Eleanor Trawick
Ball State University
Bach's Suites for Solo Violoncello invite analysis from a number of different points of view, and not simply for their rhythmic ingenuity. With so much depth and so many riches lying just below the immediate surface, it is tempting to look right past the most obvious and superficial of the characteristics of the suites- their genre, and the designation of the individual movements as "Allemand," "Courante," and the like. Yet the dances Bach inherited, with their metrical formulae and rhythmic conventions, still play a role in the cello suites, serving as foils to the more complex and unpredicatable ingredients. This tension, between an expected metric regularity and the metric irregularity of the actual pieces, is one of the most intriguing features of the suites.
This analysis will address some of the problems of rhythm and meter encountered in performing the cello suites, and it will discuss some of the ways that Bach systematically undermines regular meter and rhythmic patterns. For example, repeated motives often change their metrical placement within a movement, displacing the accents. Large-scale syncopations disrupt the meter when agogic and tonal accents contradict the notated meter for several measures at a time. And, in order to make sense of the counterpoint and voice-leading, the performer must often exaggerate the length or dynamics of particular notes; in many places such an accommodation to contrapuntal requirements contradicts the meter.