Editor's Info:
The six cello suites on this recording have their parallel in six sonatas for solo violin, also from Bach’s time in Köthen, before he moved to Leipzig. On the title page of the violin sonatas the composer wrote Libro primo (First Book). The original manuscript of the cello suites has vanished, but both wife Anna Magdalena and others left copies. Did the composer perhaps call the cello suites Second Book?
Traditional dance forms are the bones of the suites as they are in other suites by Bach and other Baroque composers. But this is not music for a palace ball. The dance tradition serves as the basis for an unrelenting elaboration and exploration of contours, sounds and rhythms.
Bjorg Lewis is one of Norway’s most sought-after and admired cellists. She has been a soloist with the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra with Mariss Jansons conducting, as well as performing with orchestras throughout Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Baltics. She has collaborated with musicians such as Leif Ove Andsnes, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Elisabeth Batiashvilli, Truls Mork, Steven Isserlis, Hakan Hardenberger, Martin Frost and Lawrence Power. Most recently Bjorg has been invited to play with the Nash Ensemble and has also performed with Antje Weithaas and Aleksandar Madžar as part of the Leeds International Chamber Season’s 2016 tribute to the Sonata.
Bjorg is a founding member of the Vertavo String Quartet, an internationally acclaimed ensemble, which is the recipient of numerous awards, including Norway’s prestigious Grieg Prize in 2005. A busy performance schedule takes Bjorg throughout Europe, North America and Japan. She has made her home in the UK for the past fourteen years and has performed at the festivals in Aldeburgh, Edinburgh, Bath and Cheltenham, as well as regularly playing at Wigmore Hall.
Bjorg is an accomplished curator of music festivals. From 2001 to 2015 she was Art....... więcej