Teldec | Bach 2000 | home http://www.warnerclassics.com/teldec/bach2000/home.html 1 of 1 2000.01.02. 10:59 Teldec | Bach 2000 | An Introduction http://www.warnerclassics.com/teldec/bach2000/introd.html A Note on the Edition TELDEC will be the first record company to release the complete works of Johann Sebastian Bach in a uniformly packaged edition 153 CDs. BACH 2000 will be launched at the Salzburg Festival on 28 July 1999 and be available from the very beginning of celebrations to mark the 250th anniversary of the composer's death in 1750. The title BACH 2000 is a protected trademark. The artists taking part in BACH 2000 include: Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Gustav Leonhardt, Concentus musicus Wien, Ton Koopman, Il Giardino Armonico, Andreas Staier, Michele Barchi, Luca Pianca, Werner Ehrhardt, Bob van Asperen, Arnold Schoenberg Chor, Rundfunkchor Berlin, Tragicomedia, Thomas Zehetmair, Glen Wilson, Christoph Prégardien, Klaus Mertens, Barbara Bonney, Thomas Hampson, Herbert Tachezi, Frans Brüggen and many others ... BACH 2000 - A Summary Teldec's BACH 2000 Edition, 153 CDs in 12 volumes comprising Bach's complete works performed by world renowned Bach interpreters on period instruments, constitutes one of the most ambitious projects in recording history. BACH 2000 represents the culmination of a process that began four decades ago in 1958 with the creation of the DAS ALTE WERK label. After initially triggering an impassioned controversy, Nikolaus Harnoncourt's belief that "Early music is a foreign language which must be learned by musicians and listeners alike" has found widespread acceptance. He and his colleagues searched for original instruments to throw new light on composers and their works and significantly influenced the history of music interpretation in the second half of this century. Their ideas have been shared by many fellow musicians, among them Ton Koopman, Il Giardino Armonico, Luca Pianca and Andreas Staier, all of whose performances appear in the BACH 2000 Edition. As an entirety, BACH 2000 offers listeners the chance to rediscover the astonishing developments in Bach interpretation of the last forty years and the tonal beauties of Bach's works performed on period instruments. Without Nikolaus Harnoncourt's and Gustav Leonhardt's groundbreaking accounts of the cantatas, a complete Bach edition would have been inconceivable. But with the recording of Bach's Complete Sacred Cantatas as inspiration, not to mention Harnoncourt's 1970 St. Matthew Passion and Gustav Leonhardt's legendary 1965 account of the Goldberg Variations, the early 1990's found Teldec in an extraordinary position: able to embark on the artistic, financial and logistical adventure to record and license recordings of the remainder of Bach's oeuvre and present a complete edition in time for the 250th anniversary of his death. From Schleicht, spielende Wellen, BWV 206, recorded by the Monteverdi Choir Hamburg, Amsterdam Chamber Orchestra, Jürgen Jürgens and André Rieu in 1963 to the Trio in A major, BWV 1025 with Werner Ehrhardt and Gerald Hambitzer recorded in April 1999, BACH 2000 chronicles nearly four decades of Bach performance on period instruments. By 1995, the year in which the project BACH 2000 was conceived, Teldec had already committed approximately two thirds of Bach's oeuvre to disc. In the last year alone the company has produced aproximately twenty new recordings specifically for the BACH 2000 Complete Edition. Many of these new recordings are of works never before available on disc, including chorales, works for organ and works for harpsichord. The launch of Teldec's BACH 2000 Edition takes place in Salzburg on 28 July 1999, one year to the day before the actual anniversary. Criteria for a Complete Bach Edition BACH 2000 includes all works that modern scholarship regards as authentically composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. Where Bach made extensive changes to works in order to adapt them to meet the demands of later performances, the alternative versions have also been included. Incomplete works have been included when their musical substance was deemed valuable, although where fragments consist of only a few bars, these are not included. BACH 2000 also includes a handful of reconstructions of lost works, the existence of which is fully verified but which have not survived as such. Finally, a few inauthentic pieces are included, where they are inextricably associated with Bach's name and are so familiar that their exclusion would have been regretted. Groups of Works Included in Teldec's BACH 2000 Edition Central to the BACH 2000 Edition are the sacred cantatas, recorded between 1971 and 1989 by the Concentus Musicus Wien under Nikolaus Harnoncourt and the Leonhardt Consort under Gustav Leonhardt with soloists including Barbara Bonney, Thomas Hampson, Paul Esswood, Kurt Equiluz, Max van Egmond and Robert Holl. This was the first complete edition of the sacred cantatas performed on period instruments in the history of the gramophone and remains so to this day. The set won the Erasmus Prize in 1980, before it was even completed. Ton Koopman and his Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra subsequently recorded the secular cantatas. Bach wrote over 400 chorale settings but left no collection of his own in the form of a published or publishable volume of chorales. His pupil, Johann Philipp Kirnberger, went to great lengths to make good this omission. Between 1784 and 1787 four volumes appeared in print containing a total of 371 chorale settings, most of which are familiar to us from the composer's cantatas, motets, oratorios and Passions. But there are around 186 chorales that cannot be ascribed to surviving works or were part of lost compositions or 1 of 3 2000.01.02. 10:59 Teldec | Bach 2000 | An Introduction http://www.warnerclassics.com/teldec/bach2000/introd.html teaching material. These have been collected and recorded in their entirety for the first time ever by the Rundfunkchor Berlin under its British-born conductor Robin Gritton. With regard to the rarely performed or recorded Schemelli Songs, there is disagreement about the authenticity of several of these. For the BACH 2000 Edition Teldec has selected those known to be authentic and most likely to be authentic; they are performed by Christoph Prégardien, Klaus Mertens, Ton Koopman and Jaap ter Linden. Bach's fame in his own lifetime rested not only on his gifts as a composer but also, and more especially, on his exceptional abilities as an organist. Since 1994, Ton Koopman has recorded Bach's complete works for organ on famous historic organs in the Netherlands and Germany. Foremost among these are the instruments in Freiberg Cathedral, built by Gottfried Silbermann, an organ builder with whom Bach had a professional association, and the organ in Hamburg's Jacobikirche, built by Arp Schnitger. For Bach's complete works for keyboard, the BACH 2000 Edition has chosen to use the harpsichord. Included are such releases as Gustav Leonhardt's groundbreaking account of the Goldberg Variations as well as recent recordings of Bach's transcriptions of the sonatas after Reincken by Andreas Staier, toccatas by Bob van Asperen and concertos, fugues and other works by harpsichordist Michele Barchi. Barchi also plays the Suites BWV 996 and 997 on a historic lute-harpsichord specially built for this Edition. Additional lute works are performed by Luca Pianca, an internationally acclaimed lutenist and theorbo player and a co-founder of Il Giardino Armonico. The Cello Suites were recorded by Nikolaus Harnoncourt in 1965 and appear in the BACH 2000 Edition for the first time on CD. The edition includes Bach's solo violin works performed by Thomas Zehetmair and the violin sonatas performed by Alice Harnoncourt (violin), Nikolaus Harnoncourt (viola da gamba) and Herbert Tachezi (harpsichord). Of the orchestral repertoire, the Brandenburg Concerti are represented by the highly acclaimed Il Giardino Armonico recordings released in 1997. The orchestral suites are performed by Nikolaus Harnoncourt and the harpsichord concerti by Gustav Leonhardt. Also included in BACH 2000 are Nikolaus Harnoncourt's 1970 legendary recording of the St Matthew Passion with Concentus musicus Wien and the Arnold Schoenberg Chor as well as his 1995 recording of the St John Passion with the same forces. Packaging for Teldec's BACH 2000 The stylish packaging for BACH 2000, created by the Hamburg-based Suxdorf Studios für Design following a competition among internationally renowned designers, consists of colorful, high quality cardboard cubes that house each of the 12 volumes. As each volume is a separate genre, the display is not only compact and attractive but also easy to use. Inside each cube are cardboard sleeves containing the individual CDs, as well as booklets comprising documentation that totals 2,400 pages for the entire Edition. Also included are a bonus CD illustrating the history of performance practice of the St. Matthew Passion and a lavishly illustrated book written by musicologist Wolfgang Sandberger titled BACH 2000: 24 Inventions on the Life and Works of Johann Sebastian Bach. Produced in co-operation with Metzler Verlag of Stuttgart, the hardcover book contains 150 illustrations, 50 of them in full color, and offers 24 Inventions (essays) dealing with Bach's life, his music and ist perception throughout the centuries. A foreword by Nikolaus Harnoncourt and a complete catalogue of Bach's compositions with cross-references to the recordings crown this indispensable publication for Bach lovers. The book is available in German, English, French and Spanish; a Japanese edition will be published later this year. To accommodate Bach lovers who already own the 60 CD Complete Sacred Cantatas set, Teldec has produced a "Light Version" of the BACH 2000 Edition. The "Light Version" includes the bonus CD, Sandberger book, and all 12 cubes but only the remaining 93 CDs, so that buyers who already own the sacred cantatas do not have to purchase them a second time.