The Brandenburg Concertos present one of music’s great riddles. Bach sent them to Christian Ludwig, the Margrave of Brandenburg and brother of King Frederick I of Prussia, as a gift in 1721. For reasons unknown, he seems to have quietly filed them away after which they changed hands several times before being ‘lost’ until around 1850 when they were eventually published as a set.
It is music of endless inventiveness – from the intricate silken passage-work for strings in Nos. 3 and 6, to the grandiose harpsichord cadenza in No. 5, or the dazzling virtuosity of the trumpet in No. 2 – which demands a supergroup of virtuosos.