Cameron Carpenter - All You Need is Bach (2016)

Sony Classical is pleased to announce Cameron Carpenter’s new album ALL YOU NEED IS BACH. Bach’s great keyboard masterpieces provide an ideal platform both for Carpenter’s formidable creative and re-creative gifts and the seemingly limitless possibilities of his dream instrument – his signature International Touring Organ (ITO).

Bach’s complete organ music has been central to Carpenter’s immense and multi-facetted repertoire. For his first all-Bach release, Carpenter has created a stimulating and wide-ranging program that reveals the fullest scope of Bach’s genius. Works include Contrapunctus IX from The Art of Fugue, Organ Sonatas in D minor and E-flat major, Prelude and Fugue in B minor, French Suite No. 1, Invention No. 8, the Chorale Prelude to “O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde groß” and, as a centrepiece, the great Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor. The album title All You Need Is Bach not only refers to the immense popularity of Bach but also to The Beatles’ classic 1967 recording All You Need Is Love, where Bach’s Invention No. 8 in F major proudly rises out of the coda’s collage-like texture.

In creating the ITO, the organ building team of Marshall & Ogletree apply sophisticated computer technology to digitally reproduce the sounds of many diverse American pipe organs without any of their mechanisms. Carpenter can access these sounds with unprecedented immediacy and flexibility. In addition, the ITO also draws upon the scientific findings relating to historic temperaments in the field of historically informed performance practice. For example, Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue uses the Werckmeister III in a transposition centering the Werckmeister “sweet key” on C, the Trio Sonatas are presented in Kirnberger and Kellner temperaments in D and D#, while O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde groß and the Prelude and Fugue in B minor both feature equal temperament.

Most importantly, however, Carpenter’s virtuosity, the musical potential of the International Touring Organ, and their meeting through the lens of the unique relationship between an instrument and its designer, allow him to delve unusually deeply into Bach’s emotional world.

Tracklist:
1. The Art of Fugue, BWV 1080: Contrapunctus IX
2. Trio Sonata for Organ No. 3 in D Minor, BWV 527 / I. Andante
3. Trio Sonata for Organ No. 3 in D Minor, BWV 527 / II. Adagio e dolce
4. Trio Sonata for Organ No. 3 in D Minor, BWV 527 / III. Vivace
5. Prelude and Fugue in B Minor, BWV 544 / Prelude
6. Prelude and Fugue in B Minor, BWV 544 / Fugue
7. French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 / I. Allemande
8. French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 / II. Courante
9. French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 / III. Sarabande
10. French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 / IV. Gavotte
11. French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 / V. Bourée
12. French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 / VI. Loure
13. French Suite No. 5 in G Major, BWV 816 / VII. Gigue
14. Trio Sonata for Organ No. 1 in E-Flat Major, BWV 525 / I. Alla breve
15. Trio Sonata for Organ No. 1 in E-Flat Major, BWV 525 / II. Adagio
16. Trio Sonata for Organ No. 1 in E-Flat Major, BWV 525 / III. Allegro
17. From "Orgelbüchlein": XXIV Choral Prelude "O Mensch, bewein dein' Sünde gross", BWV 622
18. Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor, BWV 582 / Passacaglia
19. Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor, BWV 582 / Thema fugatum
20. All you need is Bach / Invention No. 8 in F Major, BWV 779