Bach: Goldberg Variations

Featuring

Pi-hsien Chen
Johann Sebastian Bach

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Compositional Technique

The Goldberg Variations begin and end with an Aria of a sarabande character, which can also be found in Bach's "Klavierbüchlein für Anna Magdalena Bach."

Composition History

Graf Hermann von Kayserling, who suffered from insomnia, requested piano pieces of a "soft and somewhat merry character" to be played for him at night by his harpsichordist, Johann Theophilus Goldberg.

Compositional Technique

Unlike many baroque variation cycles, the variations in the Goldberg Variations are based on the bass line and its harmonies, not the melody of the Aria.

Composition History

Johann Sebastian Bach was commissioned to compose the Goldberg Variations by Graf Hermann von Kayserling, the Russian envoy to the court in Dresden.

Performer Biography

Pi-hsien Chen, the pianist on this recording, began her studies at the Cologne Academy of Music at age ten and won the ARD International Music Competition in Munich at twenty-one.

Composition History

For composing the Goldberg Variations, Bach received a golden goblet containing 100 Louisdor as payment from Graf Hermann von Kayserling.

Compositional Technique

The Goldberg Variations are structured into ten groups of three variations, with every third variation being a canon whose intervals rise from unison to a ninth.