Bach: The Musical Offering (CD review)

Enrico Gatti, Ensemble Aurora. Outhere Music Arcana A384.

As you probably know, The Musical Offering by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) is a set of fugues and canons and such that Bach based on a musical theme King Frederick II of Prussia gave him. It came about during a meeting between Bach and Frederick in 1747, the meeting taking place because Frederick employed Bach's son C.P.E. Bach as a court musician. Frederick wanted to show off a new musical instrument, the fortepiano, which he had recently obtained. The King challenged Bach to improvise a six-voice fugue on a theme he gave him, which, eventually, Bach did, about two months afterwards presenting the king with his "musical offering," later publishing the variations as the set we now know.

The trouble is, no one is exactly sure about the specifics of the set. That is, it's unclear for exactly what instruments Bach originally intended the work and in what order he wanted the movements played. Indeed, the composer himself wrote out the trio sonata for flute, violin, and basso continuo, writing the other sections possibly for solo fortepiano, although small chamber ensembles often handle the canons these days. Nor does it help that the work contains musical riddles, which no one has indisputably solved. So you'll hear a good deal of musical interpretation from the various recordings currently in the catalogue. My own personal favorites are those from Ensemble Sonniere (Virgin) and the Linde-Consort (EMI), both sounding significantly different from one another even though both groups use period instruments.

Now, we get a reissue of a 1999 recording by Ensemble Aurora, a group comprised of four players: Enrico Gatti, violin; Marcello Gatti, traverse flute; Gaetano Nasillo, cello; and Guido Morini, harpsichord. They have their own ideas about The Musical Offering, and while one can hardly argue with their playing, which is excellent, one might not like everything about their rendition of the piece.

It seemed to me as I was listening to the Ensemble Aurora account that the performers are either hell bent for leather or exceedingly somber in their readings--usually both at the same time--with little room anything else. By comparison, both Ensemble Sonniere and the Linde-Consort sound more lively, more sparkling, than Ensemble Aurora yet equally serious and equally refined in their playing. Nevertheless, being different doesn't mean Aurora's view of the work is wrong or wrongheaded, just different. Such is the drawback in making comparisons.

Enrico Gatti
In the accompanying booklet, author Gilles Cantagrel refers to a 1980 article by musicologist Ursula Kirkendale that offers an explanation of Bach's rhetoric and oratorical art in the work. It is this treatise that the Ensemble Aurora seem to have taken to heart and illustrated on the present album. For me, it all seemed too scholarly, both the musical argument and the performance.

The opening Ricercar a 3, taken by the harpsichord, sets the tone for the rest of the piece, and that is at a fairly quick pace. It suggests that the members of Ensemble Aurora appear more interested in simply presenting the musical argument than in entertaining the listener with the lovely melodies involved. As with the rest of the album, the playing is quite fine, though not particularly well nuanced. Meaning it sounds a tad the same and hurried throughout.

The Canons diversi come off pretty well, although again there seems an overriding earnestness about them that rather clouds their overall beauty. The Ricercar a 6, which forms the heart of the piece, like most of the music seems taken too fast, the Ensemble Aurora pushing through it with an eye toward pleasing the mind over the senses.

And so it goes. As I continued listening to the Ensemble Aurora's reading, I continued to long for the fuller, more flowing, more graceful lines of the Ensemble Sonnerie. Still, the Ensemble Aurora provide at least an interesting alternative, one that seems more academic than most others, if that's the kind of thing you prefer.

Given the speeds Ensemble Aurora adopt, there is room left on the CD for two more works: the Sonata in G major for Violin and Basso continuo, BWV 1021, discovered in 1928, and the Sonata in G major for Flute, Violin and Continuo, BWV 1038. These pieces come across as a little more animated than the primary work and probably provide a better idea of what the Aurora players can do when academic constraints don't inhibit them. Even so, there remains a small degree of blandness about the presentations, perhaps heightened by the softness of the sound.

Producer and engineer Michel Bernstein and engineer Charlotte Gilart de Keranflec'h recorded the music at the Royal Abbey of Fontevraud, France in November 1999. Arcana first released the album in 2001 and then rereleased it in 2015. The sound of the solo harpsichord is quite good, if a little close and a trifle thin. Certainly, the sound projects a good presence, with plenty of detail. The sound of the ensemble itself is richer, of course, and a bit on the warm, soft side with a mild resonance. However, the instruments don't appear particularly well positioned for a lifelike perspective; it's more as though they're individually miked and then thrown together on the mixing board. So we get the sense of four separate instruments rather than a single, cohesive group. Nevertheless, the resultant sound is ultrasmooth and round and fairly easy on the ear.

JJP

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click here:


Meet the Staff

Meet the Staff
John J. Puccio, Founder and Contributor

Understand, I'm just an everyday guy reacting to something I love. And I've been doing it for a very long time, my appreciation for classical music starting with the musical excerpts on the Big Jon and Sparkie radio show in the early Fifties and the purchase of my first recording, The 101 Strings Play the Classics, around 1956. In the late Sixties I began teaching high school English and Film Studies as well as becoming interested in hi-fi, my audio ambitions graduating me from a pair of AR-3 speakers to the Fulton J's recommended by The Stereophile's J. Gordon Holt. In the early Seventies, I began writing for a number of audio magazines, including Audio Excellence, Audio Forum, The Boston Audio Society Speaker, The American Record Guide, and from 1976 until 2008, The $ensible Sound, for which I served as Classical Music Editor.

Today, I'm retired from teaching and use a pair of bi-amped VMPS RM40s loudspeakers for my listening. In addition to writing for the Classical Candor blog, I served as the Movie Review Editor for the Web site Movie Metropolis (formerly DVDTown) from 1997-2013. Music and movies. Life couldn't be better.

Karl Nehring, Editor and Contributor

For more than 20 years I was the editor of The $ensible Sound magazine and a regular contributor to both its equipment and recordings review pages. I would not presume to present myself as some sort of expert on music, but I have a deep love for and appreciation of many types of music, "classical" especially, and have listened to thousands of recordings over the years, many of which still line the walls of my listening room (and occasionally spill onto the furniture and floor, much to the chagrin of my long-suffering wife). I have always taken the approach as a reviewer that what I am trying to do is simply to point out to readers that I have come across a recording that I have found of interest, a recording that I think they might appreciate my having pointed out to them. I suppose that sounds a bit simple-minded, but I know I appreciate reading reviews by others that do the same for me — point out recordings that they think I might enjoy.

For readers who might be wondering about what kind of system I am using to do my listening, I should probably point out that I do a LOT of music listening and employ a variety of means to do so in a variety of environments, as I would imagine many music lovers also do. Starting at the more grandiose end of the scale, the system in which I do my most serious listening comprises Marantz CD 6007 and Onkyo CD 7030 CD players, NAD C 658 streaming preamp/DAC, Legacy Audio PowerBloc2 amplifier, and a pair of Legacy Audio Focus SE loudspeakers. I occasionally do some listening through pair of Sennheiser 560S headphones. I miss the excellent ELS Studio sound system in our 2016 Acura RDX (now my wife's daily driver) on which I had ripped more than a hundred favorite CDs to the hard drive, so now when driving my 2022 Accord EX-L Hybrid I stream music from my phone through its adequate but not outstanding factory system. For more casual listening at home when I am not in my listening room, I often stream music through the phone into a Vizio soundbar system that has tolerably nice sound for such a diminutive physical presence. And finally, at the least grandiose end of the scale, I have an Ultimate Ears Wonderboom II Bluetooth speaker for those occasions where I am somewhere by myself without a sound system but in desperate need of a musical fix. I just can’t imagine life without music and I am humbly grateful for the technology that enables us to enjoy it in so many wonderful ways.

William (Bill) Heck, Webmaster and Contributor

Among my early childhood memories are those of listening to my mother playing records (some even 78 rpm ones!) of both classical music and jazz tunes. I suppose that her love of music was transmitted genetically, and my interest was sustained by years of playing in rock bands – until I realized that this was no way to make a living. The interest in classical music was rekindled in grad school when the university FM station serving as background music for studying happened to play the Brahms First Symphony. As the work came to an end, it struck me forcibly that this was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard, and from that point on, I never looked back. This revelation was to the detriment of my studies, as I subsequently spent way too much time simply listening, but music has remained a significant part of my life. These days, although I still can tell a trumpet from a bassoon and a quarter note from a treble clef, I have to admit that I remain a nonexpert. But I do love music in general and classical music in particular, and I enjoy sharing both information and opinions about it.

The audiophile bug bit about the same time that I returned to classical music. I’ve gone through plenty of equipment, brands from Audio Research to Yamaha, and the best of it has opened new audio insights. Along the way, I reviewed components, and occasionally recordings, for The $ensible Sound magazine. Most recently I’ve moved to my “ultimate system” consisting of a BlueSound Node streamer, an ancient Toshiba multi-format disk player serving as a CD transport, Legacy Wavelet II DAC/preamp/crossover, dual Legacy PowerBloc2 amps, and Legacy Signature SE speakers (biamped), all connected with decently made, no-frills cables. With the arrival of CD and higher resolution streaming, that is now the source for most of my listening.

Ryan Ross, Contributor

I started listening to and studying classical music in earnest nearly three decades ago. This interest grew naturally out of my training as a pianist. I am now a musicologist by profession, specializing in British and other symphonic music of the 19th and 20th centuries. My scholarly work has been published in major music journals, as well as in other outlets. Current research focuses include twentieth-century symphonic historiography, and the music of Jean Sibelius, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Malcolm Arnold.

I am honored to contribute writings to Classical Candor. In an age where the classical recording industry is being subjected to such profound pressures and changes, it is more important than ever for those of us steeped in this cultural tradition to continue to foster its love and exposure. I hope that my readers can find value, no matter how modest, in what I offer here.


Bryan Geyer, Technical Analyst

I initially embraced classical music in 1954 when I mistuned my car radio and heard the Heifetz recording of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto. That inspired me to board the new "hi-fi" DIY bandwagon. In 1957 I joined one of the pioneer semiconductor makers and spent the next 32 years marketing transistors and microcircuits to military contractors. Home audio DIY projects remained a personal passion until 1989 when we created our own new photography equipment company. I later (2012) revived my interest in two channel audio when we "downsized" our life and determined that mini-monitors + paired subwoofers were a great way to mate fine music with the space constraints of condo living.

Visitors that view my technical papers on this site may wonder why they appear here, rather than on a site that features audio equipment reviews. My reason is that I tried the latter, and prefer to publish for people who actually want to listen to music; not to equipment. My focus is in describing what's technically beneficial to assure that the sound of the system will accurately replicate the source input signal (i. e. exhibit high accuracy) without inordinate cost and complexity. Conversely, most of the audiophiles of today strive to achieve sound that's euphonic, i.e. be personally satisfying. In essence, audiophiles seek sound that's consistent with their desire; the music is simply a test signal.

Mission Statement

It is the goal of Classical Candor to promote the enjoyment of classical music. Other forms of music come and go--minuets, waltzes, ragtime, blues, jazz, bebop, country-western, rock-'n'-roll, heavy metal, rap, and the rest--but classical music has been around for hundreds of years and will continue to be around for hundreds more. It's no accident that every major city in the world has one or more symphony orchestras.

When I was young, I heard it said that only intellectuals could appreciate classical music, that it required dedicated concentration to appreciate. Nonsense. I'm no intellectual, and I've always loved classical music. Anyone who's ever seen and enjoyed Disney's Fantasia or a Looney Tunes cartoon playing Rossini's William Tell Overture or Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 can attest to the power and joy of classical music, and that's just about everybody.

So, if Classical Candor can expand one's awareness of classical music and bring more joy to one's life, more power to it. It's done its job. --John J. Puccio

Contact Information

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"Their Master's Voice" by Michael Sowa

"Their Master's Voice" by Michael Sowa