Maya Beiser: InfInIte Bach

The solo cello suites of J.S. Bach reimagined in a Luminous Spatial Audio Recording

In InfInIte Bach, Maya Beiser elevates our sensory perception of the solo cello Suites of J. S. Bach in the expanded realm of spatial audio. Anchoring her body and instrument in the studio space, she reimagines this seminal Baroque work in a visceral experience that is both immersive and transcendental. The multilayered sounds of her cello emerge as ethereal and illuminated, like ambient lights and shadows tempering the overwhelming force of tradition.

New York, NY – On May 26, 2023, cellist and producer Maya Beiser will release InfInIte Bach on her

Islandia Music Records label – her first recording of the complete Solo Cello Suites of J.S. Bach. Maya

made this album in her converted barn in the Berkshires in Massachusetts, recording the Suites while

exploring the varying frequencies and resonances of the room, in order to create layers of sound

acoustically. InfInIte Bach will be released digitally in full Dolby Atmos spatial audio, available via Apple

Music, and in an immersive binaural mix on all other platforms.

Maya writes of the process, “I spent 2022, my 60th year of life, immersed in recording, and rerecording,

deconstructing and decontextualizing, experimenting and exploring sounds, reverberations, harmonics in

my converted barn in the Berkshires, Massachusetts, engaging with Bach’s cello Suites. Having

dedicated the past 35 years to creating new music, work that reimagines the cello on a vast canvas in

multiple disciplines, I radically departed from the conventional classical cello sound. Yet, the Suites were ingrained in my daily practice. Even as I was getting ready to perform a new work by Steve Reich, Louis

Andriessen, or David Bowie, I would still begin every day playing a movement from the Suites. Over the

years I was experimenting with the process of unlearning the doctrine I was taught about this music, until

last year when I took the time to relearn it anew.”

Maya’s approach to this recording was inspired, in part, by Alvin Lucier’s seminal 1969 piece, I am sitting

in a room. She writes, “I brought my longtime sound engineer and collaborator, Dave Cook, to the space

and we started exploring the acoustic environment. I considered how the space itself uncovers, informs

and reshapes my interpretation of the Suites, feeding back the music to me as I play and record it. We

mixed many microphones placed at various distances in the resonant space to emphasize nuances in

overtones, reflections, and reverberations. Analyzing the multichannel recording, identifying and

accentuating the natural drones and harmonics, we further reinforced the resonances and macro

harmonic structure of the music. In the spatial audio mix, we aimed to bring the listening experience into

the room; guiding the listener through the virtual space as the music infinitely evolves around them.”