# Which Is Your Favorite Bach Orchestral Suite?



## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Out of the four surviving great orchestral suites by Bach, which one is your favorite? These are great works of the French dance suite, maybe with the exception of no.2 (the flute one), which is more a concerto.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

I enjoy them all. I think the second suite for the flute with its concerto like extended movements is marvelous. It is a true masterpiece for flute and orchestra.


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## Brahmsian Colors (Sep 16, 2016)

I've thoroughly enjoyed No. 3 from the time I first heard it many years ago with Hermann Scherchen on the old Westminster label.


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## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

Agreed. They're all lovely but there's a special something about no.3 for me. I once spent far longer in a bookshop than I'd intended simply because it was playing over the sound system and, as a result, walked out with half a dozen other books in addition to the one I'd come in for.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Like them all...but #4 edges out #3 by a slight margin...


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## mparta (Sep 29, 2020)

Answering the question I thought you asked rather than the question you asked.

I like this recording, I think the oboe substitution is wonderful and the playing likewise.

I just know the first suite best, it has some special candy moments melodically and harmonically that are very special.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

^ I found samples on Youtube. Superb! Thank you for sharing.


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## mparta (Sep 29, 2020)

There's some grousing in an Amazon review about the modification to the suites, I'm not expert enough to recognize that any damage has been done, I do like these performances.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Great bassoon part in Suite #4/Bouree II, running 8th notes under the 2 oboes...pretty athletic, long if both repeats are taken....
Suite #1 has a good part also...in fact, Bach always wrote great bass lines...they are fun to play...melodic lines in themselves, when played along with upper lines, that's the polyphony!!


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## Musicaterina (Apr 5, 2020)

This is an "original" version of the Orchestral Suite No. 3 BWV 1068, as Bach added the trumpets, the timpanis and the oboes later, around 1730. Played by the Nederlands Bach Society, conducted by Lars Ulrik Mortensen.






The Orchestral Suite No. 3 is my favourite Orchestral Suite by Johann Sebastian Bach, and my favourite movement is the second, namely the Air. But I like the other Orchestral Suites by Bach, too. And not only the ones by Bach, but also the ones, for example, by Christoph Graupner.


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## mparta (Sep 29, 2020)

Heck148 said:


> Great bassoon part in Suite #4/Bouree II, running 8th notes under the 2 oboes...pretty athletic, long if both repeats are taken....
> Suite #1 has a good part also...in fact, Bach always wrote great bass lines...they are fun to play...melodic lines in themselves, when played along with upper lines, that's the polyphony!!


Playing the first suite bassoon part is how I got to know these. Moons ago.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

I wonder how many more orchestral suites and concertos were lost, since Bach must have written many more than the surviving few. Such wonderful great works.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

ArtMusic said:


> I wonder how many more orchestral suites and concertos were lost, since Bach must have written many more than the surviving few. Such wonderful great works.


But...we have this 4 ones, I sill can not decide. Sorry.


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## Bruckner Anton (Mar 10, 2016)

#2 for me, so many great tunes.


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