J.S. BACH
The Well-Tempered Clavier Book II

David Korevaar
PIANO


MS1021   ~   19.95 (2CD set)

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American Record Guide, July/August 2005

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J.S.Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier Book I

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For pianist David Korevaar, composing has provided a depth of insight that makes his performances "extraordinary" (Washington Post), and "sonically impressive and thoroughly commanding" (The Boston Globe). He has been heard in solo recitals, chamber music, and orchestral performances throughout the United States, as well as in Japan and Europe. He is a founding member of the Prometheus Piano Quartet, and earlier toured as a founder of the Young Concert Artists ensemble Hexagon.

David Korevaar's compositions have earned him high regard, as has his sympathetic handling of the compositions  of his peers.  He has participated in the commissioning and premiering of a number of new works, as well as the performance and recording of works by American composers including Rochberg, Copland, Rorem, Riegger, Stephen Jaffe, Scott Eyerly, Libby Larson and Lowell Liebermann.

Honors and awards include top prizes in the University of Maryland William Kapell International Piano Competition and from the Peabody-Mason Music Foundation, as well as a special prize for his performance of French music awarded by the Robert Casadesus Competition.

 

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In the early 1740's, J.S. Bach completed a compilation that he called Twenty-Four New Preludes and Fugues. These pieces are arranged exactly as his Well-Tempered Clavier Book I of 20 years earlier (that is, a Prelude and Fugue in each major and minor key, moving upwards by half step from C major to B minor) and have thus come to be known as the Well-Tempered Clavier Book II. There are fewer slow pieces in this book than in the first, a difference particularly noticeable in the case of the Fugues, many of which resemble identifiable Baroque dances in their rhythms and gestures. Moreover, the Preludes are longer and more thoroughly developed than in Book I. 

Historically, Bach's WTC II is the last major expression of the Prelude and Fugue as a form Already in the 1740's, these pieces were seen as archaic. The Rococo, Pre-classical style, with its increased emphasis on homophonic writing (melody and accompaniment), was coming into fashion, and Bach's intensely contrapuntal approach to composition was seen as no longer relevant to the musical times. With hindsight, it is possible to hear this second book as a kind of answer to that historical reality: while demonstrating the "learned" style of which Bach was the last and greatest master, these Preludes and Fugues also exhibit a range of emotion and mix of compositional styles that look forward to the nascent "Classical" style of Haydn and Mozart.

 

Visit David Korevaar's Website:
 www.davidkorevaar.com

 

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