J.S. Bach: Sei Solo - The Sonatas and Partitas Thomas Zehetmair

• Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 - 1750): Sonata for Violin Solo No. 1 in G Minor, BWV 1001:
• 1 1. Adagio 03:28
• 2 2. Fuga. Allegro 04:42
• 3 3. Siciliana 02:32
• 4 4. Presto 03:34
• Partita for Violin Solo No. 1 in B Minor, BWV 1002:
• 5 1. Allemanda 04:19
• 6 2. Double 02:47
• 7 3. Corrente 02:35
• 8 4. Double. Presto 03:14
• 9 5. Sarabande 03:22
• 10 6. Double 02:37
• 11 7. Tempo di Borea 02:54
• 12 8. Double 02:55
• Sonata for Violin Solo No. 2 in A Minor, BWV 1003:
• 13 1. Grave 03:42
• 14 2. Fuga 06:59
• 15 3. Andante 03:48
• 16 4. Allegro 05:44
• Partita for Violin Solo No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1004:
• 17 1. Allemande 05:04
• 18 2. Corrente 02:06
• 19 3. Sarabande 03:54
• 20 4. Giga 03:57
• 21 5. Ciaccona 12:29
• Sonata for Violin Solo No. 3 in C Major, BWV 1005:
• 22 1. Adagio 05:01
• 23 2. Fuga 09:20
• 24 3. Largo 03:06
• 25 4. Allegro assai 05:16
• Partita for Violin Solo No. 3 in E Major, BWV 1006:
• 26 1. Preludio 03:45
• 27 2. Loure 03:23
• 28 3. Gavotte en Rondeau 02:41
• 29 4. Menuet I / Menuet II - Menuet I da capo 04:01
• 30 5. Bourrée 01:20
• 31 6. Gigue 01:43
• Total Runtime 02:06:18

Info for J.S. Bach: Sei Solo - The Sonatas and Partitas

Thomas Zehetmair, one of the great violinists of our time, re-visits the solo works of Bach, the summit of the violin repertory. Using period instruments, Zehetmair plays the music with vividness and intelligence to produce a recording that is deeply steeped in the music and at the same time original.

The album was recorded at Propstei St. Gerold and is issued as a double album with texts by Peter Gülke and Thomas Zehetmair.

Composed three centuries ago, Johann Sebastian Bach’s set of six works for solo violin stands as one of the holy grails of the instrument’s literature – perhaps the holiest. Now the great Austrian musician Thomas Zehetmair makes his own mark in the rich history of this music, revisiting the repertoire on period instruments.

Zehetmair is an extraordinary violinist and a consistently inquisitive and self-questioning artist. He has not only played the big concertos but has given close attention to chamber music and new repertory, and has also found an extra calling as a conductor, channeling this varied experience into his return to the formidable cornerstone of Bach’s solo masterpieces.

As a young man Zehetmair worked with Nikolaus Harnoncourt in his period ensemble, working with him to prepare for his first recording of the sonatas and partitas on a modern instrument. For this new recording, he draws out exquisite colours from two violins from Bach’s lifetime, both of them by masters in the German tradition, but there is nothing antiquarian in his approach – old instruments, for him, are tools with which to express a modern sensibility: alert, edgy, multivalent. His performance engages, too, with the superb acoustic of the priory church of St Gerold, in Austria where so many legendary ECM recordings have been made.

Peter Gülke, in his accompanying essay, refers to the “floating spirituality” of this music, and to how Bach here offers one side of a conversation with the performer, whom he leaves free to determine matters of dynamic shading, phrasing and bowing. Zehetmair brings vividness and intelligence to the conversation on a recording that, deeply steeped in the music and true, is at the same time powerfully original.

Thomas Zehetmair, baroque violin

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Booklet for J.S. Bach: Sei Solo - The Sonatas and Partitas