Jeremy Denk is one of America’s foremost pianists, proclaimed by the New York Times as “a pianist you want to hear no matter what he performs”. Also a New York Times bestselling author, Jeremy is the recipient of both the MacArthur ‘Genius’ Fellowship and the Avery Fisher Prize, and is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

In the 2024/25 season, Jeremy continues his collaboration with longtime musical partners Joshua Bell and Steven Isserlis, with performances at the Tsindali Festival and Wigmore Hall, following on from his multi-
concert artist residency at the Wigmore in 2023/24. He also returns to the Lammermuir Festival in multiple performances, including the complete Ives violin sonatas with Maria Wloszczowska, and a solo recital featuring female composers from the past to the present day. He performs this same solo programme on tour across the US, as well as continuing his exploration of Bach in ongoing performances of the complete Partitas. Jeremy is known for his interpretations of the music of American visionary Charles Ives, and in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth, Nonesuch Records will release a collection of his Ives recordings later this year.

Highlights of Jeremy’s 2023/24 season included premiering a new concerto written for him by Anna Clyne, co-commissioned and performed by the Dallas Symphony led by Fabio Luisi, the City of Birmingham Symphony led by Kazuki Yamada, and the New Jersey Symphony led by Markus Stenz. He also reunited with Krzysztof Urbański to perform with the Antwerp Symphony, and with the Danish String Quartet for their festival Series of Four.

Jeremy has performed frequently at Carnegie Hall, and in recent years has worked with such orchestras as Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, and San Francisco Symphony. Meanwhile, he has performed multiple times at the BBC Proms and Klavierfestival Ruhr, and appeared in such halls as the Köln Philharmonie, Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, and Boulez Saal in Berlin. He has also performed extensively across the UK, including recently with the London Philharmonic, Bournemouth Symphony, City of Birmingham Symphony, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, and Scottish Chamber Orchestra.

Denk is also known for his original and insightful writing on music, which Alex Ross praises for its “arresting sensitivity and wit.” His New York Times Bestselling memoir, Every Good Boy Does Fine, was published to universal acclaim by Random House in 2022, with features on CBS Sunday Morning, NPR’s Fresh Air, The New York Times, and The Guardian. Denk also wrote the libretto for a comic opera presented by Carnegie Hall, Cal Performances, and the Aspen Festival, and his writing has appeared in the New Yorker, the New Republic, The Guardian, Süddeutsche Zeitung and on the front page of the New York Times Book Review.

Denk’s latest album of Mozart piano concertos was released in 2021 on Nonesuch Records. The album, deemed “urgent and essential” by BBC Radio 3. His recording of the Goldberg Variations for Nonesuch Records reached No. 1 on the Billboard Classical Charts, and his recording of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata Op. 111 paired with Ligeti’s Études was named one of the best discs of the year by the New Yorker, NPR, and the Washington Post, while his account of the Beethoven sonata was selected by BBC Radio 3’s Building a Library as the best available version recorded on modern piano.

The program notes provided for this performance were written by Dr. Eric Bromberger for Mr. Denk’s 2024 performance of the partitas at SOKA in California; they are reprinted here with his kind permission.

When Bach moved to Leipzig in 1723, his musical duties changed. For his music-loving prince in Cöthen, Bach had written the great part of his secular instrumental music, but now–as Cantor of the Thomaskirche–he was charged with producing music for religious functions, and the music flowed out of him at a pace that would have exhausted even a Mozart: from the late 1720s came several hundred church cantatas and the St. Matthew Passion. But Bach did not altogether lose interest in instrumental music–he had written the first book of The Well-Tempered Clavier in Cöthen, and now in Leipzig he continued to compose for keyboard. Bach’s set of six partitas, originally written for harpsichord, was composed between 1726 and 1731 and published in the latter year as the first volume of his Clavier-Übung (“Keyboard Practice”). In a wonderful introductory note in the score, the composer described these works as having been “Composed for Music Lovers, to Refresh their Spirits, by Johann Sebastian Bach.” Bach understood the partita to be a suite of dance movements–its name implies a set of “parts”–based on the traditional sequence of allemande-courante-sarabande-gigue. He adopted this tradition but made it his own by supplementing it with three of what he called “galanteries”: extra movements, somewhat lighter in character and intended to make the work more attractive to listeners. These consisted of an introductory movement (in a different form in each of the six partitas) and two extra dance movements.

Partita No. 1 in B-flat Major, BWV825 — The Partita No. 1 in B-flat Major dates from 1726, when Bach was 41. It opens with a flowing and stately Praeludium, whose progress is enlivened by constant turns. Each of the four traditional movements of the partita has a distinct national origin. The Allemande (that name suggests it German ancestry) is traditionally a slow dance of serious character, usually in 4/4 time and in binary form; the present Allemande moves along rather quickly. The Courante (French for “running”) is a lively movement in triple time; this one dances along its steady triplet figurations. The Sarabande, of Latin American and Spanish heritage, is a stately dance in triple time, while the concluding Gigue (derived distantly from the Irish jig) rockets along at a blistering pace and requires some deft hand-crossings by the performer. The interpolated “galanteries” in this partita–they come between the Sarabande and Gigue–are a pair of minuets that are played without pause. The first dances nimbly along its hard-edged main theme, while the second–much shorter–is chordal and restrained.

Partita No. 2 in C Minor, BWV 826 — The Partita No. 2 in C Minor comes from 1727, when Bach was also working on his St. Matthew Passion. It opens with an imposing Sinfonia in three parts: the opening Grave is built on steadily-dotted rhythms, the Andante moves easily above a walking bassline, and the concluding section is a spirited fugue. The partita’s C-minor tonality gives the Allemande, Courante, and Sarabande a wistful, dark cast, and Bach keeps the tempo restrained in these movements as well. The interpolated movement here is a Rondeaux in 3/8, athletic and poised, and then Bach springs a surprise: he drops the expected Gigue and in its place concludes with a brilliant Capriccio in binary form.

Partita No. 3 in A Minor BWV 827 — The Partita No. 3 in A Minor opens with a Fantasia that dances gracefully along its 3/8 meter as the melodic line flows easily between the two hands. The ornate Allemande is enlivened by turns, mordants, and sharp interjections, while the energetic Courante contrasts a steady flow of sixteenth-notes in one hand with sharply-dotted rhythms in the other. The Sarabande is solemn and dignified–some scholars have noted that there is nothing distinctly sarabande-like about this music. Two interpolated movements follow. The Burlesca is sturdy and propulsive (though not self-consciously “funny”), while the Scherzo is distinctive if for no other reason than the fact that this is the only time Bach used that title. The partita concludes with an unusually powerful Gigue, full of contrapuntal complexity, that rushes relentlessly along its 12/8 meter.

Partita No. 4 in D Major, BWV 828 — The Partita No. 4 in D Major dates from 1728, when Bach was 43. It opens with a lengthy Ouverture in the French style: a grand slow introduction, full of runs and dotted rhythms, gives way to a fast fugue in 9/8 that rushes along its staccato main idea; Bach does not return to the slow opening at the end of this movement. Like all the “standard” partita movements in this work, the Allemande is in binary form, and if both halves are repeated this stately movement is by far the longest in the whole work. The Courante is full of a jaunty, snappy energy, while the Aria–one of the “galanteries”–is not so much lyric or vocal in character as it is balanced and precise.The spare Sarabande moves slowly along its 3/4 meter, while the brief Menuett is energized by the showers of triplets in the pianist’s right hand. Bach rounds the partita off with a brilliant Gigue, contrapuntal in character, that rips along its 9/16 meter. This is a tour de force of keyboard writing (and of contrapuntal complexity), and it brings the work to an impressive close.

Partita No. 5 in G Major BWV829 — The Partita No. 5 in G Major dates from 1730. The wonderful Preambulum has been likened to a concerto. It features brilliant exchanges between the hands, and all this dashing energy is interrupted by dignified chords that provide moments of repose before the music dashes off again. The Allemande is of a slow and serious character, while the Courante is lively. The Sarabande, in 3/4 meter, makes frequent use of dotted rhythms and grace notes. The concluding Gigue dances energetically and features polyphonic entrances and off-the-beat accents. The interpolated “galanteries” are first a Tempo di Minuetto that belongs mostly to the right hand; its athletic and angular character makes this quick music seem at far remove from the minuet of classical form. The second is a Passepied (“pass-foot” in French), a lively dance in triple time, said to be originally a sailors’ dance.

Partita No. 6 in E Minor BWV 830 — The Partita No. 6 in E Minor is one of Bach’s most imposing–and serious works for keyboard. Its opening Toccata, by far the longest first movement of the six partitas, is in ternary form: its outer sections have an improvisatory character (carefully written out), and these frame a somber and expressive fugue, which is all the more effective for being so restrained. The Allemande is propelled along dotted rhythms made ornate by rhythmic swirls and rolled chords. The Courante requires quite different music from the pianist’s two hands: the left has the steady 3/8 meter, while the right breaks free with syncopations and racing 32nd-note runs. The energetic Air, one of the interpolated movements, is brief, but the complex Sarabande returns to the somber mood of the opening fugue. Textures are complex here, with long runs, dotted rhythms, turns, and broken chords. The other interpolated movement, Tempo di Gavotta, nicely meshes triplets and dotted rhythms. Bach rounds the partita off with a Gigue that does not so much dance as drive this serious music to a firm close.

Suites, part 1:

Suites, part 2:

ChatJSB: Jeremy Denk