Sunday, May 3, 2020

Good Intentions Down the Road to …

Sergey Malov with his cello da spalla on the cover of his new album (courtesy of Naxos of America)

We are now only a little more than four months into the year; and I feel as if I have already encountered the worst classical recording of the year or, at least, the worst recording of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. Sergei Malov is one of the recent musicians to champion the cello da spalla, a cello small enough to be braced by the shoulder. He is the latest cellist to record the six Bach suites for unaccompanied cello (BWV 1007–1012) with this instrument, following in the footsteps of Sigiswald Kuijken and Ryo Terakado. His recording was released by Solo Musica at the beginning of this month, this past Friday.

I should make it clear that I have long been interested in what may be called “innovative approaches to historically-informed performance.” However, to the extent that these suites were probably composed for pedagogical purposes, it is easy to imagine that Bach would have encouraged their being performed on different instruments. Whether there was ever a “correct” instrument is a matter of little more than idle speculation.

Where Bach’s approach to pedagogy is concerned, all that really matters is a solid command of technical skills which may then be engaged to take an inventive approach to performance. On the technical side Malov’s bowing technique tends to be crude, and his approaches to tempo are consistently rushed. Such an approach leaves little room for invention, suggesting that Malov’s approach to these suites misses the point on all fronts. Indeed, between his breakneck tempo selections and his tendency to omit repetitions, one might guess that his only goal was to get all six suites to fit on a single CD. Achieving that goal may be the only success in his undertaking this Bach project.

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