21 CÉDRIC PESCIA The humanity of these Suites is all the more evident as they do not begin with a majestic prelude but with an Allemande, generally very gentle in nature. From the outset, we enter a world that leaves room for tenderness... Indeed. Bach shows great delicacy in his treatment of these dances, most of which were no longer in fashion. What we have here is a kind of remembrance, even nostalgia for something still present in the collective memory yet belonging to the past. These pieces are rarely exuberant but display a certain modesty. And at the centre of each Suite, always in third position, stands a Sarabande. At that point emotion reaches its height: it is the heart that beats, that races, that sometimes suffers. Yet everything passes very quickly when one performs them in concert. One enters an emotional world only to find oneself, a few brief minutes later, in an entirely different atmosphere. Moving from one dance to another represents a real challenge for the performer, since they possess such distinct characters and even different styles. It reminds me of the Schumann cycles, in which short pieces with contrasting moods also follow on from one another in succession.
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