This new edition, based on volume 4 of the New Bach Edition, Revised (NBArev), now completes Bärenreiter's collection of the cello suite editions. Andrew Talle has fundamentally reassessed the relations between the surviving sources and has drawn conclusions regarding their evaluation and consequently the genesis of the suites. His evaluations are augmented with thorough discussions of the instrument for which the suites were conceived and the interpretative practices in Bach's day.

The musical text of the edition is based on these findings. It approaches the composer's original intentions as far as the sources will permit. Details regarding articulation were deemed as being viable and were added to the musical text if they appeared in the majority of the sources. ''This edition does not present a perfect reconstruction of the lost autograph; no editor could claim to do so. Instead, I have attempted to provide musicians and scholars with a reliable version of the surviving musical text of the six cello suites and to shed light on the options which the Bach sources offer.''