Andreas Staier

'Aria mit verschiedenen Veränderungen', the original title that Bach gave in 1741 to his 'Goldberg Variations', betrays a touch of irony on his part. Indeed, the fourth part of his 'Clavier Übung' amounts to somewhat more than an 'aria with a few variations'. It is an absolute masterpiece, one of overwhelming beauty, compositionally well thought out and with an intense emotional profundity. Bach at the top of his form. The foundation of the work is the bass line of the opening aria, which, via inventive contrapuntal techniques, appears thirty times, each time in a different guise. The initial aria appears again at the end, identical, yet totally different after everything that we have heard before - one of the finest moments in the entire keyboard repertoire! Reason enough to devote a concert series to the Goldberg Variations. We begin at the beginning: the original version for harpsichord with two manuals. It is played by the pre-eminent expert Andreas Staier, who has recently made a brilliant recording of the work. As a preamble to the concert, Ignace Bossuyt tells you everything you need to know about the Goldberg Variations. This is supplemented by commentary from Andreas Staier at the harpsichord.