Bach & Ysaÿe Vol. 1 Antje Weithaas

• Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750): Sonata No. 1 in G minor, for violin solo, BWV 1001:
• 1Bach: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, BWV 1001: I. Adagio04:01
• 2Bach: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, BWV 1001: II. Fuga05:36
• 3Bach: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, BWV 1001: III. Siciliana02:48
• 4Bach: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, BWV 1001: IV. Presto03:21
• Eugène Ysaÿe: Sonata in G minor, for violin solo, Op. 27 No. 1
• 5Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 27 No. 1: I. Grave - Lento assai05:01
• 6Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 27 No. 1: II. Fugato – Molto moderato05:19
• 7Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 27 No. 1: III. Allegretto – Poco scherzoso aimabile04:10
• 8Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 27 No. 1: IV. Finale con brio – Allegro fermo03:15
• Ysaÿe: Sonata in A minor for violin solo, Op. 27 No. 2:
• 9Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Minor, Op. 27 No. 2 "Jacques Thibaud": I. Obsession - Prelude - Poco vivace02:48
• 10Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Minor, Op. 27 No. 2 "Jacques Thibaud": II. Malinconia (Poco lento)03:03
• 11Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Minor, Op. 27 No. 2 "Jacques Thibaud": III. Sarabande "Danse des ombres". Lento04:04
• 12Ysaÿe: Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Minor, Op. 27 No. 2 "Jacques Thibaud": IV. Les Furies – Allegro furioso02:57
• Bach: Partita No. 2 in D minor, BWV 1004:
• 13Bach: Violin Partita No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1004: I. Allemanda04:33
• 14Bach: Violin Partita No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1004: II. Corrente02:36
• 15Bach: Violin Partita No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1004: III. Sarabanda04:06
• 16Bach: Violin Partita No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1004: IV. Giga03:56
• 17Bach: Violin Partita No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1004: V. Ciaconna14:15
• Total Runtime01:15:49

Info for Bach & Ysaÿe Vol. 1

Antje Weithaas launches her trilogy of solo violin albums with the first work in each cycle. It was Antje Weithaas’s own idea to jointly record Johann Sebastian Bach’s six sonatas and partitas for solo violin in conjunction with Eugène Ysaÿe’s six solo violin sonatas. “The works by Bach are rather well-known”, she remarks. “But Ysaÿe is invariably shoved into the virtuoso corner, but as a composer he is to be taken quite seriously!”.

Eugène Ysaÿe‘s son remembers that his father started composing the solo violin sonatas when he heard Joseph Szigeti, a violinist younger than himself, play Bach in Brussels in 1923. Antje Weithaas sees many parallels with Bach’s Sonata No. 1 for Solo Violin, BWV 1001: “The works have similar structures.”

“Both composers wrote technically challenging pieces featuring double stops and ornamental figurations. Although there is no proof for such connections, I’m quite certain that Ysaÿe had them in mind.” The fugues, in each case, represent quite a challenge. Each composer demands double and multiple stops from an instrument normally designed to play one part at a time. “The notes are written directly on top of one another, as the composer must have imagined them in his head, but not in the way they are to be executed. Since the performance tradition has not survived, we can only make guesses.”

“Antje Weithaas is one of the great violinists of our time.” (FonoForum)

Antje Weithaas, violin

Antje Weithaas
One can hardly imagine a better advocate for music than Antje Weithaas. For her, not only does music itself take the fore but also its conveyance to the public. As one of the most sought-after soloists and chamber musicians of her generation, Antje Weithaas has a wide-ranging repertoire that includes the great concertos by Mozart, Beethoven and Schumann, new works such as the Violin Concerto by Jörg Widmann, modern classics by Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Ligeti and Gubaidulina, and lesser performed concertos by Korngold, Hartmann and Schoeck.

Antje Weithaas has been invited to perform with Germany’s leading orchestras, including the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Bamberg Symphoniker and the major German radio orchestras, as well as numerous major international orchestras such as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, Philharmonia Orchestra, BBC Symphony, and the leading orchestras of the Netherlands, Scandinavia, and Asia. She has worked with the illustrious conductors Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sir Neville Marriner, Yuri Temirkanov, Yakov Kreizberg, Sakari Oramo and Carlos Kalmar.

Antje Weithaas kicks off her 2014/15 season with concerts at the Edinburgh International Festival and Rheingau Music Festival. With Camerata Bern, whose artistic director she has been since the 2009/10 season, she will perform Brahms’ Violin Concerto, appear in a joint project with Lars Vogt and go on tour in Central America. Two special highlights of the season will be her performances as soloist in concerts with the Konzerthaus-Orchester Berlin under Michael Gielen (Berg) and in recital at Wigmore Hall. Having been featured in a residency at de Singel Antwerp in the 2013/14 season, which showcased her musical versatility, Antje Weithaas will be Artist in Residence of the Philharmonic State Orchestra of Mainz in the current season and curate a Schumann weekend at the Schwetzingen Festival.

The Arcanto Quartet, with fellow violinist Daniel Sepec, violist Tabea Zimmermann and cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras, continues to be particularly important for Antje Weithaas’ chamber music activities. In recent years, the quartet has performed at Carnegie Hall in New York, the Gulbenkian Foundation Lisbon, Palau de la Música Barcelona, Théâtre du Châtelet and Cité de la Musique Paris, the Philharmonie in Berlin and the Konzerthaus Vienna, as well as touring Israel, Japan and North America. On the label Harmonia Mundi, they released CDs with works by Bartók, Brahms, Ravel, Dutilleux, Debussy and Schubert.

Antje Weithaas has released several highly acclaimed recordings of sonatas by Brahms and Mendelssohn, as well as of works by Dvorák, Suk, Schubert, Saint-Saëns, Ravel and Fauré with Silke Avenhaus on the CAvi-music label. Her most recent releases are the recording of the Berg and Beethoven Violin Concertos with the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra under Steven Sloane on the Cavi Label, and Vol. 1 of the complete recording of Max Bruch’s works for Violin and Orchestra for cpo with the NDR Radio Philharmonic under Hermann Bäumer. Her first joint CD with Camerata Bern, a recording of Mendelssohn’s concerto for violin, piano and orchestra (with Alexander Lonquich) and his string quintet No. 2 in B-flat major Op. 87 (for string orchestra) was followed by a CD with works by Beethoven (String Quartet No. 11, Kreutzer Sonata).

Antje Weithaas began playing the violin at the age of four and later studied at the Hochschule für Musik “Hanns Eisler” Berlin with Professor Werner Scholz. She won the Kreisler Competition in Graz in 1987 and the Bach Competition in Leipzig in 1988, as well as the Hanover International Violin Competition in 1991. After teaching at the Universität der Künste Berlin, Antje Weithaas became a professor of violin at the Hochschule für Musik “Hanns Eisler” in 2004. She plays on a 2001 Peter Greiner violin.

This album contains no booklet.