While the opening concert of the Canberra International Music Festival demonstrated the wide-ranging scope of Artistic Director Roland Peelman’s Bach festival, Canberra violinist Kristian Winther’s survey of Bach’s works for solo violins was one, as Peelman put it, for the Bach purists.

Kristian Winther at the Canberra International Music Festival. Photo © Peter Hislop

Bach’s Sei Solo a Violino senza Basso accompagnato (Six Solos for Violin Without Bass Accompaniment) survive in an autograph score in the composer’s hand dated 1720, when Bach was living in Cöthen. Some have concluded that the title ‘sei solo’ or ‘you are alone’ instead of the correct Italian, ‘sei soli’, is a reference to his grief at the sudden passing of his wife Maria Barbara, who died that year – though this is disputed. Whether or not the three sonatas and three partitas are autobiographical, this music for solo violin is complex and multi-layered, Bach writing for an instrument he was intimately familiar with. The six virtuosic works amount to a little over two hours of music, but performing the complete set from memory in a single day – across two sessions, in...