Interpreting Bach at the Keyboard

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. In this important 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. 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.

CONTENIDO

Abbreviations
A note on terminology
Part 1. General Problems of Interpretation
1. An authentic eighteenth- century performance source: C.F. Colt's organ-barrels
2. Studies in rhythm
3. In search of the correct Bach tempo
4. Bach's articulation
5. Dynamics
6. Problems of sonority
7. Problems of harpsichord and piano technique, and of expressive playing
8. The Urtext problem: An imaginary interview
9. Rendering the structure as a whole
10. Prelude in E flat minor and Fugue in D sharp minor, WTC I, BWV 853. An analysis for performance
Part II. Studies in Ornamentation
11. Introduction
12. The development of ornamentation in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
13. J.S. Bach's ornaments: Some general remarks
14. Pralltriller
15. Appoggiaturas
16. The loner trill
17. Bach's mordent
18. Arpeggios
19. The application of ornaments that are not notated
20. Free embellishments in Bach's keyboard works
21. Epilogue
Appendix 1. Some recommended editions of Bach's keyboard works
Appendix 2. Some textual and interpretational problems in Bach's Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue, BWV 903
Appendix 3. J.M. Gesner, 'Johann Sebastian Bach as conductor, keyboard player, and organist' (Göttingen, 1738)
Appendix 4. Excerpt from the Article 'Takt' in J.G. Sulzer's Allgemeine Theorie der schónen Kunste , vol. ii (Leipzig, 1774)
Appendix 5. The Dedication of Partita No. 1 (BWV 825) and the Dedicatory Poem
Appendix 6. Friedrich Blume and Hans Joachim Moser
Bibliography
Index