Haendel : Huit Suites. Driver.

Piano International (Jul, 2014)
It was the circulation of ‘surrepticious and incorrect copies’ (the illegal downloads of the day) that prompted Handel to publish his Suites de pieces pour le clavecin (later known as the Eight Great Suites) in London in 1720. It’s likely that most of the music was composed between ten and 15 years earlier, yet it was only after he moved to Cannons in 1717 that Handel compiled the suites, revising and adapting existing scores and adding several entirely new movements.

The suites attest to Handel’s prolific creativity and to his skill at integrating a host of German, French and Italian influences into a seamless individual style. Though loosely based on the …