Christian Tetzlaff recorded the Bach sonatas and partitas for solo violin in 1994, for Virgin Classics, a performance that has been repackaged in a terrific four-disc budget set along with
Ralph Kirshbaum's readings of the unaccompanied suites for solo cello. This new recording by
Tetzlaff, made in 2005, doesn't differ in its fundamentals from the earlier set. His interpretations still have the unusual combination of brisk, Romantic, and detailed.
Tetzlaff plays with very little vibrato, but he often pushes the tempo beyond the confines of the dance rhythms contained in the music; the feel of his playing is sharp rather than graceful. The most expressive aspect of his playing comes not in the tone quality of the violin but in the dynamic contrasts he inserts into the music -- and these are, if anything, intensified in this version as compared with the earlier one.
Tetzlaff may be a little chilly for some listeners, but he is among the few violinists who does not seem to be trying to scale the heights of these works -- the notes obey him, rather than forcing him to obey them. In the big Chaconne that ends the Partita No. 2 in D minor, BWV 1004 (CD 2, track 5), he is at his best with a constantly lively reading that slashes through polyphonic passages, springs lightly off of double and triple stops, and fades away to near silence without ever letting things get out of hand. Some might quibble whether
Tetzlaff returned "too soon" to these massive challenges of the violin repertory, but the overall effect of these recordings is different from that of the earlier ones -- partly because of the very live acoustics of the Norwegian church where the new recording was made. The new recording is sharper and a bit more dramatic, but both approach the Bachian sublime.