Michèle Auclair & Marie-Claire Alain play Bach Six Sonatas for Violin and Keyboard, BWV 1014–1019

Bach commenced work on his six sonatas for violin and keyboard (BWV 1014-19) whilst at the courts of Weimar and Köthen and returned to the compositions over several decades, revising and polishing until the years before his death. Prefiguring the classic duo sonata, violin and keyboard meet on equal terms in this music, and both are challenged by Bach’s compositional demands. At the time this compositional style was both unusual and innovative, but went on to gain more mainstream acceptance in the late eighteenth century.Michèle Auclair was born in Paris on November 16, 1924. She initially studied the violin with her primary teacher...