Clarification.

["Nemesio Valle, III" <nevst3@imap.pitt.edu>]

At 1:44 PM -0400 5/4/01, Anne Smith wrote:
> I am most curious about why you think that Glenn Gould hated most of
> Beethoven.

[snip]

> I do not find it goofy, weird or strange that musicians dislike certain
> composers.  I myself do not care for the music of Schumann.


Perhaps my language was too strong in an effort to list a few of GG's
many eccentricities.  I apologize for that.

However, I daresay that GG's recording output is very different than
many other mainstream pianist performers in the gapping lacunae in
his repertoire not to mention his complete refusal to perform on
stage publicly for the last 17 years of his life.  To my knowledge,
no other performer has gotten away with this.

Gould made most of his critics happy with the likes of Bach and
Schoenberg.  However, his first Beethoven album (the last three
sonatas) was relatively scandalous, while his Mozart was greeted with
incredulity.  We all know the story.  Nearly absent from his
recording list are the names Liszt, Chopin, Schumann, Mendelssohn,
and many others who are the meat and potatoes for just about every
other pianist.

While other performers do specialize in certain periods or even focus
on certain composers, they do not so avidly avoid other canonized
material.  Recitals usually contain some sort of balance amongst
periods; Romantic pianists almost always toss in a token Baroque and
20th century piece.  And, the exact opposite in Gould's case is true
-- he essentially avoided the piano music of the Romantic 19th
century and made the piano music of the late 18th-early 19th
centuries so peculiar that people reacted with shock.

And, as if his playing of various pieces didn't explain his emotional
perspective, his writings often did, saying things like the
Appassionata fell between the King Stephen Overture and the
Wellington's Victory Symphony and the like is to say the least
stunning.  And he didn't stop there.  Read the liner notes for his
Beethoven albums as recorded by Tim Page.  They are very unusual.
Follow that with his interview with Monsaingeon on Mozart or his GG
interviews GG on Beethoven.  Very very peculiar business going on.
Not the likes of any other performer I can think of.  This isn't
simple a performer disliking a composer, it is almost scandalous.

It is not the fact that GG disliked certain composers that is
intriguing, I think, but the extent to which he avoided them when he
could and perverted them when he couldn't which is beyond the
normative performer's attitude.  This is the major point, and I am
sorry if I was unclear in my haste to respond to the other post.  I
am,

Respectfully yours,
Nemesio Valle, III

And don't get me wrong -- I love the interpretations that GG gave us
for Beethoven and Mozart, but they are no doubt perverse.
--
Nemesio Valle, III
University of Pittsburgh
Duquesne University

Address:        5802 Callowhill Street
               Pittsburgh, PA 15206
Phone:          412-365-0340

Email:          nevst3@pitt.edu

"The purpose of art is not the release of a momentary ejection of
adrenaline but is, rather, the gradual, lifelong construction of a
state of wonder and serenity."
               Glenn Gould

"I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from
him."
               Galileo Galilei

"Specialization is for insects."
               Lazarus Long

"Competitions are for horses, not artists."
               Bela Bartok

"Understanding is both the first principle and the source of good
sound writing."
               Horace