The blog “Infodad.com: Family-Focused Reviews” has done a review of three Bach albums, one of which is Joshua Smith’s newest J.S. Bach Flute Sonatas release.
From Family-Focused Reviews:
“Flautist Joshua Smith and the other performers in a new recording of Bach’s flute music are representative of the skill of modern players on old instruments: they imbue the works with warmth and color entirely suitable for the time in which Bach wrote the music, without unnecessary Romantic-era flourishes and without turning the pieces into display vehicles for Smith or anyone else. This is cooperative music-making at its finest, with each player contributing his or her element to the whole texture while holding virtuosity in check and making no attempt to overstate an individual part or alter the fine balance that Bach brought to these delicate and poised works. The pieces are miniatures, especially the first flute sonata (in C Major, BWV 1033), whose four movements run only eight minutes; but there is something substantive in each work. In the second and third sonatas (E Minor, BWV 1034; E Major, BWV 1035), it is the first movements, both marked Adagio ma non tanto and both providing considerable depth of feeling. And the Trio Sonata from “The Musical Offering,” with its extended Largo opening balanced by the Allegro that follows, is a simply wonderful weaving together of flute and violin lines. These performances are effective, even loving, adhering to practices of Bach’s time while speaking meaningfully to our own.”