Cello Suite No. 2 in D Minor

Unlike the neat patterns which opened No. 1, the “Prelude” which begins the Suite No. 2 offers a more narrative flow, coaxing expressive melodic phrases from a constant stream of notes, and ending emphatically with some wide-spaced string crossings. The “Allemande” is a noble, dignified movement, closer in style to those found in Bach’s keyboard works, and full of inner tension—which becomes nervous tension in the skittish, darting “Courante” that follows. The “Sarabande”, with its characteristic lean on the second beat, is a majestic lament, rising in pitch and pathos at the close. Between the “Sarabande” and final “Gigue”, Bach chose a different pair of dances for each suite. Here, the “Menuets” represent the most up-to-date and fashionably phrased dances of the six suites: with “Menuet” I repeated after “Menuet” II in the French manner. The concluding “Gigue” is of the short-breathed, percussive type, regularly accented and just a little halting. About J.S. Bach's Cello Suites Works for an unaccompanied solo instrument—especially the cello—were rare in Bach’s day and were much more likely to have been improvised than painstakingly written down. The six solo Cello Suites (BWV 1007-12) were composed during Bach’s time at the court of Cöthen (1717-23). Although it is unlikely that they were conceived as a set, all six works follow a similar pattern. To the traditional suite—allemande, courante, sarabande and gigue—Bach added an introductory prelude and tucked in a pair of fashionable modern dances (minuets, bourrées, or gavottes) before the final gigue. Not published until 1825, it wasn’t until they were recorded by Pablo Casals in the 1930s that they began to enjoy widespread popularity.