BACH: Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello – Mary Constanza, c. – MSR Classics

by | Sep 6, 2013 | Classical CD Reviews

BACH: Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello – Mary Constanza, cello – MSR Classics MS 1450 (2 CDs), 148:07 [Distr. by Albany] ***1/2:

Mary Constanza got her initial degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and holds a Master of Music degree from Juilliard. She is currently Assistant Principal Cellist of the Greenwich Symphony and is on the faculty of the Hotchkiss School, while maintaining a large private practice. She plays on an 1832 Giovanni Dollenz cello.

Based on this recording it is hard to believe that she isn’t serving in a major symphony orchestra, so I can only assume that it is by choice. Technically she is all you could ask for: clean, even exceptionally clean technique, solid if consistently subtle tonal qualities, and a good sense of phrasing. Bach’s suites respond to a variety of approaches, even perversions, and if you issued the instructions “don’t think about this music, just look at it and play it” then I think that this recording might have been the result. We don’t have the originals, though there are copies made by contemporaries, and we are left bereft of any instructions Bach might have indicated like bowing marks or even limited dynamics. In other words, a performer is on her own when moving towards a performance of these pieces.

Constanza prefers to see these pieces as a succession of the seasons of a person’s life, starting at birth with Suite No. 1 and progressing further. I don’t see how this imagery affects my perception of the music, but I do find that what is lacking here is not elegance but passion. These are cool and distant readings, not in sonic perspective but in emotional content. This is not necessarily a criticism—it depends on how hot-wired you like your Bach. I need more, even though I do appreciate the incredible sense of line and clarity that Constanza brings to the music. So it’s your choice. My top pick still remains the unbelievably rich readings by Winona Zelenka, though Constanza has her rewards as well.  [Then there’s also Casals, Rostropovich and Starker (the first in a great Pristine remastering, the second on DVDs and the latter even on SACDs in 3 channels)…Ed.]

—Steven Ritter

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