That such a form creator as Bach, who fitted every worlt into a strict self-made architectural plan in which the overall structure and the smallest musical gesture alike had their place, had to regard this "unfarmed" form as a challenge and stimulus is self-understood. The selection and sequence of the movements as a task for the performer, a matter of course in France ten years earlier and still quite thinkable among his contemporaries, is out of the question in his suites. One cannot amit a single movement or out it in a different place, without destroying the whole works. For Bach differed in one important respect from all composers of his generation: he rejected the freedom of the performer, that essential feature of all baroque music entirely. Perhaps it was just because he, as an unequalled improviser, knew the dangers that threatened the best compositions of his colleagues through the arbitrary interference self-understood at that time, such as choice of instruments. transposition, arrangements of the order or again through clumsy ornarnentation, that he left no place for this in his own works. In this, he was two generations ahead of this time. Just as he wrote out the execution of the ornaments in detail  - which must almost have been an insult to the musicians of that time - he also laid down himself the final and unequivocal form.
Through the extension of the dominating introductory movement the overture, to half the length of the entire work he elevated his suites from the sphere of light "table rnusic" and formed them into genuine works of "worldly"' festive music. The elements of greatness and splendour are underlined by the constitution of the orchestra in the 1st, 3rd ond 4th suites The dances and characteristic pieces follow the overture according to a brilliant plan of dramatic significance.
ln the First Suite in C major, a beginning is made by a nostalgic, song-like courante in the French manner. This legato piece is followed, as if the reins were being let looser, by a gay gavotte (in which. in accordance with Muffat's demands, the second and fourth crotchet "should be far more restrained than hurried"); this intensivication finds its climax in a wild southern forlana. Constant quaver movement in me middle parts is here intended to represent the excited crowd of spectators. This most unbridled and follt-like of all Bach's dances is followed, in rnost extreme contrast by a minuet, the court dance "par excellence". ln a self-contained symmetrical sequence (a kind of miniature in itself) - minuet/bourree/passepied (a quick variety of minuet) - the spirits that have become so heated by the farlana are calmed again. and mode "fit for the court" ance more In addition, the two last dances represent a symmetrical final reflection of the first two: courante (song-like) and gavotte (refinedly dance-like) are corresponded to by the bourrée and passepied. These two dances are closely related to the first two, bourrée being the more lively sister of the gavotte and the passepied, a peculiar song-like variety of this dance form, recalling the courante. lt differs markedly from the usual pattern, its expressively legato quaver figures in the first section and even more so in the Passepied ll (in the oboe solo) importing a flowing, cantabile quality to the piece. The hemiole fineness of the traditional passepied are suggested in the background in this piece.
ln the second Suite in B minor. the intensification of expression of the individual dances is perhaps still more clearly marked. The sequence of dances begins with a discreetly noble Rondeau (a gavotte) ond rises to powerful expression in the measured stnding of the Sarabande. The impetuous Bourrée I and the delicate Bourrée II bring a further intensification, which finds its goal in the grandiose and proud Palonaise. The latter's "Double" is at the same time the virtuoso climax of the flute solos in this suite. Again the classical Minuet follows an elegant calming influence. Since, however, this suite is truly speaking a flute concertino, the impudent coquettish Badinerie is tacked on as a bravura piece for the flute - a ready-composed encore, as it were.

Concertante Elements in the Suites
Soloists are already used un the earliest overtures and dances of Lully, preference being shown for a trio of two oboes ond a bossoon that reply to the tutti sections played "forte". The contrasting of two dances played in alternation (such as two minuets or two govottes), the second of which was allated only to this solo trio (thus the later classical designation "Trio" for every second minuet) was also introduced by Lully. These solo possibilities already prepared were extended by Bach in many directions. There are predominant solo instruments in each of his suites, which make their main appearance in the Allegro section of the overture thus lending it a concertante character buth are also heard in the dances. In the First Suite it is the two oboes and the bossoon, whose virtuoso passages even go beyond those of the First Brandenburg Concerto in their technical demands Their solos are explicitly headed "Trio" in the autograph wind parts The bassoon, in particular, was otherwise given such difficult and solo tasks only by Vivaldi at that time. Also concertante are - apart from the Overture - Gavotte ll and Passepied ll, whereas the Bourrée II is a genuine wind trio in the older sense. ln the Second Suite the transverse flute predominates, which had just risen to the status of o highly fashionable instrument at that time. "...This instrument it is true, has become very popular, especially in Germany, since thirty to forty years...", writes Quantz in 1752. It here plays solo in the Overture. Randeau (Govotte), Baurrée Il, in the Double of the Polonoise and in the Badinerie.