J. S. Bach Suite No. 2 in D minor, BWV 1008

Johann Sebastian Bach was born at Eisenach on 21 March 1685 and died in Leipzig on 28 July 1750.  The six suites for solo cello BWV 1007-1012 were written around 1720 while Bach was in Cöthen.  In the tradition of the instrumental dance suite, all six contain a Prélude, Allemande, Courante, Sarabande and Gigue.  Bach inserts an additional dance movement in between the Sarabande and Gigue: Minuets in suites 1 and 2, Bourées in suites 3 and 4, and Gavottes in suites 5 and 6.  There is speculation that the suites were written for either Christian Ferdinand Abel, the gambist of the Cöthen court chapel, or Christian Bernhard Linike, who was employed there as a cellist.

Bach’s tenure in Cöthen, from 1717-1723, saw him concentrate primarily on instrumental works as he only had duties to the court and not to the church.  The six sonatas and partitas for solo violin and the Brandenburg concerti also belong to this period of Bach’s compositional output.  During this period his first wife, Maria Barbara, died  in 1720 while Bach was away visiting Carlsbad; his anguish over her death is thought to be expressed in the great Chaconne that ends the D-minor violin partita.  Bach met his second wife in Cöthen, soprano Anna Magdalena Wülken and daughter of a court trumpeter, whom he married in 1721.  Bach’s relationship with Prince Leopold of Cöthen was at first quite congenial as the prince was an avid lover of music, but after the prince married Friederica Henrietta of Anhalt-Bernburg, who had no interest in any of the arts and who resented her husband’s artistic involvement, Bach took a position in Leipzig, where he would remain until his death in 1750.

The movements within each all of the cello suites are thematically and harmonically related.  The opening motive of the préludes generally serve as a primary thematic germ throughout the movements; in the case of the D-minor suite, it is a rising D-minor arpeggio.  The harmonic progression of the préludes also tend to be followed in the following dance movements.

The autograph manuscript of these works are lost and therefore all modern editions are based on these five secondary sources: A) manuscript in the hand of Anna Magdalena Bach dated between 1727-1731 B) copy of cello suites in the hand of Johann Peter Kellner probably dated around 1726 C) copy of suites in a collection of Bach’s works originally owned by Johann Christoph Westphal from the second half of the eighteenth century D) a copy dating from the end of the eighteenth century E) the first published edition of the suites, Janet et Cotelle in Paris in or around 1824.

-Program notes by Dr. Daniel Doña