GG: Murray Perahia's Goldberg's

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

Ok-- I'll go out on a limb here.

Murray Perahia's Goldberg recording is un-Gouldian.  It's anti-Gouldian.
Under-Gouldian!  Listening to it in full made me understand Gould's Bach
much, much better, in fact. The reverb! The pedal! (The repeats!) Bringing
out one voice (sometimes at the expense of the others).  I hear more of
the structure of the relationship of the variations to the aria in
Perahia. It's a Sony disc so I guess it would have to be strikingly
different for them to issue it next to you-know-who in their catalogue.

Perahia on the Goldberg recording:
 "I think the most important thing is that the listener hear the structure
which is NOT an academic exercise.  It's a living, breathing, emotional
experience."

and

"I love playing for an audience. I love the immediacy, the sponteneity of
it, but there's a challenge that making a record has in it that I enjoy as
well-- umm trying to get your vision of the piece into a concrete form."

Fascinating differences!! See, hear Perahia play a snippet of the
Goldbergs:
http://www.sonyclassical.com/music/89243/multimedia.html

My violinist friend said that Gould treats the piano like a percussive
instrument while Perahia plays it like a stringed instrument.  That's why
her mind likes Gould and her heart likes Perahia.

-Mary Jo