Bach: Die Kunst Der Fuge

BACH The Art of Fugue • Sergio Vartolo (hpd); Maddalena Vartolo (hpd) • NAXOS 8.570577 (2 CDs: 102: 13) Some recordings deserve high praise, some deserve faint praise, and some earn their fair share of ridicule. Then there is the category of those that earn your respect over time, if you have the stamina to hang in. Bach’s The Art of Fugue , BWV 1080, usually considered an intellectually “dry” work, as played on the harpsichord by Sergio Vartolo (with Maddalena Vartolo on the final two pieces for two harpsichords), won me over after a struggle. The first time through, I experienced a rash of negative judgments: the tempo was too slow, the beat was too regular, the dynamic range was too narrow (only from p to f , while the piano could cover from ppp to fff ), the soloist is an academic (and you know how they are), and there was no exhilaration by acceleration. Everything was too risk free, too free of passion. I was under the spell of the modern piano readings of B