Mr. Sverdlove is an alumni of the Bowdoin International Music Festival where he studied several summers with Lewis Kaplan of the Juilliard School. Max was also the recipient of the Bryce and Jonelle Jordan Music Scholarship to the Penn State University School of Music where he was a student of James Lyon. Max Sverdlove graduated from Penn State with a Bachelor of Music in Violin Performance in May 2005. Mr. Sverdlove performs on the "Arcalli", a fine Italian mid-18th century violin and currently records exclusively on the Musical Horizon label.
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This is the first mini-album in the "Max Does" series of recordings. Each "Max Does" is a novel interpretation of a selection from the standard classical violin repertoire.
Max Does: Bach Sonata in A minor was performed with a modernized view on the baroque performance style.
This recording was performed using a modern copy of a baroque-era long bow crafted out of snakewood by Christopher English. The Arcalli was equipped with modern day synthetic strings instead of traditional catgut strings and the strings were tuned to the modern standard of A440.
When in doubt of a composer’s intentions, I believe a musician should perform using a current standard, if one exists. However, if a performer is provided with evidence that shows that using a modern standard would be stylistically incorrect, one should always try to find and apply the “best-fit” standard as appropriate.
It is for this reason that I chose to perform using a baroque bow. The violin bows in Bach’s time varied greatly in shape and length. In fact, there were no standards to the shape or length determined at that time. The modern bow (which is based on the classic Tourte bow) was very different from those present during Bach’s era. I chose to perform utilizing a long bow because many passages in this particular Bach Sonata would be quite impossible to perform using a period short bow, especially those with really long held notes. Another reason that I chose the baroque long bow over the modern bow is due to the fact that many of the passages in the Sonata are stylistically performed correctly and more accurately utilizing a bow with an arched back, one with fewer hairs than a modern bow, and with a bow which weighs quite a bit less than today’s modern bows.
I had a much more difficult time determining whether I should use catgut strings tuned to a “baroque” pitch or to use synthetic strings tuned to A440. It is almost impossible to determine what tuning a composer in the Baroque-era had intended for their music to be performed at. In fact, the modern standard of A=440 Hz was not made official by the International Organization for Standardization until 1955. Before this standard was determined, it was common practice for musicians to tune their instruments to the local church bell, organ, or other keyboard instrument. This resulted in the “correct” pitch having a great range. It was not unheard of for one ensemble to perform a composition at A415 (an entire half-step lower from A440) and another at A466 (a half step higher than A440). There are reports of even more dramatic pitch variations.
In recent years, many period ensembles have adopted a practice of performing baroque music at A415. It is believed that our sense of “in-tune” pitch has increased over time and thus classical music is generally “correctly” performed at A430, and many performers are currently tuning at A442 (or even higher frequencies) for modern music. I chose to record at the modern A440 because I have no way to know what tuning standard Bach had in mind and to simply choose A415 would have been an “uneducated guess”. If I had evidence as to what pitch Bach intended for his music to be performed at, I would have chosen to record at his standard.
In reference to the modern synthetic strings versus catgut strings dilemma, I chose synthetic strings because catgut strings are more likely to break when wound at higher tensions (hence why I believe many modern period performers choose A415 as more appropriate – handmade catgut strings are generally very expensive). I also personally prefer the sound catgut strings produce when tuned at lower frequencies. In my opinion, catgut strings tuned at higher tensions start to sound very tinny at times. Lastly, tuning at the modern A440 simply correlated to performing on a modern string. I decided that this would be the best way to more precisely reproduce the pitches in an accurate manner. It should be noted that if I had chosen to perform at A415, I most definitely would have chosen to perform on catgut strings to better reflect the sound of the time period.
Throughout the performance of this Sonata, I use the bowings as specified by Bach in his score. After studying photocopies of Bach’s handwritten score, I came to realize that the standard bowings as suggested and published by many of the great teachers differ greatly from Bach’s original bowings. Even the urtext editions, although they were by far the closest, sometimes got it wrong by adding an extra note under a slur. The first example of this can be found in the second half of measure 14 in Grave. I play the bottom two notes separate (up-down) from the two slurred passages.
Aside from following the exact markings that Bach made on his score, in most sections of the Sonata, I try to follow the standard Baroque procedure of keeping downbeats and strong beats played as down bows with more emphasis and weaker beats played as up bows with less emphasis. Sometimes this means that I was required to retake the bowing (play two strokes in the same direction with a slight pause between each, or literally in other cases, I had to pick the bow up and replace the bow on the string). There are of course exceptions to this rule. The first of which is the first note of the piece. Although the first note of Grave is written on the downbeat, I do not see this note as being a part of the melodic idea. It is a grand gesture to announce the key. Hence, not only do I play this chord as an up-bow, I play it from the top down, emphasizing the bottom 2 octave As. The following short G helps to outline the key of A natural minor. I believe the true musical form of this opening passage begins on the following note, F, which is not a downbeat, but a downward embellishment into the downbeat at the second half of the measure. The passage works perfectly fine without those first two introductory bow strokes. Another case where the standard up and down bows are not followed is when a sequence occurs. In these sections, I simply follow the bowings as they come without any retaking of bow strokes. This is due to the passages lesser importance of strong and weak beats and the higher necessity of keeping the melodic and/or harmonic pattern going.
At the end of Grave, I understand the last two and a half measures to be an extended embellished cadence outlining the key of A minor and ending in the dominant key of E harmonic minor. The actual movement ends at the 3rd beat of measure 21. There has been some confusion among performers as to the meaning of the markings that Bach notated above and below the third to last chord of this tag. Many have incorrectly determined the notation to be a trill. Others, have come closer to my understanding of this notation, and have determined it to be a left-hand vibrato. However, they are also mistaken. I believe Bach intended the performer to use a baroque technique known as a bow-vibrato. This is performed by adding and removing pressure to the bow using the index finger throughout the bow stroke and can only be correctly executed using a bow with an arched back (such as the baroque long bow).
In some passages throughout Fuga, I play the chords from the top down, instead of the standard bottom up. I chose to do this in order to keep the melodic line from being interrupted by the intersecting notes. By doing so the melodic patterns are brought out much more clearly. This creates a very different (and sometimes shocking to those who have never experienced it) sound to these passages. I encourage everybody to keep an open mind. Another passage in this movement where a first-time listener might be surprised starts at measure 206. I tried to give the slurred notes (always the downbeat) more importance and thus a greater emphasis. The passing notes, if played separately, have a contemporary feel to them when separated from the slurred notes. It almost sounds akin to 20th and 21st century minimalism. I tried to bring this out to the best of my ability.
I changed my bowings in Andante many times before I recorded this movement. In fact, I suspect that my opinions as to how this movement should be bowed will change again. The music has two parts (a melody and a drone accompaniment) and as such it is impossible to play each and every note using separate bowings without slurring and tying them together under one bow stroke. Although Bach wrote very few bowings in this movement, it is necessary to add them. Where to place the slurs and ties is sometimes very difficult to determine. I attempted to keep each patterns bowings the same throughout the movement. But due to slight differences in the number of notes within each related passage, it became increasingly difficult to determine which notes should be put together. Sometimes, I also added rolls to chords (played from bottom to top in sequence instead of simultaneously) in order to keep the melody from being interrupted. I decided that rolling the bow across the strings was much more appropriate to the nature of this movement, rather than as I had in Fuga, starting the chords from the top down.
The last movement, Allegro, was performed the most straight-forward out of all of the movements. Many performers add slurs to the sequences starting at measures 3, 17, 27, and 42. I play these passages without slurs since Bach did not add them and it is entirely possible to perform it this way. Besides adding them changes the entire musical idea. I also do not repeat the second half. Bach wrote an additional fermata on top of the final repeat sign. I interpret this to mean that he only wrote the repeat as a marker to indicate the musical form of the movement, but intended for the performer to not follow this repeat. This is further backed up by his marking piano three measures before the end. This is as if an organist pulled out all of the stops on the organ to create that ethereal effect created when only the smallest of the pipes are being used and creates finality to the entire sonata as a whole.
- Max Sverdlove
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Special thanks goes to: Robert Nairn for introducing me to historical performance practice while I was a student at Penn State and to Judson Griffin for his introductory lessons to baroque violin performance and technique
Thanks also given to: My parents for their encouragement and support, as well as, all of my friends and co-workers who have inspired me each and every day.
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