Take a few minutes and listen to this piece.
Sarabande from Bach’s Fourth Cello Suite
Jean-Guihen Queyras (Harmonia Mundi)
The sarabande started as a wild dance passed back and forth between Spain and its colonies, so racy that it was banned in 1583.
But by the time Johann Sebastian Bach was composing sarabandes a century and a half later, they had been reinvented. Now they were peaceful, noble, reflective, like the one you’re listening to.
This comes from the fourth of six suites Bach wrote for solo cello. Each suite contains a prelude and five dances. The sarabande of the fourth has a simple structure. There’s an opening section that’s repeated, then a second section that’s repeated, too.
It was customary in Bach’s time — and some continue the practice today — to show off a little during the repeats, adding flourishes:
There’s a lot of room in the suites for this kind of individual expression, and different cellists make very different decisions. I like how Jean-Guihen Queyras, whose version you’ve been listening to, keeps even this grave sarabande light and airy; you can imagine dancing to it. But other players, like Pierre Fournier, make it slower and weightier:
This is one of the joys of classical music, especially when it comes to pieces with as few instructions as this one. Music can change so much depending on the musician.
Listen to the beginning again. Climbing upward, the opening has a sunrise feel; I think of taking a big, peaceful breath. But this sarabande isn’t triumphant start-of-day music. It’s introspective. It even dips into darkness:
Over the years, Bach composed more sarabandes than any other type of dance. Their serenity must have presented him with an irresistible challenge: How could he make music that’s so unhurried yet covers so much ground, so quickly?
The cello suites were probably written around 1720, when Bach was employed by a German prince. He spent much of his career working for churches, so this was a rare period in which he got to focus on secular works. There was no need for his music to be about anything, to have any practical use. He could simply celebrate instruments and the full range of what they could do, quietly pushing them to their limits.
Source: Music - nytimes.com
