Bach’s Cello Suites
I got two packages this week. One was a cardboard parcel snugly swaddling The Cello Suites: J. S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the Search for a Baroque Masterpiece. I have the highest hopes for it; I’ve heard the highest praise. The other was a flimsy envelope containing shards of plastic and a cracked CD case protecting a recording of Casals playing the Suites. I have a delicious plan to learn all about the Suites this way.
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Beauty gathers beauty. My man Rostropovich has a recording of Anner Bylsma playing the Suites. In the peaceful movement of this morning he put it on to compare it to the new Casals we put on last night. We listened to the first two Suites doubly interleaved; Suite I, Prelude, Bylsma; Suite I, Prelude, Casals; … Suite II, Gigue, Bylsma; Suite II, Gigue, Casals. We are in love.
P.S. The Anner Bylsma CD is of the first three suites. We discovered that I gave it to Roscivs nearly a decade ago. I knew he had listened to them a lot on his mission but we had forgotten that I had sent them to him. If I had not put a turtle sticker on the CD case we probably would have never remembered.
We also discovered that a CD of Anner Bylsma playing the last three suites costs $130 new.
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Post Note: the first part is a seed, the second is fruit.