Idis
Complete Bach Recordings, 1927-1955
About This Album
This historical reissue offers a good way to get to know the music-making of Andrés Segovia, one of those legendary figures better known by reputation than in detail. By collecting his recordings of Bach's music, the two-disc set's Italian compilers identified one of the thrusts of Segovia's campaign to make the guitar a "respectable" classical instrument -- an effort that now, with guitarists showing up on season schedules of organizations large and small, seems among the more significant innovations of the last century. Segovia tried not only to popularize the Spanish sound, and to commission new works from a variety of composers, but also, with these recordings, show that the inner sanctum of the hallowed temple of classical music, the oeuvre of Bach, could be approached with guitar in hand. The results help to illuminate why Segovia was so beloved in his own time. His successors exceeded him in sheer virtuosity, but there was always a sense of an individual's encounter with music in his performances, which had a very Iberian unpredictability. The listener does not quite get an orderly sense of Segovia's evolution as a musician over his long career, for the recordings, except for one 1935 outlier, fall into three large groups, from 1927-1928, 1947, and 1952-1955.
Track List

Disc 1

Partita For Solo Violin No. 3 In E Major, Bwv 1006
1.
Suite For Solo Cello No. 3 In C Major, Bwv 1009
2.
Prelude For Lute In C Minor, Bwv 999 (Bc L171)
3.
Suite for lute in E minor, BWV 996 (BC L166)
4.
Fugue for lute in G minor, BWV 1000
5.
Suite For Solo Cello No. 1 In G Major, Bwv 1007
6.
Partita For Solo Violin No. 2 In D Minor, Bwv 1004
7.
Partita For Solo Violin No. 3 In E Major, Bwv 1006
8.
Prelude For Lute In C Minor, Bwv 999 (Bc L171)
9.
Suite For Solo Cello No. 3 In C Major, Bwv 1009
10.
Suite for lute in E minor, BWV 996 (BC L166)
11.
12.
Suite for solo cello No. 6 in D major, BWV 1012
13.
Fugue for lute in G minor, BWV 1000
14.

Disc 2

Suite For Solo Cello No. 1 In G Major, Bwv 1007
1.
Suite for solo cello No. 6 in D major, BWV 1012
2.
Sonata For Solo Violin No. 1 In G Minor, Bwv 1001
3.
Suite for lute in E minor, BWV 996 (BC L166)
4.
Partita for solo violin No. 1 in B minor, BWV 1002
5.
Suite For Solo Cello No. 3 In C Major, Bwv 1009
6.
Prelude For Lute In C Minor, Bwv 999 (Bc L171)
7.
Partita For Solo Violin No. 2 In D Minor, Bwv 1004
8.
Partita For Solo Violin No. 3 In E Major, Bwv 1006
9.
Suite For Solo Cello No. 3 In C Major, Bwv 1009
10.
Fugue for lute in G minor, BWV 1000
11.