C.P.E. Bach: Württemberg Sonatas

Description

These interpretations by Keith Jarrett of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach's Württemberg Sonatas are a true revelation. "I had heard these sonatas played by harpsichordists and found that there was room for a piano version," Jarrett says today. This exceptional recording, made in 1994 and never before released, lets us hear the pianist in complete harmony with these pieces, rendering the stylistic peculiarities of the young Bach in all their expressive nuances: the playful gentleness of his music; his penchant for tempo changes as subtle as they are abrupt; the extraordinary inventiveness of his undulating forms—everything here is wonderfully analyzed and presented. The overall fluidity of the performance reveals qualities that perhaps only artists gifted in improvisation can convey. In Jarrett's hands, the innovative formal experiments that CPE dared to undertake in these compositions regain the freshness of discovery. Recorded by Keith Jarrett at Studio Cavelight in May 1994, this album includes liner notes by Paul Griffiths.