Bach: The Musical Offering, BWV 1079

Sooner or later the Ricercar Consort had to confront the omnipresent spirit of the ricercar explicitly advocated by Bach in his Musical Offering. This work continues to ascinate musicians, musicologists, and music-lovers. Does it transpose a rhetorical scheme into music, or reflect a heavenly design? Or some other purpose, speculative, even sacred or testamentary? In the order chosen by the Ricercar Consort, the Trio Sonata for flute, violin, and continuo takes up a central position, separating the three-art ricercar, from its six-part counterpart, a dense, fluid work, extremely challenging for the performers. Thanks to the ordering adopted in this new recording, this Ricercare à 6 appears in its full grandeur, illuminated by the mosaic of the canons.