Featured Album September 2024: Mahan Esfahani "Bach: Preludes, Inventions & Sinfonias"
Returning to our Featured Album series this September, we're delighted to introduce the new album by harpsichord virtuoso Mahan Esfahani. The latest in his series of solo recordings of music by J S Bach sees Esfahani tackle Preludes, Inventions & Sinfonias taking in both the harpsichord and clavichord. Released very recently on Hyperion Records, read on to discover more about this latest offering...
Bach: Preludes, Inventions & Sinfonias
Mahan Esfahani
OUR FEATURED ALBUM FOR SEPTEMBER 2024
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From the artist's press release:
A collection of miniatures centred around the sets of Inventions and Sinfonias which Bach wrote principally as teaching aids—of an extremely superior kind, it should be noted—to encourage any young keyboard player ‘keen to learn’. These joyous, enthralling accounts from Mahan Esfahani prove that there is a great deal more to them than that.
"Every student and performer who has spent a lifetime with the inventions and sinfonias owes every iota of their critical engagement with this music to the British scholar Richard Jones, whose exemplary edition for the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music is the benchmark for any true understanding of Bach’s works as living texts. I dedicate this recording to him and to the significant impact his work has had on me since my first contact with Bach’s music." – Mahan Esfahani, 2024
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Why The Early Music Shop loves "Preludes, Inventions & Sinfonias":
Following on from his previous recordings for Hyperion of Johann Sebastian Bach’s keyboard music (the popular Italian Concerto and French Overture; the French Suites), as well as the Notebooks for Anna Magdalena, for which he was joined by soprano Carolyn Sampson, Mahan Esfahani’s latest release is entirely devoted to what may be thought of as teaching pieces by the great master. Esfahani’s programme is centred on the fifteen Two-part Inventions and the fifteen Three-part Inventions, while assorted little preludes (BWV924–943) offer further contrast.
This assembly of high-class pedagogical miniatures for Bach’s eldest son, Wilhelm Friederich – and in the fullness of time for his younger brothers – remains, even today, part of any budding pianist’s rite of passage. Their instruction in different keyboard styles and independence of hands, using keys that are manageable to the youthful keyboard player, allows the formation of essential skills for the player.
Esfahani, however, shows us that there is far more to these miniatures than teaching fodder. His playing – clear, precise, ever-alert to Bach’s phrasing – reveals the true power of this music to belie its pedagogical origins. Whether on clavichord or harpsichord – Esfahani is a master of both – he possesses the unfailing ability to seek out the essential character of each of these short pieces and deliver it newly minted.
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Preludes, Inventions & Sinfonias is available now from The Early Music Shop online or in our Snape Maltings showroom.
Click here to order now!
Click below to hear a preview of the opening track: