Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin, BWV 1001-1006

Bach finished the six Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin at Köthen in 1720, the same years as the cello suites, and wrote the fair copy out himself — which is the difference between the two sets: this one survives in the composer’s own hand. Three sonatas, each a slow movement, a fugue, a lyrical third and a running finale; three partitas, each a suite of dances. They end with the two movements that are the instrument’s Everest either way you count it — the Ciaccona, 257 bars of variations over a four-bar bass, and the C major Fuga, 356 bars on a chorale melody, both written for one player and four strings.

As practice material they are a line: unaccompanied, one staff, and long. The dances are short enough to work on whole; the fugues and the Ciaccona are worth taking a section at a time.

About this edition. The text is Cellofun.eu’s, dedicated by its editor to the public domain, and it is their literal transcription — Bach’s notes and Bach’s slurs, with no fingering, bowing or dynamic added. They typeset it for cellists, an octave and a fifth below the violin, so that Bach’s open strings fall on the cello’s; it is transposed back here, and what you read is at the pitch he wrote it.

The Sonata No. 2 in A minor, BWV 1003, is not in this book. This editor has not published it, and no other typesetting of it was free to use: the music has been out of copyright for centuries, and somebody’s typing of it is their own work. Rather than a fifth sonata from an unclear source, there are five works here and not six.