Anthea Cottee will perform the Sarabande and Courante from JS Bach’s Cello Suite No 1, BWV 1007, for the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra’s Bach Series on its digital platform, Brandenburg One. She speaks to Limelight about about Bach, psychology and how a horse-riding accident forced her to make a difficult decision about her career in music.

Anthea CotteeAnthea Cottee. Photo © Katelyn-Jane Dunn

I understand you were originally a violinist and violist – how did you come to play the cello?

I played violin from the age of five, and fell in love with the viola when I was in Year 12 at school when I was asked to play the incredibly beautiful viola part in Vaughan Williams’ Variations on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. I then went over to Adelaide to study viola and was totally committed to it. Unfortunately, a month after I arrived I fell off a horse and broke my jaw. After about six months of operations, recovery, and practicing about ten minutes a day it became clear that I was not going to be able to manage much more than that, so I faced a difficult decision of what to do from there....