This has been an exceptionally interesting early NFL season when it comes to quarterbacks. With the rise of the gifted young Kansas City QB Patrick Mahomes, we're hearing a lot about the rare quarterback who can work within a "system" drawn up by the coaching staff, but also have great results improvising when things break down. Which brings me to CPE Bach, the Aaron Rodgers of 18th century composers. A dutiful son to Johann Sebastian when his father was still alive, Carl Philip Emmanuel tended more often than not to go off in interesting directions when writing his own works. His knowledge of music from before and during his father's time was profound, so he could play well from inside the pocket, as it were. But as one of art's gifted eccentrics, like Gesualdo, Caravaggio, James Joyce and Werner Herzog, CPE Bach often went his own way, pulling the music of his time along with him.
More than half of these keyboard concertos are in minor keys, and all exhibit to a some degree Empfindsamkeit, which is more or less "Sensibility," used Jane Austen-style. In many ways this "sensitive" and "sentimental" style prefigures Romanticism, starting a line which goes through Haydn and Mozart's minor key symphonies, sonatas, concertos and opera arias, to Schumann and Chopin. Every year or two since 2010 Hännsler Classics has released the individual discs in pianist Michael Rische's cycle, but it's so nice to have this four CD set of the collected works. These are highly characterized performances, played on a modern instrument that highlights the composer's forward-looking style. My admiration for this particular Bach Son has never been higher!
This disc will be released on November 8, 2019
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