Tamara Bernstein

[Allan MacLeod <allan.macleod@usask.ca>]

Just a few thoughts for fellow Gould fans on Bernstein's article.

1.  The National Post, for which she writes, is essentially a wedding of
a trashy Sun type newspaper with the Financial Post.  It gives business
people all the news they need on markets, and the tititllation of a
gossip and scandal rag.  It aims to shock and offend. Nothing written in
it should be treated with respect--except for its business pages, if you
are into that.  It is worth mentioning that the wife of the owner of
that newspaper admitted in print that she had pulled strings to get a
ticket for a sold-out recital in Toronto in 1983 by Kiri Te Kanawa,
because she was "in" and then couldn't understand what all the fuss was
about!   Music criticism is Toronto newspapers is quire simply abysmal.

2.  On the other hand, Tamara Bernstein came from the Globe and the
Globe's  music critics are of the trash the hero style.  The chief music
critic essentially drove Gunther Herbig out of town when the latter was
conductor of the Toronto Symphony.  He was insulting in the extreme.
And both he and Bernstein, as young Turks, take aim at any one of
established reputation unless they play on original instruments or are
excessively bizarre.  Bernstein has clearly not listened to Gould's
Brahms or else she could not have made the silly comment about Gould
lacking feeling or expressiveness or warmth.

3.  If one looks at the 50 or so pianists on Philips Great Pianist
series, fewer than ten are North American, and even then I am not sure
where Previn and Perahia were born.  So Gould is in rare company.  It is
quite appropriate for Canadians to celebrate one of the few geniuses of
the piano from North America.

4.  Gould and Toronto are inseparable.  See his video on Toronto.  Talk
to Torontonians of a certain age for whom Gould was a presence in that
city.  In may ways he epitomized the city in both its greatness and
failings.  To celebrate Gould is to celebrate Toronto and again it is
entirely appropriate for a celebration of him to be held in that city
every so often.

5.  This morning I was musing on the difference between Toronto and
Montreal, where, I should say, there is a good music critic.  Montreal
dares to be great, it takes risks, it brings itself close to bankruptcy
to make big, vivid, successful splashes.  Look at some of the conductors
it has had:  Klemperer, Mehta, Dutoit.  And having pulled off the
impossible, it celebrates its achievements.  But Toronto is cautious and
for some reason Toronto critics like to run it down.

6.  Thank goodness for CBC Radio as it at least offers a welcome
antidote to the negativity of Toronto music critics.

7.  It would be interesting to speculate on the possibility that without
Gould the original music people would have never got a hearing.  Gould
to some extent resurrected Gould's keyboard music, but more importantly,
with his stress on clarity of lines in polyphonic music he prepared the
way for performances that  put clarity above all else.  And the thing
critics most often praise the original instrument performances for is
their ability to bring out heretofore unheard inner voices.  Well Gould
always did that and did it superbly well.

        Allan