English Suite No.2 in A minor BWV 807 (1715-1723)

Prélude

Allemande

Courante

Sarabande

Bourrées 1 & 2

Gigue

A plausible explanation for the title given to the English Suites - which is not the composer’s own - was offered by the early Bach biographer Johann Forkel, who declared that these “six great suites are known by the name of English Suites because they were written for an Englishman of rank.” Another (not incompatible) suggestion is that they were modelled on the work of Charles Dieuport, a French composer who spent most of his working life in London and whose Six Suites of 1701 were of such interest to Bach that he made copies of parts of them. That would at least explain why all the movements of the six English Suites have French titles.

The six French Suites also have French titles of course, not excluding the Anglaise fourth movement of the third Suite. While these possibly later works are shorter, technically easier and less conscientiously polyphonic in texture than the English Suites, the most conspicuous difference between the two sets is that, whereas the French Suites go straight into the sequence of dances, the English follow Dieuport’s example by beginning with a Prélude.

The Prélude of the Second Suite in A minor, unlike that of the First in A major but like the Préludes of the other Suites in the set, is in a kind of concerto form. Except in the unusually extended exposition of the ritornello material, it is a closely related in structure to the first movement of the Fourth Brandenburg Concerto. The Allemande, which is strictly imitative in style, is in binary form, like the four dances that follow. The second part of the Courante, for example, is based on an inversion of the material of the first. Printed alongside the Sarabande is an alternative, elaborately ornamented version of the melodic line that can, at the performer’s discretion, be used in the repeats. The sequence of binary constructions is broken by a pair of contrasting Bourrées, the first in A minor being repeated after its companion in A major to make a broad ternary pattern. Bach liked the closing Gigue so much that he requested not only repeats of the two parts in turn but also of the whole piece from the beginning to the end.