J.S. Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier (complete)

1. how you come across to it:
Probably ABRSM syllabus. I started to appreciate it after listening to No. 13 in F sharp major and No. 18 in G sharp minor from Book II on Dino Lipatti and Maira Yudina's CD. This time, the overwhelming experience of listening to the complete WTC played by Angela Hewitt, one book for each night, in the length of over two and a half hours for each performance, as part of her Bach World Tour.

2. why this piece?
Not only it is intellectually challenging to listen to the complete WTC at a time, but emotionally intense. Thanks to Hewitt's humanistic, or at times, sentimental approach, emotions of different kinds that were wrapped in musical lines are disclosed. I am not sure if I can have another chance to listen to the complete WTC in live concert ever again in my life.

3. (and...)
Listening in the sequence of C-c-C#-c#-D-d-Eb-d#-..., it was like inspecting a whole spectrum of keys manifested themselves in carefully articulated matrixes of notes. I have an impression that a certain preludes and fugues sound like they were composed exclusively for the keys they are now in, that they should only be played in that key, but not otherwise.

4. (also...)
Being someone vulnerable to the sound of the piano, there are moments I was moved to tears in both evenings, out of joy and gratitude. I didn't expect to shed tears in an all-Bach recital.

If I have to limit myself to the oeuvre of only one composer, he would definitely be Johann Sebastian Bach.

BWV 883


BWV 893
http://hk.youtube.com/watch?v=jj12th02yT4