Played by JAMES CHING
Prelude from English Suite in F Major Minuet from French Suite in D Minor
Prelude and Fugue in F Minor from Book II of the ' 48 ' LAST night we heard a Partita or set of short pieces by Bach. The sets of pieces called
Suites are much like the Partitas in general style. Why a certain collection of the Suites that was published after Bach's death cams, to bo known as 'English' is not known for certain.
The Prelude to the Suite in F (the Fourth of the six Suites named English ') is a lively, long and well-worked-out piece in woven style, generally in two strands or ' voices,' but sometimes in three or four—one voice constantly starting some little tune, and another then taking it over imitatively.
The 'French-' Suites were probably so called on account of their light character. The dances are all short, and in general slighter than tlfose in the Partitas and ' 'English' Suites.
The F minor Prelude in the Second Book is one of the most sensitively beautiful and expressive movements in the ' Forty-eight.' The poetry of the three-note falling motif, out of which so much of it is made, almost becomes articulate.
The Fugue has a rather long theme (' Subject') with a fall of seven notes at one point, that, often repeated in various parts of the piece, gives just a touch of pathos to it.