# Playing the Bach Cello Suites



## Nate Miller

I play the classical guitar, and the Bach Cello suites are, for me, one of the true gems in the repertoire for my instrument. I've performed the Gmajor (#1) and the Eb major (#4) for years, but I am going back to squares and playing a new set of transcriptions this fall and revisiting my whole approach and basically re-learning these pieces from the ground up again. 

I have played through the Gmajor suite in 3 different keys now, the original G, D major (the Duarte transcription) and now in C the Yeats transcription.

the Eb suite #4 I have played through in E major, but I have played 2 very different transcriptions in the key of A major.

I used to have a friend in music school that played cello, and that is what got me into these suites to start with. I remember the year that I was playing dances from the 4th suite on my juries and he was preparing that suite for his senior recital on cello. It was great fun going over the scores together. He shared a lot of his bow markings, showed me where my teacher was being a complete idiot, and stuff like that.

Are there any cellists out there who play these suites? any other guitarists? Anybody want to talk about their ideas for interpretation?

one of the things I'm thinking about this time around is in the dances, the A and B sections repeat and I am working on two interpretations of each section. This goes back to my Irish roots, I think. I remember my grandma always telling me that no self respecting Irishman ever plays a tune the same way twice :lol:

any thoughts on what to do in repeated sections? This is something I would love to hear a cellist talk about. for me on guitar, one easy device is to simply play the first time through without any added bass notes. The line just as it is in the cello score first time around, then play the added bass notes from the transcription next time around. 

another topic that I would love to hear anyone's thoughts on is "do you play all the notes". You know, we really don't have a composer's original manuscript for any of these suites, so there really isn't an authoritative edition that I know of. That leaves us a bit free in our interpretation to make some minor changes. I noticed that there are several differences in the 2 transcriptions I have played for the Eb major suite where the line is using substituted notes...what I mean is instead of a line continuing down the scale to "A", it turns and ends on a "C#" and things like that. So do you in your interpretation play all the notes as they are written in your edition, or do you borrow ideas from other editions? Or do you make a few changes on your own authority?

so any thoughts from players on their interpretations of the Bach Cello Suites would be very welcome


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## tdc

I used to play the prelude from the first cello suite on guitar, I remember noticing wide differences in interpretation and I used to essentially copy the different things I liked that I heard from other guitarists I heard on recordings, so my version became like a hybrid of a few different interpretations. While that particular piece doesn't have any repeats I can relate to your problem on them, I always felt like kind of a 'cheater' when I would play a repeated Bach section in the same way twice. I agree it is good to look for subtle ways to change it up. Admittedly I would most often fall back on copying something else I heard from another guitarist I liked. I think ideally the best solution is to learn from a teacher who specializes in this era principles of Baroque improvisation and ornamentation.


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## Nate Miller

I do the same thing with that prelude. I'm going to be performing it down at my parish as a Mass prelude sometime soon, actually, so I recently revisited that one myself. I do a lot of the same things you mentioned. I have a record of John Williams playing it, but it is the original Pablo Casals version that I turned to recently for some fresh ideas. I have the Duarte transcription in D major, which is a very nice key for that one, especially since we can tune our low E down to a D. I prefer playing the entire suite in C major, but for playing that prelude on its own like I'll be doing soon, I think D major is the prettiest key to play it on a guitar.

while there are no large repeated sections like in the dances, there are a lot of shorter repeated figures in that one.

I use 2 basic devices for the repeated short phrases...first is the old "shout and whisper" and second is to color the second time through differently. I try not to go too crazy with the colorization, but you can't just do the shout and whisper everywhere or that gets tedious as well.

and like you said, I'm reviewing all my materials on Baroque performance practice. I have a good music library. My undergrad work was in music theory, so I have a lot of useful books at home. There's really nobody in my region I could go study from, so I mostly just kick ideas around with my friends who are all professional players and rely on the education I got at music school.

lucky for me I'm a good player, with a good education and good instincts, because living out in a rural area, finding teachers who specialize in baroque performance practice would be like trying to find hen's teeth.


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## Nate Miller

I was hoping to get some input from people who play these. thanks tdc for your reply, that was exactly what I started this thread for was commentary like that. So even if you don't play the G major or Eb suite, there are 4 others, and I'd love to hear any insights players have on any of these works.

there are 2 things I've been experimenting with lately. The first thing I've been trying is to set the notes on different strings than the fingering of the transcriptions I'm playing from. The point is to get the best tone, volume, sustain and overall sound that I can. Also, when I move a section to a different set of strings, I will have the same notes, but the tambre will be different. Even the way the slurs fall can be very different when I do this. I figure this gives me a second setting for the repeated sections.

the other thing I have tried is to remove any bass notes that are not present in the original cello score I have. I know that there is no definitive edition of the cello suites, so if there is a bass line in my transcription that is not in the cello score, I leave it out first time through. then when I repeat the section, I put the bass notes back. Again, this gives me 2 distinct settings

but more than either of those two devices, I think that the practice of emphasizing a note by increasing its duration is a great way to differentiate between settings as I repeat sections. I find I shape the line differently when I omit the bass notes from my transcription.

So if anybody has any thoughts about playing any of the 6 cello suites, chime in...I'd love to hear from you


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