JS Bach: Chaconne (BWV 1002)

[Michael McBroom]

JS Bach's Chaconne from his partita for solo violin (BWV1002) is an awe-inspiring work. As a fledgling classical guitarist, I first heard the Chaconne as a transcription for guitar. I have long felt, however, that the Chaconne is too much music for a single instrument, which is what led me to attempt an arrangement for multiple instruments. Following is my arrangement of the Chaconne in ten parts. The instruments I selected are perhaps somewhat unconventional, but I selected them for optimal separation, so the various parts would remain distinct from each other. One major difference between the violin manuscript and the guitar transcription is the guitar is played an octave lower than the violin. I elected to keep this distinction, mostly because I used a guitar transcription as the basis for my arrangement and also, as a guitarist, I'm most familiar with the way it sounds in this lower register.

This was a challenging arrangement. I was helped by using a program that translated a pdf document into a MIDI file, but there were many errors in the translation from pdf to MIDI. So many, in fact, that it might have been quicker just to input the music from scratch. Well, I exaggerate, but not by much. As for the arrangement itself, I'm still not entirely satisfied with it, so any constructive criticism you'd care to offer, I'd welcome.

This piece was entirely arranged, produced, and finalized using CWbBL.

https://soundcloud.com/michaelmcbroom/bach-chaconne-bwv-1002-highly-modified

Edited December 30, 2019 by Michael McBroom

[David Sprouse]

 I studied classical guitar for years but never got around to this one.  Honestly, I like ithow you arranged it morethan for solo guitar.  

[Michael McBroom]

Thanks, David. I too studied classical guitar for years, and I'm still an active player. But the Chaconne was always one of those pieces that I'd just play through on occasion and wonder if I'd ever have the technique to play it in public. Eh, not quite. I agree, there's really so much to that piece. I'm still astounded that Bach wrote it for solo violin.