Sony Classical Announces Leonidas Kavakos THE APOLLΩN ENSEMBLE Bach Violin Concertos
Leonidas Kavakos
THE APOLLΩN ENSEMBLE
Bach Violin Concertos
New Single: “Allegro” (BWV 1052R)
Out Today
For his latest release on Sony Classical, to be released on March, 29, 2024, violinist Leonidas Kavakos goes back to Bach – the composer whose music has inspired him for decades.
Having played Bach as a youngster, Kavakos stopped performing the composer’s music in public in order to reexamine his relationship with the scores and recalibrate his baroque technique. In 2022, he released an acclaimed recording of the composer’s Partitas and Sonatas for Solo Violin on Sony Classical - his first release including music by Bach. New single “Allegro” (BWV 1052R) is out today –– listen here.
Now Kavakos turns to Bach’s four solo violin concertos - varied and vivid orchestral works from the first half of the 18th century in which the composer combined the best of German and Italian instrumental styles.
Ever questioning orthodoxies, Kavakos experimented with a one-per-part playing in preparation for his recording. With the members of The ApollΩn Ensemble, he concluded that the best approach was to use the smallest possible group of musicians - just five ensemble string players and a harpsichordist.
‘You couldn’t get more intimate with the music than this’, the violinist says. Using a single instrument for each of the ensemble parts creates ‘a particular harmonic and rhythmic world that both complements and enhances what everyone else is doing’ and ‘brings an enormous variety and richness to the sound and was a constant inspiration.’
Having experimented with baroque and classical bows, Kavakos uses a bow modeled on a François Tourte example from the early 1800s, together with his 1734 Willemotte Stradivarius.
Bach’s four violin concertos communicate strikingly different moods. The dark D minor concerto ‘opened up an incredible world for me,’ says Kavakos, who describes the contrasting E major concerto as ‘pure sunshine.’ Bach’s slow movements, says Kavakos, ‘carry us to the place where every human soul would love to be.’
An exclusive Sony Classical artist, Kavakos is one of the world’s most respected violinists. He continues to be a guest of the great concert halls and orchestras of the world as both violinist and conductor.