Orchestral Suites Nos. 2 & 4

"Akademie für Alte Musik, Berlin, offers stylish, alert and refreshingly understated readings which allow Bach's music to speak for itself on its own terms...these are very desirable performances distinguished by their modesty and restraint and good taste."
Performance FIVE STARS
Sound FIVE STARS
- BBC Music Magazine

"Listening to these profoundly satisfying interpretations one is left in no doubt of the care that has been taken in their preparation by the conductorless ensemble, whose playing to my mind encompasses all facets of the best in German Bach playing. The sheer sound of the AAMB is itself worth comment, for there is an impressive depth founded on a sonorous and clearly etched bass line, and warm but beautifully articulated playing from the upper strings."
- Fanfare

"Akademie für Alte Musik, Berlin, offers stylish, alert and refreshingly understated readings which allow Bach's music to speak for itself on its own terms...these are very desirable performances distinguished by their modesty and restraint and good taste."
Performance FIVE STARS
Sound FIVE STARS
- BBC Music Magazine

"Listening to these profoundly satisfying interpretations one is left in no doubt of the care that has been taken in their preparation by the conductorless ensemble, whose playing to my mind encompasses all facets of the best in German Bach playing. The sheer sound of the AAMB is itself worth comment, for there is an impressive depth founded on a sonorous and clearly etched bass line, and warm but beautifully articulated playing from the upper strings."
- Fanfare

The Orchestral Suites, or the "mixed style".
Called "Ouvertüren" in Germany, because they began with a large-scale overture à la française, Bach's Suites for orchestra offer a unique synthesis of the French and the Italian styles. The Leipzig Cantor did not content himself with a mere set of amiable dances for his "Collegium Musicum": he revived the genre in his own manner, accenting the contrasts, refining the orchestration, and introducing a hitherto unknown contrapuntal element. Two centuries later these admirable orchestral works continue to represent an indispensable treasure of the Baroque.