GG bio, etc.

[Mary Jo Watts <mwatts@rci.rutgers.edu>]

Anne Marble said:

> It's obvious Ostwald didn't take GG's non-piano work
> seriously, and that's a dang shame. At the Gathering,
> somebody (maybe our own Mary Jo Watts?) said something
> about how a biographer who didn't appreciate the
> Solitude Trilogy wasn't an appropriate biographer for
> GG. (If Mary Jo wasn't the one who said that, she _did_
> applaud the comment. <g>)

Indeed I did, Anne. I don't think many folks who've written about Gould
have taken the ST seriously. Didn't GG say somewhere that the IoN was the
closest thing to an autobio he'd ever write? I had such a good time
talking with Lorne Tulk about the ST. During the Gathering, I had made an
attempt to point out what I found to be the obvious countrapuntal
structure of the "trio sonata" at the beginning of the IoN-- how GG made
literal the "musical" structure of the piece-- how it reflected his sense
of music as language, and maybe vice versa.  Lorne said to me that people
just don't get that aspect-- ex. in homage to GG people have created radio
pieces that just lay sound over sound without regard for "musical"
structure.  I was really surprised to hear it-- I thought the structure of
what GG was doing was obvious but maybe I've listened to the pieces WAY to
many times! <g>  Edward Said's article in Raritan where he discusses GG's
attempt to make music a venue for intellectual, linguistic thought would
only have been enhanced if Said had paid attention to the ST.  The ST is
entrancing, maddening, apolitical (or not political enough for my taste),
beautiful, grating, smart, witty, experimental (if only because it takes
one way of thinking--the musical, the performative and translates that
thought to words, recordings)-- it reflects all one really needs to know
about GG.  Except who is that cert. beautiful girl...IOW who was the
intended listener, the new audience, the ideal listener...who was GG
trying to reach with so many voices?

<relurk>
-Mary Jo Watts