JS Bach
The Complete Cello Suites
Henri Demarquette (cello)
Evidence EVCD115 131:00 mins (2 discs)
Best-known for his performances of contemporary music, French cellist Henri Demarquette has also spent a lifetime with Bach, having played the Cello Suites since his early childhood. He first recorded them in 2002 and now returns to them seasoned with life’s experience. His approach here has a debonair confidence – just as fresh and vital as the youthful version but the sound now is fuller, riper, and more present in the recorded perspective. One perceives the lingering influences of the great French cellists: the finesse, lyricism and poetry of Pierre Fournier; the richly shaded tone and articulate phrasing of Paul Tortelier.
His reading of the G major Suite encapsulates the flexibility and variety of his approach. He despatches the Prelude with improvisatory bravado and more than a dash of rubato, recalling the prelude’s origins as an extemporised ‘warm-up’ exercise. He balances lyricism and poetry to eloquent effect in the Allemande, while the Courante and Sarabande gambol and ruminate by turns. The paired Minuets trip and curtsey with refined French gallantry before the final, feisty Gigue.
Throughout, Demarquette shows a particular sensitivity to Baroque style with his rhetorical phrasing, spare use of vibrato, and responsiveness to the vacillating affects of different keys. His tendency to sustain or swell on cadence notes becomes a trifle mannered but barely detracts from his ability to paint pictures with myriad shades and supple bowing techniques. From his noble Stradivari cello he draws a rich, velvet sound and exploits the instrument’s sonorous resonances to build majestic musical edifices. The performance is superbly recorded in the glowing acoustic of the Chapelle du Méjan in Arles. Kate Bolton-Porciatti