Alexandra Coghlan

Bach’s Cello Suites represent a spiritual meditation — from the Nativity to the Resurrection

It’s not a theory, the cellist Steven Isserlis insists, merely an ‘instinctive reaction’ — but it’s a striking argument

John Sebastian Bach (from Payne’s Universum, 1847). [Alamy] 
issue 23 October 2021
  • Comments

  • The Bach Cello Suites: A Companion

    Steven Isserlis

    Faber, pp. 240, £12

‘One player on four strings, with a bow.’ That’s what Bach’s six Cello Suites boil down to, says Steven Isserlis. It sounds simple enough, until you add more than 100 editions and 200 recordings into the equation, not to mention countless books, chapters and articles all wrestling with a work Isserlis calls ‘a Bible’ for cellists.

GIF Image

Disagree with half of it, enjoy reading all of it

Free for a month
Our magazine articles are for subscribers only. Try a month of Britain’s best writing, absolutely free.

Read next

Trending

Danny Shaw

Can Britain end its dependence on foreign workers?

Migration, migration, migration. Sir Keir Starmer didn’t express it like that in his Downing Street press conference, but he might as well have done. ‘Significantly’ reducing immigration, which is what he pledged in front of the cameras, can now be added to ‘smashing the gangs’ as clear priorities on which Labour will be judged over the

More on musical appreciation

Also by Alexandra Coghlan

Latest

Comments

Join the debate, free for a month

Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first month free.

Already a subscriber? Log in