Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Six Partitas BWV825-830
Robert Levin (piano)
rec. 2017, Vosne-Romanée, Burgundy, France
Le Palais des Dégustateurs PDD017T [3 CDs: 138]
Sometimes, a first audition can be to a listener’s disadvantage. In order to fit Bach’s Six Partitas BWV 825-830 onto a couple of CDs, there are only so many ways you can do so; therefore, as a listener, you must choose how to approach them. You can ignore protocol and dive into your favourites, repeating them to your heart’s content, or you can go with the record company’s order. This varies, depending on the speed of the pianist and the whim of whoever is recording them. These were the last pieces of Bach’s keyboard works to be composed, along with both the French and English suites, and despite the clear unity they possess, didn’t all come out at once.
I confess that I listened in CD order, as I have more difficulty than most in not doing that. One of the problems with that approach, is that if you don’t care for the playing in the opening B flat minor Partita, it can colour your judgment for the remainder of the CD and, if you’re really unlucky, the whole set. However, as so often happens, as I grew used to Robert Levin’s style – which on first listening I’d found rather jagged and mechanical, but it began to grow on me. This was possibly due to my mood, but just as likely, as with any pianist, to my accepting the manner in which he plays. This applies especially when what is being played is something of an old war-horse, about which you already have set ideas.
Having only come to truly appreciate Bach and his keyboard music in the last couple of years, perhaps I have been spoiled by being exposed to great modern interpreters like Andras Schiff, Igor Levitt and, especially, Angela Hewitt. When versions of these works almost become a familiar musical background, as well as a pleasure, it is difficult to shift your position in favour of another version of the same war-horse, just as, for example, it is for me to look beyond a relatively unknown set of Brahms Piano Concertos by Martino Tirimo.
The six partitas for keyboards were composed between 1725 and 1730 or 1731. The actual manuscripts no longer exist, something that they have in common with both the English and the French suites, but additions, often annotated by people around Bach, are being discovered all the time, and the up-to-date scholarship by Robert Levin which appears in a couple of ‘alternative takes’ in this set, is testament to that. To distinguish them from the French and English suites which, along with a late overture, share the distinction of being Bach’s last keyboard works, the six partitas have sometimes become known as the German suites, something which I don’t think suits them at all. To illustrate this, you need only to see that all six suites contain dances not just from Germany, but France, Italy and Spain. Another way in which they vary from the English Suites, is that, rather than sticking to a strict prelude, they employ an adventurous variety of openings, including an overture, (no 4), sinfonia, (no 2), a fantasia, (no 3) and finally a toccata, (no 6).
There’s no doubt, however, that the partitas are a great deal more structurally free-ranging than either of the earlier sets of suites, and this more than anything is what leaves them open to a certain degree of improvisation, something the pianist Robert Levin is well known for. Of course, he is so much more than another pianist playing Bach’s partitas; he is a fine and erudite scholar, writer of many articles and essays on a number of composers and a deep musical thinker. Therefore, as he says in the accompanying booklet, he has a clear reason for doing everything. Here he is in an interview in the accompanying booklet in the with French journalist Stéphane Friederich on the thorny subject of ornamentation:
“The manuscripts testify to an acute sense of adaptation, – I dare not use the word ‘tinkering’. In fact, each time he (Bach) was working on the score he added free ornamentations to the student’s copy. By ‘free ornamentation’ I do not only mean a catalogue of ornaments indicated by symbols such as trills and mordants, for example, but a free ornamentation in the character of an improvisation, a natural step to any personal interpretation. In this way I can play certain passages several times in a row in very different ways. One must also realise that the works were composed, then revised, sometimes over several years, and consequently they have profoundly evolved over time.”
My knowledge of this repertoire is relatively limited, confined to opinion and enjoyment as much as knowledge, so an analysis of all six of the pieces would be of limited use. Instead, what I have chosen to do is to explore Robert Levin’s recording of the D Major Partita No 4, and compare this in general with those of two more modern recordings by renowned Bach pianists, Angela Hewitt’s second recording on Hyperion and Igor Levitt’s on Sony Classical .
The Overture sounds rather ugly to begin with, as the playing is sharp and almost brutal to my ears until the piece begins to develop. This is also something you can say about Levin’s performance in general and which was initially so off-putting about the first Partita. Once he gets going, however, it is a different story, with wonderfully fluid and thoughtful playing. The biggest difference to the performances of Angela Hewitt and Igor Levitt is in the speed, and this is nowhere better expressed than in the second movement allemande. Having said that, it still moves at a stately pace and works in that same fluid and rhythmic way. It is still a good deal quicker than the other two pianists (two and four minutes respectively).
With the exception of the sarabande, the remaining movements are quickly done. The speed of the third movement, the courante, seems a little excessive to my ears, especially the idea of it being a dance – maybe it is just a little too fast. It is certainly exciting. Again, the aria that follows is very exciting and lightly played, but, as so often with these performances, we enter a new world of fleet footed dance rhythms, whereas the more languorous sarabande, which is a little like a cat stretching in comparison, proves to be a delightful contrast. A rather studied formality returns in the very short minuet, and the longer gigue that follows it, and ultimately the impression is one of sharpness and efficiency, clarity at the expense of engagement, rather than the warmth and generosity of both Angela Hewitt’s and Igor Levitt’s readings. In overall timing, Robert Levin is ten minutes quicker than either Hewitt or Levitt, with Partita no 4 over and done with in twenty-eight minutes, in contrast to their more expansive thirty-three and thirty-five minutes respectively.
Overall, this is my impression of all of Robert Levin’s Six Partitas, but especially numbers 1 and 4 – one of what is sometimes a mathematical clarity and efficiency over-riding the music’s natural heart. My liking for these recordings is rather on and off, quite the opposite of Angela Hewitt’s and Igor Levitt’s, which overall make me feel more content and I find more satisfying.
Steve Gladwin
Extra tracks
Partita No 3: Alternative version of Gigue
Partita No 6: Tempo di gavotte alia modo (triplet executions) and Gigue alia modo (triplet execution)
Availability: Le Palais des Dégustateurs
