Album Notes

Few would argue with the assertion that Johann Sebastian Bach was the greatest musical genius of his time. Whereas other composers from the baroque era tended to work within the national fashions of their day, he succeeded in blending and transcending all styles to create music that seems genuinely timeless. It is perhaps for this reason that most musicians nowadays, however freely they may approach the music of ‘lesser’ composers, have strong opinions, rigorously defended, about how Bach should be played

The generally accepted consensus amongst today’s musical cognoscenti is that Bach’s music is so perfect, so dense, intricate and mathematically precise, that it must be left to speak for itself, aided only by a good general sense of baroque performance style. The performer must not be tempted to ‘personalise’ it – far less, re-write it – in any way. So in this light it is perhaps ironic that his music has also been tampered with more than that of any other composer – such that we have Switched-On Bach from synthesizer virtuoso Wendy Carlos, Jaques Loussier’s jazzed-up Bach, rock-Bach from Jethro Tull and Sky, the romantic Bach orchestrations of Leonard Stokowsky, and so on – the reverse argument being that Bach’s music is so perfect and robust that it cannot be destroyed, no matter what liberties one takes!

It would be interesting to know Bach’s own opinion about how he would like his music to be performed, here in the 21st century. (Actually, most likely he would be staggered to think that it is still in existence at all, let alone be such an important part of today’s musical output!) Certainly there is evidence that he was not the strict authoritarian that some would have us believe – indeed he was described by his pupil Mizler (in an obituary published in 1754) as possessing a ‘light and witty style’ of performance, and there are contemporary accounts of him berating pupils exactly for sticking to his written notes – instead, he would encourage a free spirit of improvisation and embellishment. Bach himself was of course very free with his treatment of the music of others - evidenced, for example, by his solo keyboard transcriptions of concertos by Vivaldi and other Italian masters.

In our CD ‘Johann, I’m Only Dancing’ we attempt to strike a balance between the commercialism of ‘pop-Bach’ and the austerity of ‘authentic’ Bach to create a new sort of ‘rock-chamber-Bach’. We have drawn repertoire from many different sources along the way, and the prime goal in our choice of pieces has been to highlight Bach’s sublime ear for melody and harmony, and the infectious dance spirit which pervades so much of his work. The title, stolen from a David Bowie hit (“John, I’m only dancing – don’t get me wrong, she turns me on, but I’m only dancing”) perhaps best sums up our entirely honourable intentions!