It has been known for some time that Bach knew of and played early examples of the piano, essentially invented by Bartolomeo Cristofori in the early 18th century, and several recordings have experimented with performances of Bach on a Cristofori piano or one by Cristofori's primary German follower, Gottfried Silbermann. This release by Italian historical keyboardist Luca Guglielmi goes farther in its ambitions, even suggesting that the results militate in favor of performing Bach on the modern piano rather than on the ...
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It has been known for some time that Bach knew of and played early examples of the piano, essentially invented by Bartolomeo Cristofori in the early 18th century, and several recordings have experimented with performances of Bach on a Cristofori piano or one by Cristofori's primary German follower, Gottfried Silbermann. This release by Italian historical keyboardist Luca Guglielmi goes farther in its ambitions, even suggesting that the results militate in favor of performing Bach on the modern piano rather than on the generally accepted harpsichord. Several pieces of evidence are marshaled in favor of the idea that period piano performance is not just a novelty but desirable. The most important ones are musical: the program effectively places Bach's music into a wider keyboard context that involves keyboards of several kinds: Cristofori and Silbermann pianos, and a clavichord, which was capable of some dynamic variation and was clearly an important instrument of the period. Guglielmi uses the...
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