Bach Cello Suites and dancing

[AndrewMeronek]

Lately I've been revisiting the Bach Cello Suites (as a trombonist often does). To provide personal context, I've done a lot of local dances lately in my musical career, and most of these tend to be a mix of swing dancing and modern pop DJ stuff. So - revisiting the Cello Suites, all of them have an Allemande, and the Allemande is a dance. But - it's interesting that if I go look up Allemande dancing and compare that to how people typically perform Bach, there is a huge disconnect. There's nothing dance-like about a lot of modern interpretations of Bach Allemandes. Is this a bad thing? I don't know. There is definitely an aesthetic to going to a concert and appreciating Bach for the music's melodic and contrapuntal mastery (displayed in dramatic fashion with lots of rubato and technical flair) and there's an audience who wants just to sit passive in an audience and experience exactly that. But for Bach, when he wrote those Suites, what was the context? Would they be for a cellist who might host an impromptu party at someone's home and provide some fun dance music? Performing music for people to literally dance to is VERY different from performing sit-down-and-listen concert music.
Example of people actually dancing this dance. It's stately, bouncy, and energetic. Not heavily dramatic.



Here's an even sprite-lier take:



For comparison, a great but very different take on the Allemande (this one actually from Suite #1) in concert:

[Burgerbob]

I think it's relatively accepted that the cello suites are not actual dances.

[AndrewMeronek]

I think it's relatively accepted that the cello suites are not actual dances.

Yes, that is the current practice. I'm not convinced that should be gospel, though. Bach's music absolutely CAN dance if you approach it as such. And as far as I've been able to find, the original manuscript/dating/context/etc. from Bach is lost, so we don't really know for sure how they were initially consumed.

[HornboneandVocals]

I had to research suite 5 for a jury performance once: the suites to my knowledge were originally written as a sort of etude for bach’s cello students.

I’ve been in performance classes with string players who interpreted suites as baroque dances. The ones I heard were quite effective! Particularly on Viola, funnily enough

[AndrewMeronek]

I had to research suite 5 for a jury performance once: the suites to my knowledge were originally written as a sort of etude for bach’s cello students.

I’ve been in performance classes with string players who interpreted suites as baroque dances. The ones I heard were quite effective! Particularly on Viola, funnily enough

Yeah, it's awesome how adaptable so much of Bach's music is.

[AndrewMeronek]

In case anyone is interested, here is a snippet of my little personal project.

Bachsuiteexample.png

I definitely encourage anyone to have fun making their own arrangements of these, not just their own interpretations.



When it comes to arranging, that question of whether to interpret a movement as an actual dance or not really becomes relevant.

[Doug Elliott]

The big difference between the dance tunes and the Bach is the size of melodic skips. The Bach's wide skips and range makes it quite difficult to play at tempo, and also awkward to listen to at a faster tempo. Maybe not so difficult on cello, but that serves a very different purpose of practicing string crossings.

Make it into a tango and it works better.

[Lhbone]

My quick and lazy answer because I’m on my phone: Bach was inspired by the rhythms and meter of those French dances and used it as a basis for his compositions. We see this all the time in music and art. Another example that pops into my mind is early to mid 20th century European (mainly Paris school) composers who were influenced by jazz. They began incorporating elements, such as higher tessitura, syncopation, glissandi, etc. into their music, but I think we’d all agree that the music by Milhaud, Martin, Defaye, Bozza, etc. is not jazz and would not be used in dance halls in that time period. Knowing the roots of inspiration can and should inform your stylistic choices of the music but won’t fully imitate it.

[LeTromboniste]

Thing is, the baroque suite as a form originates from dance music, and it's more than just "inspired by", it's a whole genre that is directly derived from dance. Yet that doesn't mean it's literally meant to be danced to. Even in the 17th century, I think dance suites (for example Froberger, Corelli) were already generally "art music" and not functional actual dance pieces. Let alone in Bach's time, decades later. I'm pretty sure some of the forms that were still always included in dance suites in the 18th century had already been out of fashion as actual dances for several decades, so how much thought the composers really gave to the motions of a dance they might have never even seen, is a good question. Of course that's not to say anything goes, we should still let ourselves be educated by the dances, as the composers and performers then would have been, and I think we can generally consider that the typical modern tempi tend to be over-indulgent – the slow tempi should probably not be quite that slow, and some of the extremely fast tempi are likewise probably too fast. The sarabande for example is stately, but it's not a funeral procession. It's still a dance. Once should be able to almost think of it in 1, and it's certainly too slow if you're able to think in 6.

[SteveM]

It's hard to imagine any composer using the name of a dance form as the title of a piece that roughly conforms to the rhythms and structure of that dance form not expecting the performance to retain a fairly strong resemblance to the music that is ordinarily heard for that dance. A waltz is going to be played roughly in "waltz temp", a minuet, the same. A landler in Schumann or Mahler will be played in the tempo of a landler. In jazz, a samba or tango is going to be approached with an understanding that there is a basic tempo and feel to these dances that will be a captured in the performance. Of course, in concert or "art" music, some liberties, such as rubato, may be taken, but I think that, regardless of what you may hear from some classical performers today, straying too far from the elements of that dance is likely to also stray from the composers' intentions.

[Kdanielsen]

Thing is, the baroque suite as a form originates from dance music, and it's mroenthan just "inspired by", it's a whole genre that is directly derived from dance. Yet that doesn't mean it's literally meant to be danced to. Even in the 17th century, I think dance suites (for example Froberger, Corelli) were already generally "art music" and not functional actual dance pieces. Let alone in Bach's time, decades later. I'm pretty sure some of the forms that were still always included in dance suites in the 18th century had already been out of fashion as actual dances for several decades, so how much thought the composers really gave to the motions of a dance they might have never even seen, is a good question. Of course that's not to say anything goes, we should still let ourselves be educated by the dances, as the composers and performers then would have been, and I think we can generally consider that the typical modern tempi tend to be over-indulgent – the slow tempi should probably not be quite that slow, and some of the extremely fast tempi are likewise probably too fast. The sarabande for example is stately, but it's not a funeral procession. It's still a dance. Once should be able to almost think of it in 1, and it's certainly too slow if you're able to think in 6.

Maximillian nails it (of course). A common term for this is stylized dance music. That’s worth a google.

[baileyman]

I would expect the dance labels to indicate dance related rhythm and accenting to make it "swing" in that style. A dance's tempo would be constrained by how quickly or slowly people could dance the style and still feel its sense. (Probably performed at businessman's bounce tempo.) An art piece could extend that range since the ears could hear faster than the feet. I've long thought the things swing well in 50s style. Isn't it true that shortly after Bach's death the guy basically disappeared for a hundred years or so? maybe a couple hundred? I'd be surprised if there is much remembrance of these pieces in period, but likely lots of speculation.

[BGuttman]

For the record, Bach's music was rehabilitated by Mendelssohn so about a century would be right.

But remember, music is a combination of the notes on the page and the person performing them. Look at the wide variety of tempi taken by different conductors of the Beethoven symphonies-- even with metronome markings suggested by the composer. Like what you hear? Great. Don't like it? Don't listen.

[jacobgarchik]

I'm a big fan of Paolo Pandolfo's renditions of the cello suites for Viola da Gamba, especially his additions to the dance movements. He adds counterlines, harmonies, doubles lower octaves, and changes some keys to fit the viola da gamba. Gives a sense that the dance movements are the "fun" movements, where more liberties are taken.
the cd is out of print but you can hear it here.



Frederick Zlotkin has a very interesting recording where he improvises ornamentation.

if you want to go mad with bach cello suites, there's a website with reviews of over 150 recordings. And this doesn't even have all of them for cello, let alone adaptations to other instruments.
some people try and be faithful, some try to be more creative, some fall in between.
Many people have recorded the suites twice, and some people three times. Pieter Wispelwey seems to record them lower and lower in pitch as each decade leads to new insight into pitch standards used in Bach's time. His most recent recording is something like a full step lower than modern pitch.

https://bachcellosuites.co.uk/

[timothy42b]

The amount of rubato players decide to add has a lot to do with whether they sound like dances or even possibly are danceable.

In some versions it sounds a bit like the player adds rubato not for expression but to get past a technical difficulty. Well it sounds that way to me anyway.

[harrisonreed]

Mischa Maisky takes the win. His interpretations are spectacular. I don't think Bach would have been sad if Mischa performed his works in that style. Maybe surprised at first. Probably by the end he might even think "wait, did *I* write that? Go me"

You have to remember that these works resurfaced in the late 1800s and our knowledge of them is largely informed by the recordings of one person, Pablo Casals, in the early 20th century. He essentially spent his entire life interpreting the 6 suites, and the recordings he did came out in conjunction with advances in recording technology. So an entire generation of cellists grew up with him as the guide. If people are taking liberties with rubato, they are doing it while standing on Cascals shoulders.

[dukesboneman]

This is a fascinating book on the Cello suites.
It`s split into 3 parts
1) Info on Bach nd the writing of each suite
2) Casal`s insight into each suite
3) The authors journey into learning and playing them

[AndrewMeronek]

Just another little detail in the performance practice: Bach wrote a 16th note pickup for this Allemande in question - but the Allemande's traditional start is an eighth-note pickup and this is what Maisky does as well.

Make it into a tango and it works better.

There actually seems to be some overlap between a tango tempo and some of the recordings of various Allemandes.

[Kbiggs]

Mischa Maisky takes the win. His interpretations are spectacular. I don't think Bach would have been sad if Mischa performed his works in that style. Maybe surprised at first. Probably by the end he might even think "wait, did *I* write that? Go me"

You have to remember that these works resurfaced in the late 1800s and our knowledge of them is largely informed by the recordings of one person, Pablo Casals, in the early 20th century. He essentially spent his entire life interpreting the 6 suites, and the recordings he did came out in conjunction with advances in recording technology. So an entire generation of cellists grew up with him as the guide. If people are taking liberties with rubato, they are doing it while standing on Cascals shoulders.

I don’t agree with Maisky’s interpretations. His interpretation of faster movements make them seem like technical études where he’s racing to the finish, while the slower ones are v e r y s l o o o w, where the phrase almost gets lost between the notes… that is, too slow for me. It all seems very modern in time, articulation, phrasing.

I can’t point to any specific recordings of the cello suites, but I’ve enjoyed some of the interpretations in the Netherland Bach Society’s videos, “All of Bach.”

See especially the 6th Suite, which apparently was written for violoncello da spalla, performed by Sergey Malov. It’s a very different interpretation which feels more dance-like and yet it “breathes.”

Related to that would be some of Monica Huggett’s interpretations of the violin sonatas and partitas. They really breathe, while remaining dance-like.

I don’t know whether it’s a matter of chacun á son gôut or de gustibus non disputandum est, but there is it.

[LetItSlide]

I think it's relatively accepted that the cello suites are not actual dances.

We can dance if we want to.