Bach - 12 Preludes and Fugues from The Well-Tempered Clavier II review | Andrew Clements's classical album of the week

The Guardian 100

Piotr Anderszewski
(Warner Classics)
Playing his own selection of pieces from Bach’s monumental work may be heresy, but Anderszewki’s intelligence, lucidity and joy is undeniable

It’s four years since Piotr Anderszewski last released a solo piano album, of fantasies by Mozart and Schumann. Now for the first time, he has turned his attention to The Well-Tempered Clavier; while Bach has always featured prominently in his recital programmes, he has previously only recorded some of the partitas and English suites. Being Anderszewski, though, he has not opted for a dutiful progression through the 24 preludes and fugues from one of the two books into which Bach divided his monumental work, presented in the chromatic order in which they were published. To him that order is “not one in which the pieces follow each other with an emotional, musical inevitability”.