About the Album

Once again, this album celebrates the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, whom many consider to be the greatest composer of all time. After Bach’s Partitas (Bach Partitas for Saxophone [CC 72648]) and his Suites (Bach Suites for Saxophone [CC 72769]), I am now presenting Bach Solo, a new solo album containing my own selection of works.

The pandemic in 2020-21 brought little to dispel the gloom among performing musicians. Concerts and tours were cancelled for an extensive period, meaning that musicians and other performing artists were confined to home with no work. Musical life was falteringly restored here and there during those years, only to have everything closed down again on virtually no notice. But these months also proved to be a time of reflection and artistic rebirth for many. A large number of children were born as a result of the pandemic, but the arts became a breeding ground for spiritual offspring, and so it proved for me; the genesis of the work you can hear on this album. Finally, there was plenty of time to spend many hours every day working on the project against a background of calm, which made Bach’s music all the more comforting!

The prime cut with which I open this album is the Sonata I have assembled from Bach’s three sonatas for solo violin. While working on Bach’s solo violin pieces around ten years ago, I rapidly decided to confine myself to the partitas. Although these do not belong together as such, often being published with a sonata in between them, I felt it was a sensible choice, given that they are generally of a less complex texture. The sonatas would have to wait until I felt brave enough and had gained some more experience. I felt I had finally reached that point during one of the Corona lockdowns. I started with a couple of movements that I felt would be good samples, avoiding the fugues, which are almost unplayable even on the violin but could only be performed on the saxophone - a single voice melodic instrument – with some artificial help. I did not feel that would be appropriate to this style. After a lot of experimentation in different transpositions, it turned out to be possible to mould six of the total of twelve sonata movements into one cohesive whole, with the two central movements being in parallel major keys. Even though a sonata in six movements may go against musical tradition, I feel it is a very satisfactory solution from a musical perspective.

Album tracks