David Russell: David
Russell Plays Bach
Telarc CD 80584
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 Bach was no
lutenist. We know this because his autograph scores for several of the lute works ask the
player to play notes that are musically logical but impossible to finger. Nevertheless,
his music composed for that instrument has survived better than the instrument he composed
it for. Even with today's revival in interest in the lute, lute players aren't exactly
ubiquitous.
Yet, Bach's lute music seems to be everywhere in the guise
of guitar interpretations, and the number of guitar transcriptions of his keyboard and
solo instrument works is proliferating at a breakneck pace. When the results are as
marvelous as they are in David Russell Plays Bach, I say bring 'em on!
DR Plays Bach consists of Prelude, Fugue, and
Allegro (BWV 998); Partita No. 2 (BWV 1004); and Suite No. 4 for Lute
(BWV 1006a). The first work was almost certainly inspired by Bach's friend, fellow
composer, and lute virtuoso Sylvius Weiss. It is a primer in lute styles and colors. The Partita
is Russell's own arrangement of the famous solo violin work and the fourth lute suite is
Bach's own arrangement of his violin partita in E minor, which culminates in a meditative
re-setting of Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring.
There has been a trend in recent years to emphasize the
sense of crystalline clarity in Bach's music. There is an intense mathematical precision
to much of the old master's compositions, but music as bloodless as many of the
interpretations of Bach would have it simply doesn't last hundreds of years.
Russell realizes this and he gives this recording a
folksiness and a range of tonal color and dynamic shading that breathes new life into
these pieces. His rhythms are crisply delineated and precise, but they sound spontaneous,
as if these were the guitarist's improvisations rather than carefully rehearsed
compositions. They say that an off-the-cuff remark is the hardest sort of speech to
deliver successfully -- and Russell has the chops and the skill to make all of his hard
work sound charming.
The sound is, quite simply, quietly spectacular. The
instrument is captured with a wonderful blend of direct and reflected sound. If your
system's up to it, you'll hear a great guitar in a great room, no more, no less. Be
careful in establishing a playback level because even though a guitar's far louder than a
lute, it's still a quiet instrument and too much volume will destroy the personal scale
Russell achieves here, and wash out the perfectly nuanced tonal palette he employs.
That would be a great pity because one of DR Plays Bach's
greatest triumphs is precisely the amount of tonal variation Russell imparts to these
works. He paints with a vivid brush, using bold strokes -- it's the antithesis of the
overly cerebral approach that typifies our age. This returns the lusty blush to Bach's
cheeks. Remember, the man fathered 23 children; he was certainly not overly cerebral about
everything.
If you love the music of Bach, as I do, this is a disc to
which you must pay attention, and if you think Bach is okay, but a rather dull,
repetitive fellow, this disc will prove eye-opening. Either way, David Russell is
undeniably one of those musicians who can hear music in a completely new way and, if
you're willing to listen, make you hear it that way, too.
...Wes Phillips
wes@onhifi.com
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