[wkasimer]

This is stage one of the eigth game in the "Favorite Recordings Of..." project. The goal here is to nominate recordings for Bach's Cello Suites. Separate participants may nominate the same recording several times, but the same person may not.

Nominations end after 7 days, or 1 day of inactivity. and we will vote on all works nominated. You may nominate up to 5 works, but you may only post nominations once. Note that we have made some changes to the overall system, you can see a summary here. Please include the name of the cellist, label, and year(if applicable). Example:

Fournier: 1961 Archiv

Sorry, but I guess that I'm still not quite clear about the nomination rules. Is every nominee included in the voting round, or just the ones with the most nominations?

 

[wkasimer]

Suren Bagratuni 2005 (Blue Griffin)
Truls Mork 2005 (Virgin)
Ralph Kirshbaum 1994 (Virgin)
David Geringas 2011 (Es-dur)
Anne Gastinel 2007 (Naive)

 

[wkasimer]

Ma is technically superb but bland by comparison to the others listed here.

Have you heard his third recording? I also found the first two pretty bland, but his latest recordings (and the live recordings I've heard) are far more interesting interpretively.

 

[wkasimer]

Different tastes. The first three on that list, I find uninteresting. Yes it's practically sacrilege to say that about one of those artists.

Maybe so, but I agree with you about Starker and Rostropovich - when the time comes to cull my collection of Bach cello suites, they will be the first to go. I've never understood the admiration for Starker's Mercury set; his later recordings on Sefel and RCA, while not ideal, are more interesting.. I still love the Casals set, even if I recognize that many others have played them better since.

Fournier recorded a number of times. I do like the one from the early 60's.

To be honest, I find Fournier pretty bland, although he does play beautifully.

I have a number of Suites recordings. All of Ma's are worthy as is Gendron and Queyras. Plus several others.

There are dozens of worthy recordings of the suites, many of them virtually unknown because the field is so dominated by big name cellists who have recorded them for so-called "major" labels.

 

[wkasimer]

Quite true. I had to make myself stop collecting them. Got rid of a few

And if you want a real change of pace:
Zlotkin and Dumas.

I can't help myself. At least now, I listen via Spotify before deciding whether to buy yet another set.

I didn't much care for Dumas, but it's a shame that Zlotkin's set isn't more widely available - it's the only one I know that so ornaments the repeats.

 

[wkasimer]

Zlotkin can be had from Amazon.de.
As to his repeats I think he overstates the point considerably.

I wouldn't want to listen to a steady diet of Zlotkin's ornamentation, but I'm often disappointed by cellists who take every single repeat without doing anything to provide contrast.