Interpreting Bach at the Keyboard

by Badura-Skoda, Paul; Clayton, Alfred

• ISBN13: 9780198161554
• ISBN10: 0198161557
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1993-12-16
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

The ever-increasing number of performances of Bach's music is a sign of its enduring vitality. But perhaps no other composer is subject to such a wide diversity of interpretation--assessing the merits of these many interpretations and unravelling the sources and documents on which they are based can be extremely difficult for the modern performer. In this important new book, Paul Badura-Skoda draws on forty years of studying and performing Bach to present startling new insights into many different aspects of Bach's music. He looks at rhythm, tempo, articulation, and dynamics; examines the instruments for which Bach's music was intended, and considers problems of sonority. He then discusses ornamentation in depth, analyzing each of the signs and symbols used by Bach, and argues that much of Bach's ornamentation in current performance is monotonous and fails to reflect the actual Baroque style. Sometimes contentious, always stimulating, Badura-Skoda's book conveys a passion for an informed interpretation of Bach's music based on a recognition and respect for Bach's actual intentions. Copiously illustrated with musical examples, the book will take its place as a standard work for all students and performers of Bach's ever-popular keyboard music.

Table of Contents

Abbreviations

A note on terminology

General Problems of Interpretation

An authentic eighteenth- century performance source: C.F. Colt's organ-barrels

Studies in rhythm

In search of the correct Bach tempo

Bach's articulation

Dynamics

Problems of sonority

Problems of harpsichord and piano technique, and of expressive playing

The Urtext problem: An imaginary interview

Rendering the structure as a whole

Prelude in E flat minor and Fugue in D sharp minor, WTC I, BWV l853 An analysis for performance

Studies in Ornamentation

Introduction

The development of ornamentation in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries

J.S. Bach's ornaments: Some general remarks

Pralltriller

Appoggiaturas

The loner trill

Bach's mordent

Arpeggios

The application of ornaments that are not notated

Free embellishments in Bach's keyboard works

Epilogue

Some recommended editions of Bach's keyboard works

Some textual and interpretational problems in Bach's Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue, BWV 903

J.M. Gesner, 'Johann Sebastian Bach as conductor, keyboard player, and organist' (Gottingen, 1738)

Excerpt from the Article 'Takt' in J.G. Sulzer's Allgemeine Theorie der schonen Kunste, vol. ii (Leipzig, 1774)

The Dedication of Partita No. 1 (BWV 825) and the Dedicatory Poem

Friedrich Blume and Hans Joachim Moser

Bibliography

Index

Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.