Bach Violin Partita No. 2 in D minor

Bach Violin Partita No. 2 is the most beautiful piece of music anyone could hear. I’m not the only one with a favorable opinion. Who could be better to qualify this work than Johannes Brahms, who made an arrangement for piano left hand of the last movement of this piece, the Chaconne, and wrote in a letter to Clara Schumann:

I would think that I have not sent you anything so amusing for a long time as this today – if your fingers can stand the pleasure! The Chaconne is for me one of the most wonderful, most incredible masterpieces. On one system, for a small instrument, the man wrote an entire world of the most profound thoughts and powerful sentiments. When I try to imagine, I could have made, could have conceived this piece, I know for certain that the immense excitement and emotion would have made me insane. Now, if one does not have a great violinist around, it is certainly the most splendid delight to simply hear it in one’s mind.

For a good reason the Chaconne is the movement that requires more attention in this piece, as this movement alone is longer than the rest of the piece, but I always consider it as a whole. All the movements share a common motive, a somewhat melancholic one, and all of them make use of it with its own distinctive character.

The allemanda, the opening movement, starts with a recurring motive followed by a more optimistic section that is haunted by melancholy all the time. It is like someone trying unsuccessfully to overcome his sadness.

The following Corrente is more lively and virtuosic. By the first measures you expect a more cheerful and joyful mood (at least that is what I feel) but then you get somewhat disappointed.

I consider the Sarabande very personal and meditative, better heard in a slow tempo. I like to hear it when I need to clear my mind. I get some time to stop everything and just listen to this beauty. All the problems just go away for a while.

After the peaceful Sarabande, the gigue is just the opposite but also just as beautiful. In a different manner, of course, with its fast and brilliant passages.

Chaconne

To describe with words this piece is impossible. Just imagine the most powerful emotions gathered together and transformed into a piece of music. This is what this piece gives me, all kind of powerful emotions: joy, sadness, melancholy, nostalgia, hope, fear.

This is the intrinsic value of the piece. Then it has also its external value, that is, its intellectual and musical value. It is composed in the theme and variations form. According to the biographer Forkel, Bach considered an unthankful task the writing of variations over the same recurring harmonies. Look the masterpiece that Bach gifted us doing this unthankful task!

It is my desire to write a full musical analysis of this work, and of course I will be publishing it. All analysis of this piece would be useless to describe its beauty. The only way to understand it itto hear it (in one’s mind as Brahms if necessary) again and again. You’ll going to start and never stop until the end of your life.

Links:

• Transcription for guitar
• Itzhak Perlman playing the Chaconne: This is my favorite interpretation of the Chaconne. Part 1 Part 2


• Perlman playing the Sarabande
• The Chaconne on piano: Busoni's transcription of the Chaconne for piano played by Fazil Say: Part 1 Part 2
• On classical guitar: Andrés Segovia playing the Chaconne on Classical Guitar: Part 1 Part 2
• On bass guitar: Dave Grossman playing the full Partita No. 2 on electric bass guitar! Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Downloads

This is a synthesized version in Ogg Vorbis format.

1. Allemande
2. Courante
3. Sarabande
4. Gigue
5. Chaconne

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