Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I, BWV 846-869 Aaron Pilsan

• Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 - 1750): Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1:
• 1 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude I in C Major, BWV 846 02:01
• 2 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue I in C Major, BWV 846 02:00
• 3 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude II in C Minor, BWV 847 01:32
• 4 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue II in C Minor, BWV 847 01:39
• 5 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude III in C-Sharp Major, BWV 848 01:15
• 6 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue III in C-Sharp Major, BWV 848 02:20
• 7 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude IV in C-Sharp Minor, BWV 849 02:31
• 8 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue IV in C-Sharp Minor, BWV 849 04:07
• 9 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude V in D Major, BWV 850 01:15
• 10 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue V in D Major, BWV 850 01:40
• 11 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude VI in D Minor, BWV 851 01:47
• 12 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue VI in D Minor, BWV 851 02:15
• 13 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude VII in E-Flat Major, BWV 852 03:37
• 14 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue VII in E-Flat Major, BWV 852 01:29
• 15 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude VIII in E-Flat Minor, BWV 853 03:06
• 16 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue VIII in D-Sharp Minor, BWV 853 04:32
• 17 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude IX in E Major, BWV 854 01:16
• 18 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue IX in E Major, BWV 854 01:04
• 19 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude X in E Minor, BWV 855 02:01
• 20 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue X in E Minor, BWV 855 01:11
• 21 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XI in F Major, BWV 856 00:58
• 22 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XI in F Major, BWV 856 01:17
• 23 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XII in F Minor, BWV 857 02:10
• 24 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XII in F Minor, BWV 857 04:29
• 25 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XIII in F-Sharp Major, BWV 858 01:30
• 26 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XIII in F-Sharp Major, BWV 858 01:47
• 27 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XIV in F-Sharp Minor, BWV 859 00:56
• 28 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XIV in F-Sharp Minor, BWV 859 03:04
• 29 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XV in G Major, BWV 860 00:50
• 30 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XV in G Major, BWV 860 03:05
• 31 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XVI in G Minor, BWV 861 02:09
• 32 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XVI in G Minor, BWV 861 01:28
• 33 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XVII in A-Flat Major, BWV 862 01:13
• 34 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XVII in A-Flat Major, BWV 862 02:32
• 35 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XVIII in G-Sharp Minor, BWV 863 01:36
• 36 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XVIII in G-Sharp Minor, BWV 863 02:08
• 37 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XIX in A Major, BWV 864 01:12
• 38 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XIX in A Major, BWV 864 02:16
• 39 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XX in A Minor, BWV 865 01:03
• 40 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XX in A Minor, BWV 865 04:13
• 41 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XXI in B-Flat Major, BWV 866 01:18
• 42 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XXI in B-Flat Major, BWV 866 01:52
• 43 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XXII in B-Flat Minor, BWV 867 02:55
• 44 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XXII in B-Flat Minor, BWV 867 03:02
• 45 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XXIII in B Major, BWV 868 00:54
• 46 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XXIII in B Major, BWV 868 02:18
• 47 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Prelude XXIV in B Minor, BWV 869 04:40
• 48 Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue XXIV in B Minor, BWV 869 07:19
• Total Runtime 01:46:52

Info for Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I, BWV 846-869

A child prodigy on the piano, his name is already associated with the Verbier Festival, the Philharmonie de Paris and Vienna’s Konzerthaus. For his Canadian premiere, he performs Book 1 of this classic work, which Haydn and Mozart studied in great depth.

In 1722, at the age of thirty-seven, Johann Sebastian Bach made a calligraphic copy of his collection of twenty- four preludes and fugues under the title Das Wohltemperirte Clavier oder Praeludia und Fugen durch alle Tone und Semitonia (The Well-Tempered Clavier, or preludes and fugues through all the tones and semitones). He added this explanatory note to the title: ‘For the profit and use of musical youth eager to learn, as well as for the particular pastime of those already skilled in this study, drawn up and written by Johann Sebastian Bach . . .’ The collection was the culmination of Bach’s compositional exploration of the tonal possibilities of keyboard instruments – the word ‘clavier’ served as a collective term and encompassed the harpsichord, but also the organ and clavichord, and later the fortepiano. In it, Bach made use of the fugue, a form rooted in the sacred vocal music of the Middle Ages and by that time regarded as antiquated, and combined it with the most unusual musical material, moving through all twelve semitones of the chromatic scale in increasing complexity. ...

Aaron Pilsan, piano

Aaron Pilsan
is internationally recognized as a future star of the piano world. Selected by the influential German magazine Fono Forum as "Best Young Artist of the Year" in 2011, he was subsequently chosen as a "Rising Star" for the European Concert Hall Organization (ECHO) in 2014 which resulted in invitations to perform in many of Europe's most prestigious concert halls.

Aaron is frequently invited to the leading festivals, including the Menuhin Festival Gstaad, Schubertiade, Schwetzingen Festival, Bregenz Festival, Musikfest Bremen, Klavierfestival Ruhr, Mozartfest Würzburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival and the Kissinger Sommer festival, to name a few. He has graced the stages of Europe's major venues including the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Palais des Beaux Arts Brussels, Boulez Saal Berlin, Vienna Konzerthaus, Philharmonie de Paris and Luxemburg Philharmonie.

An avid chamber music player, Aaron regularly performs with artists including cellist Kian Soltani, Isabelle Faust, Sharon Kam, Szymanowski Quartet and Quartetto di Cremona. Despite being beloved for his interpretations of the classical and early Romantic repertoire, Aaron's musical sensibilities lend themselves very well to contemporary music. He collaborates regularly with composers Jörg Widman and Thomas Larcher and recently performed the world premiere of Persian classical composer Reza Vali's piece for cello and piano at Berlin's Boulez Saal.

Aaron's debut recording on the French label Naive featuring the works of Schubert and Beethoven was highly acclaimed by the international press with Gramophone Magazine calling this recording "refreshing and rewarding" and crediting him for using "his remarkable agility to a purely musical end." In February 2018, Deutsche Grammophon released HOME, a musical tribute to Aaron's hometown in Austria together with long-time duo partner and cellist Kian Soltani featuring the works of Schubert and Schumann.

Born in 1995 in Dornbirn, Austria, Aaron began to play the piano at the age of five. He studied with Karl Heinz Kämmerling at the Mozarteum Salzburg and is currently a protégé of Lars Vogt. Aaron has been supported by the Swiss Foundation "Orpheum," is a scholar of the Mozart Gesellschaft Dortmund, and was awarded the "Förderpreis Deutschlandfunk" in August 2017.

Booklet for Bach: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I, BWV 846-869