Books, Arts & Manners: Bach & Casals, the Incomparables

THE reissue of Pablo Casals’s 1938-39 recordings of Bach’s six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello is a musical event of considerable and happy consequence. It is a marriage of true geniuses—with Bach extracting lyricism from an inhuman instrument, and Casals bringing to bear his signal and empathetic artistry. This is no small accomplishment, for the cello suites can be room-emptiers if not poured into crystal goblets.

We do not know when or for whom Bach wrote these suites. Casals said that he came across a dusty copy when he was 13, and that he worked over them until he was 25 before he felt he could perform them publicly. The results of his labor, on display here, bring to mind Ezra Pound’s observation that Bach is “never too far from physical movement.” Others have played and recorded the suites, but they have never given them the movement Casals did—the dance rhythms of courante and sarabande, minuet and gigue, which he insisted were their fundamental character (EMI 5 66215 2).

RT

About the Author

Ralph de Toledano

Featured Tags

THE reissue of Pablo Casals’s 1938-39 recordings of Bach’s six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello is a musical event of considerable and happy consequence. It is a marriage of true geniuses—with Bach extracting lyricism from an inhuman instrument, and Casals bringing to bear his signal and empathetic artistry. This is no small accomplishment, for the cello suites can be room-emptiers if not poured into crystal goblets.

We do not know when or for whom Bach wrote these suites. Casals said that he came across a dusty copy when he was 13, and that he worked over them until he was 25 before he felt he could perform them publicly. The results of his labor, on display here, bring to mind Ezra Pound’s observation that Bach is “never too far from physical movement.” Others have played and recorded the suites, but they have never given them the movement Casals did—the dance rhythms of courante and sarabande, minuet and gigue, which he insisted were their fundamental character (EMI 5 66215 2).