Suite No. 1 in G major – Prelude

Suite No. 1 in G major – Prelude was premiered on April 19, 2015 by Ben Kaye-Skinner.

While waiting for a wedding to begin in the summer of 2013, I listened to Jessica Dussault playing her cello. She is a marvelous player, and we had worked together on projects with The Colonel Mustard before. As she played the prelude from Bach’s Suite No. 1 in G major I realized just how beautiful that piece of music is, and how much I wanted to play it. Not being a cellist, there was some immediate difficulty in this dream, but I hunted down the music anyway.

Fast forward a year and the Geneva Arts Council was preparing a concert to celebrate the 100th birthday of the Rialto II Theatre.  I was fortunate enough to be on the playbill of musicians tied to Geneva that was asked to perform, and I knew that I wanted to use this as my opportunity to tackle the Prelude. Professional players with a 4-valve euphonium (or a tuba and some really powerful drugs) would be able to play the original as written, but I was unable to acquire a 4-valve instrument or someone to pay me to be a professional player. So I adjusted the key and a few notes (and practiced my butt off) and ended up with this, which I proudly premiered at the event.