Re: GG: Charles Rosen's Goldbergs

[Robert Clements <clemensr@mailhost.world.net>]

At 22:46 9/1/1997 +0000, Alun Severn wrote:
>
>I wonder what folks think of Charles Rosen's version of the Goldbergs (Sony
>Essential Classics, SBK 48173). I bought this some months ago in a sale and
>have been playing it on and off ever since, gradually coming to the
>conclusion that here is an interpretation which is pretty damned close to
>GG's for its tone, its rigor, its shape and wholeness, while at the same
>time largely free (it seems to me, certainly no expert) of the extremes of
>tempi that GG's later version is often accused of.
>
>Though if I am not mistaken, all repeats are observed, making it a rather
>long exercise.

Shockingly underrated performance; which (as you surmised) includes all
repeats... should be a _lot_ better known (it probably suffers from critics
who assume that only GG amongst pianists can play the Goldbergs).

I'm not sure that the similarity with GG holds _that_ well though (apart
from the straight & _clavier_ clean piano sound, which both pianists were
searching for): Rosen was basically using a classicist's aesthetic to
_realise_ the score; whereas - as always - GG's performance is a
romanticist's reconsideration bordering on (figurative) transcription of the
work. But for my money, at least, Rosen really _is_ an essential classic....

All the best,


Robert Clements
clemensr@mailhost.world.net