This year’s collaboration between SFEMS and the California Jazz Conservatory continues the afternoon of Sunday, November 8, with a recital by harpsichordist Katherine Heater, who will perform works by Johann Sebastian Bach, exploring the fantasy and the fugue, two of the compositional forms most closely linked to the great keyboard master’s renowned gifts of improvisation.
During his lifetime, Bach’s reputation as an organist and harpsichordist was even greater than as a composer. He was especially admired for his improvisatory brilliance. One imagines that many of his keyboard works began as improvisations. We know that to be the case, most famously, with The Musical Offering. More fundamentally, explains Katherine, there is fugue and fantasy throughout Bach’s music. “Fugue and fantasy are more texture than form,” she adds, “states of mind, really.”
Katherine’s program will feature the Partita IV in D major; the violin sonata in A minor, as transcribed for keyboard in D minor; and the Italian Concerto. The Partita (BWV 828) is a magnificent example of a German baroque suite, and a personal favorite she has long wanted to perform.
The transcription of Bach’s violin sonata in A minor (BWV 1003) is particularly interesting in light of the concert’s theme. The D minor transcription is probably by Bach himself but possibly by one of his sons or students. “The important thing,” says Katherine, “is that J.S. Bach used to play his violin sonatas on keyboard, apparently improvising the transcription spontaneously. So this piece is possibly an idealized version of one of those improvised transcriptions. It has a fugue movement and long extempore-sounding opening.”
Katherine also will do a short demonstration of a partimento-style fugue, using Bach’s Fugue on a Theme by Tomaso Albinoni, BWV 946.
The concert will conclude with the famous Italian Concerto, an exuberant finish to any harpsichord recital!
“There and Bach” begins at 4:30 p.m., at the California Jazz Conservatory, 2087 Addison St., between Shattuck and Milvia, in downtown Berkeley. The venue is one block from the downtown Berkeley BART station, and parking is easily available at the Addison Street parking garage. Street parking is free on Sundays and also relatively easy in the afternoon. The school’s café is open prior to and during the concert, allowing audience members to enjoy a glass of wine, coffee, or a light snack.
All tickets are $20; reservations are highly recommended, as the venue is small and intimate. For reservations and information, please call the California Jazz Conservatory at 510-845-5373 or Buy Tickets.
