Times Union: Classnotes: Six degrees of fresh Bach appreciation
November 18, 2019 Ask any cellist and they’ll have a unique insight or personal story about the six suites for unaccompanied cello by J.S. Bach. A few years ago Ashley […]
Tag Archives: Bach Cello Suites
I Care if You Listen: Matt Haimovitz: Overtures to Bach’s Cello at the Chelsea Music Festival
July 3, 2018 In the gorgeous General Theological Seminary in Chelsea, cellist Matt Haimovitz paired classic works by J.S. Bach with those of living composers Philip Glass, Du Yun, David Sanford, and Vijay Iver. […]
Arizona Daily Sun: Around the Town: Cello champion Haimovitz to perform at NAU’s Ashurst Hall
March 28, 2018 One of the best cellists in the world is coming to Northern Arizona University. The School of Music Horizons Concert Series is hosting Bach Listening Room with […]
Santa Fe New Mexican – Pasatiempo: In the language of Bach: Cellist Matt Haimovitz
September 15, 2017 “There are a handful of human beings in our history that you sort of can’t imagine the world without their existence,” Matt Haimovitz said in response to a […]
The Washington Post: Cellist challenges listeners in museum concerts
October 23, 2017 Cellist Matt Haimovitz is known for expanding perceptions about his instrument. That includes a career-long championship of contemporary music, as well as performing in unexpected venues, such […]
The Salt Lake Tribune: There’s room for cello on the musical menu at the U. of Utah
October 3, 2016 Courtesy | Steph Mackinnon Genre-busting cellist Matt Haimovitz, who will give a recital, a master class and a couple of pop-up performances at the University of […]
Superconductor: Concert Review: A Journey in the Dark
September 26, 2016 Matt Haimovitz at The Crypt Sessions The cellist Matt Haimovitz is one of the mavericks of his instrument, breaking new ground with each commission for solo cello […]
CBC Music: Matt Haimovitz unveils 6 new Overtures to Bach
September 21, 2016 “Perhaps a handful of minds throughout history have had as profound an impact as Bach on future composers and thinkers,” muses Montreal cellist Matt Haimovitz. “Bach is […]
La Scena Musicale: Review – Overtures to Bach: Matt Haimovitz (Pentatone Oxingale)
September 1, 2016 Recently named Pentatone’s Artist of the Season, Matt Haimovitz has never shied from making waves in performance or recording. The Montreal-based cellist has already proven his Bach […]
My Classical Notes: OVERTURES to Bach
August 23, 2016 Performing artists are continuing to explore new ways to present their music. We have seen works by a contemporary composer joined with compositions from the 1700’s. We […]
Classical-Modern Music: OVERTURES to Bach album review
August 26, 2016 If you do not know, Matt Haimovitz is that enormously talented, accomplished and daring more-or-less young cellist who has embarked on a series of brilliant, genre bending […]
Merker: Cello Suiten nach Anna Magdalena
November 21, 2015 J. S. BACH – The Cello Suites according to Magdalena– Matt Haimovitz; PENTATONE Oxingale Series 2 CD von Dr. Ingobert Waltenberger Der neugierige und vor allem auch als Vorkämpfer […]
Daily Hampshire Gazette: A Bach rebirth: Matt Haimovitz returns to Valley, cello in hand, to reinterpret baroque masterpieces
March 8, 2016 You don’t usually expect to find a classical cellist at a rock club. But Matt Haimovitz isn’t your usual classical cellist.
Audiophile Audition – BACH: The Cello Suites (complete, Anna Magdalena manuscript) – Matt Haimovitz, cello – Pentatone (2 discs)
Haimovitz gives thoughtful and well-considered performances of these seminal works in resonant sound that captures his baroque cello and cello piccolo (Suite 6) in terrific sonics. I won’t harp yet again on the felicities of recording solo and small ensembles in surround sound—often more than the largest Mahler symphony, these sorts of settings benefit from the finest sound, allowing the most subtle of expressions to come across as if one was sitting directly in the presence of these artists in the most intimate of listening spaces.
Gramophone Magazine – Album Review: JS BACH Six Solo Cello Suites, BWV1007-1012
“Haimovitz brings a beguiling lightness to the line that propels the listener from the sunny serenity of the Prelude to the moto perpetuo of the final Gigue, despite the deceptively complicated harmonic structure of that Suite as a whole. This, in turn, allows the almost preternatural control he displays in the Sarabande of the Fifth Suite to unravel it with all the desolation of a melodic line that has no hint of that previous complexity, and create the impact it should – as a profound statement of emotional isolation.”
Strings Magazine: Matt Haimovitz Returns to the Solo Suites and Intimate Venues
Given his commitment to connecting with his audience, Haimovitz chose a unique way to share this passion with his listeners. He has commissioned preludes to the Six Solo Suites, created by contemporary composers from diverse backgrounds and disciplines. “It’s a way to bring these suites into the 21st century,” he says, “to have living, breathing composers grapple with the materials, Bach’s musical building blocks, and find their own take on it.”
The six composers bringing contemporary vitality to Bach are Philip Glass, Luna Pearl Woolf, Du Yun, Vijay Iyer, Roberto Sierra, and Mohammed Fairouz. Haimovitz has encouraged them to draw on folk melodies, just as Bach did in his day. As we spoke, the pieces were still being written, and Haimovitz’s excitement and anticipation is contagious.
Oxingale Records 