Alisa Weilerstein, Cello Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) E Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello
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Wednesday, May 1, 2019, 8pm First Congregational Church, Berkeley Alisa Weilerstein, cello Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) e Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello Suite No. 1 in G major, BWV 1007 Prélude Allemande Courante Sarabande Minuet Minuet II Gigue Suite No. 2 in D minor, BWV 1008 Prélude Allemande Courante Sarabande Minuet Minuet II Gigue PAUSE This performance is made possible, in part, by Patron Sponsor Patrick McCabe. Cal Performances’ 2018 –19 season is sponsored by Wells Fargo. 15 Suite No. 3 in C major, BWV 1009 Prélude Allemande Courante Sarabande Bourrée Bourrée Gigue Suite No. 4 in E-flat major, BWV 1010 Prélude Allemande Courante Sarabande Bourrée Bourrée Gigue INTERMISSION Suite No. 5 in C minor, BWV 1011 Prélude Allemande Courante Sarabande Gavotte Gavotte Gigue Suite No. 6 in D major, BWV 1012 Prélude Allemande Courante Sarabande Gavotte Gavotte Gigue Opposite: Photo by Paul Stuart. 16 PROGRAM NOTES A Note from the Artist Johann Sebastian Bach In 1888, a 12-year-old boy in the provinces of e Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello, Catalonia discovered something on a dusty shelf BWV 1007–1012 of an old music store: a tattered score of the Six In 1713, the frugal Friedrich Wilhelm I of Suites for Vio lon cello Solo by Johann Sebastian Prussia dismissed his household musical estab - Bach. He couldn’t believe what he had found, lishment in Berlin. e young, cultured Prince and immediately recognized it as an invaluable Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, 40 miles north of treasure. He bought the score and took it home Leipzig, took the opportunity to engage some with him to practice. It would be 13 more years of Friedric h’s finest musicians; he provided before he dared play the suites in public. is them with excellent instruments and established remarkable boy is one of my personal heroes; a library for their regular court performances. the legendary artist, musician, cellist, and— In December 1717, Leopold hired Johann above all—humanitarian, Pablo Casals. Sebastian Bach, then organist and Kapellmeister We cellists owe an incalculable amount to at Weimar, as his director of music. Inspired by Casals. He is largely credited with modernizing the high quality of the musicians in his charge cello technique, and was one of the few pioneers and by the Prince’s praise of his creative work, who helped bring the cello into the 20th century Bach produced much of his greatest instru - as a solo instrument. But I personally think that mental music during the six years of his tenure among his largest contributions to cellists, and at Cöthen, including the Brandenburg Con - to music lovers everywhere, were his discovery certos, the suites for orchestra and the violin and timeless inter pre tations of the Bach suites. concertos, e Well-Tempered Clavier , many Growing up, I listened to his recordings of the chamber and keyboard compositions, and the suites several times daily, and I lovingly return to works for unaccompanied violin and cello. e them oen. Casals also impressed upon me the six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello were ap - sacred nature of this music, and I have always parently written for either Christian Ferdinand approached the suites with a special reverence. Abel (whose son Carl Friedrich became the erefore, the idea of performing the com - partner of Sebastian Bach’s son Johann Christian plete Bach suites in one concert is something in an important London concert venture in the that has always thrilled and terrified me at the 1760s) or Chris tian Bernhard Linigke, both same time. I can only say how very honored and master cellists in the Cöthen court orchestra. humbled I am to bring this music to you this e cello in Bach’s time was still an instru - evening—music that perfectly marries the most ment of relatively recent origin. It was the profound emotions with impeccable intellect. Cremonese crasman Andrea Amati who first Berkeley has been part of my life since my brought the violin, viola, and cello to their mod - earliest childhood; my father grew up in the ern configurations around 1560 as the succes - Berkeley Hills and his father, my grandfather, sors to the old, soer-voiced family of viols. passed away here only three years ago at the age (e modern double bass, with its tuning in of 104, in the house he had lived in since 1950. fourths and its sloping shape—compare its pro - My love for the cello and for Bach’s suites, specif - file with the square shoulders of the other or - ically, blossomed here in Berkeley, whether chestral strings—is the only survivor in the in practice sessions in my grandparents’ living modern orchestra of that noble breed of earlier room, or, as a very young girl (not more than instruments.) For the first century of its exis - four or five years old), in lessons with the late tence, the cello was strictly confined to playing Margaret Rowell. To me, the Bach Suites for Solo the bass line in concerted works; any solo pas - Cello have always represented a “circle of life.” sages in its register were entrusted to the viola I can’t think of a more fitting place to perform da gamba. e earliest solo works known to them all than in Berkeley, home to some of my have been written specifically for the instru - deepest and most cherished memories. ment, from the 1680s, are by Domenico Gabri - —Alisa Weilerstein eli, a cellist in the orchestra of San Petronio in 16b PLAYBILL PROGRAM NOTES Bologna (unrelated to the Venetian Gabrielis); uets (the second of which, in G minor, exhibits notable among them are his Ricercare for Unac - a delicious, haunted languor) and a spirited companied Cello of 1689. e first concerto gigue of vibrant character. for cello seems to be that composed by Giu - e prélude of the Second Suite (D minor) is seppe Jacchini in 1701. e instrument gained of a solemn, brooding cast. e allemande , rich steadily in popularity as it displaced the older in double stops and implied counterpoint, con - gamba, a circumstance evidenced by the many tinues the mood of the opening movement. e works for it by Antonio Vivaldi and other early- courante is serious in nature but determined 18th-century Italian composers. When Bach and forceful in rhythm. e sarabande provides proposed to write music for unaccompanied one of the most thoughtful episodes in the cello sometime around 1720, however, there suites. e first minuet, intense and densely were few precedents for such pieces. e exam - textured, is nicely countered by the graceful ples with which he was most familiar were by second minuet that occupies the movement’s a tiny enclave of composers (Westhof, Biber, center. A powerful gigue closes the suite. Walther, Pisendel) centered around Dresden e ird Suite (C major) opens with a pré - who had dabbled in compositions for solo vio - lude that exploits the rich scales and arpeggios lin, and it was probably upon their models that of the instrument’s middle and low registers. Bach built his six Sonatas and Partitas for Violin e allemande’s elaborate quick figurations and the half-dozen suites for cello. In compar - make its tempo seem faster than a metronome ing these two series of Bach’s works, Philipp would allow. e courante is light and ani - Spitta wrote, “e passionate and penetrating mated. e stately sarabande is balanced by energy, the inner fire and warmth which oen the twin bourrées (the second of which slips into grew to be painful in its intensity [in the violin C minor) and the spirited gigue , whose few works], is here soened down to a quieter measures of implied bagpipe drone are among beauty and a generally serene grandeur, as was the most novel tonal effects in Bach’s instru - to be expected from the deeper pitch and fuller mental catalog. tone of the cello.” e Fourth Suite (E-flat major) begins with a Bach’s solo cello suites, like his contempora - pr élude that is broad in character and rich in neous English Suites for Harpsichord (BWV harmonic implication. e allemande is marked 806 –811), follow the traditional form of the by wide-ranging figurations and swily flowing German instrumental suite—an elaborate rhythms. A nimble playfulness is captured by prelude followed by a fixed series of dances: the courante , while the sarabande is notable for allemande , courante , sarabande, and gigue . its wealth of double stops. e two bourrées are Be tween the last two movements of the cello the most lighthearted and dance-like music in works are inserted additional pairs of minuets the suites. e closing gigue is a rousing per - (Suites Nos. 1 and 2), bourrées (Nos. 3 and 4), or petuum mobile . gavottes (Nos. 5 and 6). e Suite No. 5 (C minor), oen character - e First Suite (G major) opens with a fanta - ized as the most profound and austere of the set, sia-like prélude whose steady rhythmic motion begins with a prélude reminiscent of a French and breadth of harmonic inflection generate overture: a slow, deeply melancholic opening a sweeping grandeur that culminates mag - section with dotted rhythms is followed by nificently in the heroic gestures of the closing quickly moving music whose subtle shis of measures. e ensuing movements follow the register imply the intertwining of fugal voices. old custom of pairing a slow dance with a fast e ensuing movements use the forms and one: an allemande (here marked by wide-rang - styles of the traditional dances, though their ing figurations and swily flowing rhythms) expressive state is not one of diversion but of is complemented by a courante , a dance type sadness in the slow movements (Allemande, originally accompanied by jumping motions; Sar a bande) and firm determination in the fast a stately sarabande is balanced by a pair of min - ones (Courante, Gavottes, Gigue).