Sometimes Bach keeps it light, but now and then he goes all out for heavy. And this pair of works in B-flat minor, a ‘difficult’ key with five flats, digs very deep. It is even viewed by some as the highlight of the whole second Wohltemperirte Clavier: Bach’s most substantial three-part sinfonia as the prelude, followed by an overwhelming fugue on a productive theme.

Twenty years after his first collection of music in every key imaginable, Bach completed a second 'Wohltemperirte Clavier'. We recorded his first book of Preludes and Fugues at the homes of 24 different musicians. For this second part, performed in its entirety by Christine Schornsheim, we chose 12 very different locations in Utrecht, to celebrate the 900th anniversary of our home city.

Recorded for the project All of Bach on on 15 March 2022 at Dom Church, Utrecht, the Netherlands. If you want to help us complete All of Bach, please subscribe to our channel https://bit.ly/2vhCeFB and consider donating https://bit.ly/3J5uprM.

For the interview with Christine Schornsheim on the Wohltemperirte Clavier II and the process of recording this in its entirety, see    • Schornsheim on the Well-Tempered Clav...  
For more information on BWV 891 and this production go to https://www.bachvereniging.nl/en/bwv/...

All of Bach is a project of the Netherlands Bach Society, offering high-quality film recordings of the works by Johann Sebastian Bach, performed by the Netherlands Bach Society and its guest musicians. Visit our free online treasury for more videos and background material on https://www.bachvereniging.nl/en/allo.... For concert dates and tickets go to https://www.bachvereniging.nl/en/conc....

Christine Schornsheim, harpsichordist
Harpsichord: Bruce Kennedy, 1989 after Michael Mietke

0:00 Prelude
3:00 Fugue