One of the Treasures of Classical Recording | Bach: The Organ Works (Box Set)

Bach Organ Works - Helmut Walcha | Bach: The Organ Works (Box Set) | Johann Sebastian Bach, Johann Ludwig Krebs, ...

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	• Bach: The Organ Works (Box Set) Johann Sebastian Bach, Johann Ludwig Krebs, ... Deutsche Grammophon, 2001 average customer review:based on 12 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Bach Organ Works- amazing; a must have

All recordings are ADD, which means all the recordings have been digitally re-mastered. The recordings from the late 1950's sound as good as the ones from the 1970's. At the end of each piece you can hear the reverberations of the singing pipes, as if we are in the church listening, feeling the vibrations from the music.

I am no Bach expert, Walcha IMO does an amazing job of playing.

These 12 CD's of incredible organ music increases my amazement of Bach, a must for everyone, especially all Bach lovers. A very calming experience in our pico-second world.

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One of the Treasures of Classical Recording

My familiarity with Walcha's Bach recordings goes back to my student days when I acquired several of the popular works on Archiv LPs (with the plain gray fold-out covers). I own this set in its's 1990s mid-price compilation on Archiv CDs. Walcha's interpretations of the organ works have been my gold standard since those early hearings. The style of playing, which incorporates varied registrations in the course of the pieces for structural and interpretive impact, is somewhat at odds with current "historically informed" use of the plenum through the big pieces. Also absent is the bending of tempo and ornamentation that figure in a number of more recent accounts of this music. Walcha employs ornamentation of the line but also allows the music to speak for itself without a lot of intervention. The grandeur of these masterpieces is always in evidence. Listen, for example, to the brooding intensity of the F minor Prelude and Fugue in which Walcha employs a somewhat more deliberate tempo than current norms to stunning effect.

My only complaint is the omission of the 1961 recording of the great E flat Major Prelude and Fugue in favor of the 1970s version. While the interpretaions are consistent, I prefer the sound of the Franz Casper Schnitger organ at Alkmaar to the Johann Andreas Silbermann at Strassburg. As others have pointed out, Walcha did not record the complete works, but what we do have is one of the great recorded legacies. We are fortunate indeed to have it.

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Bach Organ Works - Helmut Walcha

I never thought I would like Bach's organ works as they can be dense and daunting. However, if you can get onto Bach's wavelength, he can transport you to an electric cosmos of beauty and enlightenment. I was given a collection of Bach organ LPs by Helmut Walcha some time ago. My friend said that Germans regard Walcha as the premier interpreter of this music. He certainly knows how to play the organ and this music soars in his hands. This music is more varied than most people imagine. Some is extremely simple and delicate while some crushes your brain! I have always loved Archive recordings and these did not disappoint!

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Religious experience.

This set of many Bach's Organ works by Helmut Walcha is, in my opinion, the greatest recording of these immortal treasures. There are almost all of Bach's Preludes and Fugues for organ, as well as many fantasias, miscallenous works and his chorals for this instrument. Walcha plays with utmost respect to the original scores, his playing is clear and powerful. Many other organists have allowed themselves quite a bit of experiment with these pieces (likes of Ton Koopman are over the top), but in the end, i've always came back to Walcha's renditions. If you want to treat yourself with some of the greatest music ever written, then get this rare set! Bach's organ music can be challenging at first, especially the fugues, and many of my friends have complained that they hear nothing else than noise in these pieces. I suppose you have to have listened this kind of music for quite some time, before you can wholly appreciate these unique pieces. But once you have, you find a world full of riches and wonder, world which only Bach can bring you. And this is a world i wouldn't change for any riches in the world.

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Glorious

Helmut Walcha was named my TIME as "the" Bach interpreter for organ. I think that is true more than ever today with all the influences of the French Romantic school, the slam-dunk American style and the avant garde crowd. The recording has a German sound, quintessentially Teutonic in both style and approach. While Bach sounds different and even magnificient on an Aristide Cavaillé-Coll organ it does not sound authentic - or as we perceive authenticity.

The fact that the artist is blind(!) means that unlike other folks who can use the music as aids, he must rely on his phenomenal memory. This is truly the stuff of genius. The sonatas are brilliant and I have never heard a better B Minor Prelude & Fugue. I only with that his stupendous "Kunst der Fuge" could have been transferred from record to CD.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3

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