Kevin Sutton wrote:

>Sandra Beane wrote:
>
>>In reguards to the bach suites.  I feel that Rosterpovich is the best.  ...
>
>Sandra is of course entitled to her opinions, but I completely disagree.
>The Rostropovich to my ears is completely unmusical.  He hacks and saws
>away at them as if he cello were a tree to be felled, not an instrument to
>be played.  ...

Kevin is of course entitled to his opinion but I completely disagree.
Although I wouldn't choose Rostropovich as my favourite recording to call
him *unmusical* and accuse him of *hacking and sawing* disqualifies any
listener IMO.  I wonder if anyone else thinks of Rostropovich that way.  I
would be shocked.  An then Yo-Yo Ma.  The new versions are most certainly
no gimmick at all.  I've seen the Ma video - which as I understand was
broadcasted on TV - and I think this is a failure.  Ma would do himself a
favour to restrict himself to music.  But the recordings were made *before*
the video and they are typical Ma recordings - soft spoken, maybe too
gentle, all sorts of criticism are possible - but they have *nothing* to
do with *Bach TV* or *cheap gimmicks*.  They just happened to be used in a
film about which one may have his doubts.  I would venture to think that
Kevin was prejudiced against these interpretations for that reason.  One
other thing:  I was very much impressed by the image of Ma in Mali or
Senegal, having explained a local instrument to him (the *ngoni*, if memory
serves).  Afterwards Ma played a part of the first movement of the first
Bach suite, his cello firmly planted in the African soil.  He stopped and
commented that in this environment Bach sounded so incredibly *young* to
him.  It realized that I felt exactly the same way but hadn't been able to
define it like he did.  I found this an important and beautiful
observation.

Philip