Bach: The Cello Suites

The standard lore of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Cello Suites is that Bach wrote them in the early 1720s; the suites fell into obscurity until Pablo Casals discovered a copy in a musty bookshop; and Casals reintroduced the suites to the musical world by studying, performing, and recording them. The musical world now recognizes the suites as a work of genius.

This tale is mostly true, but in his book, Bach: The Cello Suites, Edward Klorman digs deeply into the history of this music. Bach: The Cello Suites, part of the New Cambridge Music Handbooks series, is a slim volume, only 188 pages long.

Chapter 1, “Contexts: Cöthen, French Style, ‘Opus’ Collections, and the Cello,” begins by reviewing Bach’s years working for Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen. During this time, Bach wrote his Violin Solos and the Cello Suites. Klorman compares the structure of the Violin Solos and Cello Suites; the Cello Suites are organized similarly, beginning with a prelude followed by five dances. Klorman explores the types of violoncellos that were played in Bach’s time and how they were played.

Chapter 2, “Dance Types, Preludes, and Analytical Perspectives,” describes the types of dances in the Cello Suites: allemande, courante, sarabande, menuet, bourée, gavotte, and gigue. Klorman continues by describing the structure of a suite and the function of the prelude. Klorman concludes this chapter by analyzing the Fourth Suite in E♭ Major in detail. I would have liked an analysis of each of the six suites, but Steven Isserlis has covered this ground in his book, The Bach Cello Suites: A Companion.

Unfortunately, we do not have a manuscript of the cello suites in Bach’s own hand. Instead, we have four manuscript copies from four different people, and there are significant differences between them. This problem is the subject of Chapter 3, “The Four Manuscript Copies.” Klorman gives the background on each of the four manuscript copies and discusses which manuscript copy has been favored or disfavored over time.

In Chapter 4, “Transmission, Performance, and Reception: 1720—c. 1900,” Klorman reviews the obscure history of the cello suites for the first 180 years after they were written. The suites were underappreciated and often viewed as études or practice exercises more than as works deserving of performance. In the latter part of the nineteenth century, piano accompaniments were written, and the suites were transcribed for other instruments including piano and violin.

In Chapter 5, “Transmission, Performance, and Reception: After c. 1900,” Klorman reaches Pablo Casals.

It would be impossible to overstate Casals’s transformative impact on the way Bach’s cello suites are played in concerts and more broadly on the space they occupy in the cultural imagination.

Klorman explores the mythology of Casals’s finding of the cello suites and Casals’s promotion and performance of the suites over the succeeding years. Casals studied the suites independently, and his interpretations of the suites varied from performance to performance.

Klorman continues by writing about performances and recordings by other artists well into the twenty-first century, including the historical performance movement using period instruments and adaptation of the suites for modern instruments. Because of the absence of an authoritative manuscript of the suites, performers have followed Casals in creating their own interpretations or modifying or mixing the music. In the words of Paul Katz in Anthony Arnone’s The Art of Listening, “the wonder of the Suites is that there is more than one truth.” In my opinion, this keeps the suites vibrant and alive three hundred years after their composition.

Bach: The Cello Suites is an important work of scholarship, and it has attracted many reviews, of which I list a few here:

• Janet Horvath: The Bach Solo Cello Suites Revisited—A Review
• Jeffrey Solow: Keeping Up With the Bach Cello Suites
• Lydia Picotte: The Infinite Lives of Bach’s Cello Suites
• Miranda Wilson: Bach for More—Violist Edward Klorman Offers a Valuable New Installment in Cello Suites Scholarship

Rating: Four of five stars (very good)