doesn't expect miracles - especially in a field as fiercely competitive as interpretations of the Goldberg Variations has become - but trust me, wonders there certainly are, and plenty of them. The overall view is very much a no-nonsense one, all repeats are omitted, and though Ohlsson is of course a master of the art of virtuoso pianism, he restrains himself sufficiently to produce a finely balanced fusion of genuine Baroque clarity and slightly hazy Romantic other-worldliness that is most appealing. His tempi are generally moderate, and the many facets of the various variations highly benefit from a pulse and rhytm that is somehow both flexible from one to the other and at the same time uncompromisingly strict. A version of the BWV 988 to put the excesses of others on display - quite apart from being a pleasure to ear-drums and intellect both.
Anybody publishing a version of the Goldberg Variations playing for less than 50 minutes, should be contractually obligated to record something else on the disc as well, and Ohlsson's choice of the second keyboard suite by Handel is a very fine one indeed. The piano playing is first class as is the sound, though to some the mood may seem a tad gray-faced for Handel.

All in all a most commendable - and recommendable - issue.