Miranda Wilson's Blog - Posts Tagged "classical-music"

Johann Sebastian Bach's Cello Suites are probably the music closest to my heart. They're perennially popular, and they're both the most profound and the most challenging repertoire for cello. In fact, I'd go out on a limb and say that Bach's Cello Suites have defined what it means to be a cellist for the past 200 years. (Well, 201: they were first published in 1824). For cellists and lovers of the cello who'd like to know more about these masterworks, here are five essential books on Bach's contribution to the cello.

Bach's Cello Suites, Volumes 1 and 2: Analyses and Explorations
This is the book I referred to the most often when I was writing my own book, The Well-Tempered Cello: Life With Bach's Cello Suites. Winold, a theorist, provides a scholarly but still accessible analysis of the structure, harmony, and style of Bach's suites. The academic approach of this two-volume book helps us understand the dramatic architecture of Bach's preludes and dance movements. This book is especially useful for professionals and advanced students who want to integrate theory and expressive interpretation.

The Bach Cello Suites: A Companion
Written by one of the top international soloists of today, Isserlis's book doesn't get caught up in overly academic language. Instead, his insight comes from the perspective of a performer. (For maximum enjoyment, you should also listen to Isserlis's 2007 recording of the Suites by Hyperion Records.) Some of his interpretations are deeply personal, for example the idea that the final five chords of the Prelude to the Second Suite reflect the anguish of "the five wounds of Christ."

Unaccompanied Bach: Performing the Solo Works
Ledbetter's book covers all of Bach's unaccompanied works, including those for violin, lute, and flute, but it's still a hugely insightful resource for the Cello Suites. His exploration of Baroque dance forms, ornaments, and stylistic conventions includes possible precedents and influences over the Cello Suites, such as Marin Marais's compositions for the viola da gamba. Ledbetter shows us that far from being an unprecedented invention, the Cello Suites represent a much longer tradition of unaccompanied string music. Ledbetter addresses practical questions that every performer faces: How should we approach Bach's notation? What can we learn from period instruments and playing techniques? This scholarly yet intensely readable book really enriched my understanding of how to play Bach.

The Cello Suites: J.S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the Search for a Baroque Masterpiece
Siblin's award-winning book jumps back and forth between three narratives: the mysterious disappearance of Bach's original manuscript, Pablo Casals's legendary championing of the music in the twentieth century, and the author's own contemporary journey of discovery with the Suites. As an amateur musician, Siblin makes Bach's Cello Suites accessible to general readers who don't necessarily play an instrument or know anything about classical music. It's just a really great book full of engaging storytelling that will make readers fall in love with the Suites all over again.

The Well-Tempered Cello: Life With Bach's Cello Suites
After years of performing and teaching Bach's Cello Suites, I found myself facing the ultimate challenge: performing all six suites from memory in a single marathon concert. This daunting goal became the jumping-off point for The Well-Tempered Cello: Life With Bach's Cello Suites, where I chronicle not just the technical and musical demands of preparing for such a performance, but the personal journey of rediscovering music that had been the soundtrack to my life.
What sets this book apart is how it weaves together Bach's story with my own experience as a performer. Following the suites' natural 36-part structure (six suites, each with six movements), I explore everything from the historical mysteries surrounding these works to the moments of breakthrough and struggle that every cellist knows. Whether you're grappling with the pyrotechnic arpeggios of the Sixth Suite's Prelude or finding the heart of the Sarabandes, this book reflects on what it means to live with Bach's music.

For cellists at any level—from students encountering these pieces for the first time to seasoned professionals seeking fresh perspectives—The Well-Tempered Cello: Life With Bach's Cello Suites serves as both a listener's guide and a meditation on how great music shapes our lives. It's the book I wish I'd had during my own decades-long journey with these extraordinary works.

Why These Books Matter
Each of these books offers a different lens through which to view Bach's Cello Suites. Winold provides the analytical framework, Isserlis the performer's intimate knowledge, Ledbetter the historical context, and Siblin the storytelling that makes these works accessible to everyone. My own contribution focuses on the lived experience of a cellist's relationship with Bach—the daily practice, the moments of discovery, the way these suites become part of who we are as musicians and human beings.
Whether you're looking for history, analysis, interpretation, or a personal exploration of what it means to dedicate your life to Bach's music, these five books take us right into the heart of the Cello Suites. Bach's music speaks to each generation of performers and audiences in new ways. We keep listening to Bach, but in a strange way, does Bach also seem to listen to us?

Have you found other books about Bach's Cello Suites particularly helpful in your musical journey? I'd love to hear about resources that have shaped your understanding—and if you've read The Well-Tempered Cello: Life With Bach's Cello Suites, I'd be thrilled to know how it resonated with your own Bach journey.

Looking for the perfect cello-related summer read? These four books will be right at home on your deck chair this summer—they're intensely readable and full of fascinating stories about emotional connection between cellists and their instruments. Best of all, they steer clear of technical jargon, so even if you don't play cello (or any instrument at all) there's a lot here to draw you into the sound-world of the best instrument. Yes, I know I'm biased :)

The Cello Still Sings: A Generational Story of the Holocaust and of the Transformative Power of Music
In her cathartic memoir, Horvath unravels five decades of family secrets, uncovering the amazing story of her Holocaust survivor parents. It's also an unflinching portrait of a contentious father-daughter relationship and a love letter to the cello that both Horvath and her father both played.

Cello: A Journey Through Silence to Sound
This luminous group biography weaves together the stories of four cellists—Lise Cristiani, Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, Pál Hermann, and Amedeo Baldovino—with the poignant story of Kennedy's own career-ending injury. The power of music and the cello to surmount the insurmountable jumps off every page. I couldn't put it down.

A Cello Named Pablo
This charming book is fun for children and adults alike. It tells the story of a cello that belonged to the great Pablo Casals, now in the hands of star cellist Amit Peled. Whimsically illustrated by Avi Katz, this book is a sweet, relatable feel-good read.

The Adventures of a Cello
Carlos Prieto recounts the adventurous life of his Stradivarius cello, tracing its history through previous owners dating back to 1720. If this cello could talk, what tales it would have to tell! Best of all, there are fun cameos from cello superstars, including Yo Yo Ma.

What I love about all these books is how they completely draw you into their stories without getting lost in technical detail. They're the kind of accessible yet substantial writing I was hoping to achieve in my own recent book, Notes for Cellists: A Guide to the Repertoire —books that welcome everyone into the conversation about why this instrument matters so much to so many of us. So whether you're an amateur, a professional, a teacher, or just a lover of the cello, consider adding these to your summer reading list.

As both a cellist and a writer, I experience a particular challenge every time I sit down to describe a piece of music: how do you use words for something that's written in notes? The interpretation of music is so ephemeral that it's hard to find words for it sometimes. It's like trying to explain a color to someone who hasn't seen it before. You can compare blue to the sky (sometimes!) but can you really describe the experience of seeing it?

Music writing walks a fine line between technical jargon and subjective interpretation. Go too far toward the analytical—"the dominant seventh resolves to the tonic in measure 47"—and you might as well be hitting the off switch with readers who haven't studied music theory. Rely too heavily on flowery metaphors—"the melody danced like butterflies in a summer garden"—and you risk sounding cringe-making.

The best music writers solve this problem not by avoiding it, but by finding the words for it. They understand that their job isn't to replicate the listening experience in words, but to make listeners want to open up their streaming services.

Some books manage to do this so successfully that they send you straight to your music library. John Eliot Gardiner's Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven makes Bach's cantatas feel like living, breathing experiences rather than something out of a stuffy concert hall. Gardiner places the reader in the composer's mindset, bring in theology and culture and literature that might have been in Bach's mind as he worked on his music. Gardiner's verbal depictions of Bach's cantatas aren't the waffling of some dilettante, but the heartfelt impressions of a scholar-performer who knows them inside out.


Edward Dusinberre takes a different approach in Beethoven for a Later Age: The Journey of a String Quartet As the first violinist of the Takács Quartet, he writes from inside the music-making process, giving us a window into how chamber music becomes a conversation between four individuals who must also be as musically unified as it's possible to be. His description of working through Beethoven's quartets shows the reader the (sometimes painful) human negotiations, the moments of frustration, and the sense of history and importance that keep quartets coming back again and again to Beethoven. Even if you've listened to them before, this book makes you listen as with new ears.

Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts proves that classical music isn't just for old people. Based on a series of televised lessons Bernstein gave in 1958, this book fills even the most jaded reader with a new sense of joy and excitement about music. I particularly love the chapter on music with a sense of humor.

What these writers share is an understanding that writing about music is, in a strange way, an act of translation. We don't always understand music on first hearing, but really good descriptive writing about music prepares us for it by pointing out what to listen for. The best writing about music makes you want to grab your phone and start listening before you've even finished the book!

As I continue working on my own music writing, I try to keep these models in mind. Every time I try to verbalize the shape of a phrase in a lesson with one of my college students, or demonstrate how we use specific techniques as brushstrokes of a great work of art, I ask myself what one of these great authors would have to say about it. If ever we were in any doubt about the importance of classical music, books like these ones remind us of the excitement and joy it's possible to feel.

Most books about music during the Enlightenment era focus on the “big three”— Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven. But there were, of course, a lot more musicians around at the time! Here are a few books that look at some other musicians who helped shape musical culture at a very interesting time in history.

George Kennaway’s John Gunn: Musician Scholar in Enlightenment Britain is one of the most fascinating. Gunn was a Scottish cellist, writer, and thinker who was the first to codify a lot of what we know about how to play the cello. Kennaway paints a portrait of a man who was both performer and scholar in the lively intellectual circles of Edinburgh and London. Kennaway also documents the life and work of Gunn’s wife Anne, an important creator and thinker in her own right.

Gabriel Banat’s The Chevalier de Saint-Georges: Virtuoso of the Sword and the Bow tells the story of Joseph Bologne (known also by his noble title, the Chevalier de Saint-Georges), a composer, violinist, and champion fencer of African descent who became a celebrity in pre-Revolutionary France. For many decades, Bologne was relegated to the footnotes of music history. Thanks in part to Banat’s book (first published in 2006), he’s been restored to his rightful place in the textbooks and on the concert stage.

Then there’s Clifford D. Panton’s George Augustus Polgreen Bridgetower, Violin Virtuoso And Composer Of Color In Late 18th Century Europe Bridgetower is often remembered only for his connection with Beethoven, but this biography reveals Panton’s research into every existing source that can tell us more about this important musician.
These books tell the story of musicians who helped shape the Enlightenment but never became household names. They offer us a glimpse into a time when music and society were closely interrelated, and when both were more diverse than we might have imagined.