GG: Rothstein article...

[Bradley P Lehman <bpl@UMICH.EDU>]

Andy H wrote:
>One interesting about that Rothstein piece in the Times is that he does
>explain why Gould moves him, and writes about his own response in much
>the way Bradley does about his: by appealing to technical/musical aspects of
>the playing.  For Rothstein it's Gould's deliberate foregrounding of
>musical details usually relegated to the background--bringing out inner
>voices, emphasizing contrapuntal textures in composers not generally
>played that way, etc.  (It does seem like a key feature of Gould's
>playing, and it's one that Bradley doesn't mention.)  And Rothstein gets
>from that technique, more or less straight to "ecstasy".   I'd be curious
>what people in these recent threads--James, Kate, Bradley, Mary Jo--and
>everyone else thinks about this:
>
>  http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/28/arts/28CONN.html

I agree with Rothstein: that emphasis on making everything "foreground" is
a clear and succinct assessment of Gould's style.  "[Gould] isn't
interested in novelistic experience. In fact, the elimination of
background and the accumulation of detail can be overwhelming. Yet when he
pulls it all together, it becomes possible to apprehend something that
also seems beyond comprehension. The result can be sublime: one begins to
experience music as if from outside, gazing in at its workings while being
absorbed in them. One is at once standing still while being swept away,
standing apart while feeling immersed."

Gould's extreme clarity of texture does foster a new way of listening: a
challenging and worthwhile exercise, IMHO.

At the same time, that goal of "foregrounding" everything does create some
necessary casualties, aspects of the music that can't coexist very
comfortably with that priority.  If everything is in the foreground, we
lose:

- easy flow, simplicity...just letting the music move along, seemingly
under its own buoyant power, inevitably.

- hierarchy of voices in the composition...some features *are* meant to be
background!...give the listener some credit in being able to tune into any
desired level of the hierarchy.  (That is, if we're beat over the head
with an undifferentiated sea of detail, all important, it becomes too much
to take in at once; and it can feel overwhelming, even insulting...the
performance can seem didactic.)  In a more normal performance, a
perceptive listener can choose to focus attention on those "less
important" halfway-hidden parts if s/he chooses to, without having those
parts thrust to an "in your face" position.

- spontaneity: if every detail is somehow structural as part of a
foreground, placed carefully into its appointed position, there's no place
for casual gestures or improvisation, an "in the moment" grace of
unpremeditated creation.

- passion and drama (sweep): if everything is governed by reason and
obvious order, the emotions take a back seat.  The listener might still
experience some emotions, but will they be uncontrollable?  (If you see a
breathtaking panorama, is your breath taken away by the vast beautiful
shapes and colors, blurred into an awesome design?  Or is it
breathtaking--the autonomic reaction--if you squint to see as many
separate leaves on as many separate trees as possible?)  The more
something is analyzed down to minute detail, the more the initial mystery
of "wow!" is drained out of it...yes?


That is, Gould's extremely detailed approach to musical performance has
some gains and some losses.

-----

This weekend I listened to Gould's late Brahms (the Op 10 Ballades and Op
79 Rhapsodies) next to the interpretations of Julius Katchen in the same
works.  They didn't sound like the same works.  I've had the Gould set for
at least 15 years and have listened to it many dozens of times; he brings
out every detail even when the details aren't particularly interesting,
and even his rubato seems rationally calculated to make structural points.
Katchen, by contrast, organizes the notes and phrases into many levels of
interest, *and* he has an overpowering range of expression, from utter
simplicity to fiery passion, letting the music sweep along with a wide
variety of characters.  The difference is startling.  And I can still pick
out any detail I care about without having to find everything in the
foreground.  I still like the Gould performances because he brings out
things one doesn't hear anywhere else...it's good to have both.

If I may risk a value judgment: Gould here seems to play an analysis, a
deconstruction, a commentary about the music's construction of notes and
phrases; Katchen more simply and directly plays *the music* rather than
its components.  The effect is completely different.  I do have an
emotional response to Gould's interpretation: frankly, a dark
claustrophobia.  It seems to me like a fatalistic, inexorable trudge
through the notes, never taking wing for any flight of fancy.  Brahms'
materials, the notes, are laid bare, the music dissected.  It moves me,
and has done so for years, but in a direction of depression rather than of
joy.  Katchen, by contrast, gives me a range of emotions that seem to be a
natural part of the music, the integrated whole.  The music flows so much
more easily, has more heights and depths, and has dramatic direction (as
the name "ballade" would imply...).

In brief, Gould here makes Brahms seem like an accomplished academic
contrapuntist, clever but dry; Katchen makes Brahms seem like a complete,
full-blooded composer with something meaningful and exciting to say.  I'm
sorry that that sounds harsh.

Gould's performances here are richly intense and disturbing, thoughtful,
overpowering...but (I don't think) in the direction the music would most
naturally go.  It's a deliberately different approach, one worth hearing
for interest's sake and to experience uncommon emotions...maybe a glimpse
at the grim spectre of Death in the G minor Rhapsody?  (That was my first
impression, years ago, hearing it for the first time soon after Gould's
death.)  Whatever it is, it's compelling!  But is it Brahms anymore?  Or a
Gould piece about Brahms?

What I find most disturbing there is: Gould at the beginning of his career
played the Intermezzi so gorgeously, with a Katchen-like simplicity full
of natural nuance and passion.  And then by the end of his career he had
remade himself into someone else: still intense, but with a different
focus.  Everything became intense foreground.  Gould's ideas *about* the
music have become the foreground.  That makes me uncomfortable, and
frankly disappointed.  I share Mary Jo's enthusiasm for the Intermezzi
record, and I think it's one of the best things he ever did; why did he
remake himself in a different direction when his early work was already so
perfect, so rich, so complete?  That's what I find disappointing.

I'm not going to stop listening to Gould's late Brahms; it's still
compelling in its way.  But I feel I get a more fulfilling experience when
I listen to Katchen, or to Helene Grimaud, or to the young Gould.  Their
performances allow me to find more in the music, exploring it myself
rather than looking under my nose at all that incessant foreground.  I
like the forest, not only the trees.

Anyway...that omnipresent foreground is a feature of Gould's radio
documentaries, too; it's what makes them so fascinating on repeated
listening, there's always something previously unnoticed for the ear to
follow....


Bradley Lehman, Dayton VA
home: http://i.am/bpl  or  http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl
CD's: http://listen.to/bpl or http://www.mp3.com/bpl

"Music must cause fire to flare up from the spirit - and not only sparks
from the clavier...." - Alfred Cortot