Customer Reviews

Bach: Orchestral Suites 2 & 3, Goldberg Canons

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J. Sebastian Bach was a very virile, full-blooded man who worked all his life, had two wives, and sired about 20 children. Casals' realizations of Bach's music illustrate Bach's virility and vivacity. Casals conducts the Bach Concerti & Suites as he [Casals] plays the Bach Sonatas: with vim, vigor, and vitality; with rhythm, color, and accent; with dash, esprit, and intellect. In short, these are the very best realizations of the Orchestral Suites available--or will ever again be available.

By the way, in these sessions and at rehearsals, Casals conducted sitting down with his cello on which he illustrated the tempi, accents and inflections he wanted for the orchestra, and used his cello bow as a baton. This is as real as it gets!

The soloists are wonderful. The recorded sound is bright and clear. The price is incredibly cheap. What are you waiting for?

These recordings bring back wonderful memories. I remember our library had these recordings of Bach's ORCHESTRAL SUITES 2 and 3, along with SUITES 1 and 4, in a complete LP set. I learned these works listening to that set, and think as highly of them today as I did that summer of 1972 when first intensely interested in Classical music. Pablo Casals has the right feel for Bach's Orchestral Suites on modern instruments. Casals' tempos are never too fast, yet the allegro passages sizzle; he doesn't overdo repeats where they aren't needed. I find his Bach refreshing, relaxing, and a real antidote to our fast paced, cold, technologically advanced, materialism-gone-mad world.

Some readers will not agree with me and prefer period instruments (Hogwood and Pinnock are two examples), or more recent recordings of Marriner, Rilling, Leppard, Max Pommer (Capriccio) with modern instruments. These recordings are all respectable; Marriner(London) and Leppard (Philips - hard to find recently) are very fine, but Casals has something special which makes me really fond of his recordings. Everything is MUSICAL, and Casals isn't worried about "how would Bach have heard this?" Performance practices for Baroque music have changed alot since 1966 - nearly 40 years ago - when these recordings were made, but Casals is still my preference.

Sony has released Casals/Marlboro Festival Bach SUITES 1 and 4 on 2 different CDs, coupled with the BRANDENBURG CONCERTOS by the same forces. My advice is to get all 3 discs (this one included) for Casals' special way with Bach.