This line of discussion is where we have our best ideas worked over.
What is an accurate and historically correct
interpretation, eh? Gustav Leonhardt's Bach? I
mean, did he play it as if Bach had sat down and
plunked? And then again, would Bach have changed
his style of playing as he moved from a
harpsichord over to a mighty Steinway concert
grand? I figure that given enough hours of
practicing with what it could do, I bet you that
Bach himself would have changed his style of
playing. If so, then why are we so off-side
with GG's Bach? He played it on a 1000
horsepower monster; Bach's was 150 horsepower
tinkler. The modern grand evokes changes to
interpretation that Bach could only have had the
slightest of ideas about. Bach knew what grand
sounds were like: the organs he played on were
massive affairs and could almost blow your
eardrums out. But, the keyboards were puny by our standards.
You raise other ideas that sound like the
mannerisms and articulations of the styles, be
they German, French, Italian and
English. Again, how are we to know what the
politically correct mannerism is supposed to
sound like? When GG does a turn and a twist, is
his articulation suspect because his mind has
filtered it through so much post modern music? I
find that this is too harsh on him. Music is
both felt and researched from a "historical"
perspective, is it not? GG arrived at his own
comfortable measure as his ego, mind,
imagination and instinct blended with his
curiosity and aesthetic tastes.....and we have
him giving us as personal a JS Bach as any
player we have ever heard or will hear. How can it be otherwise?
Cheers,
Fred
-----Original Message-----
From: f_minor-bounces@email.rutgers.edu
[mailto:f_minor-bounces@email.rutgers.edu] On Behalf Of Brad Lehman
Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2008 3:04 PM
To: f_minor@email.rutgers.edu
Subject: Re: [F_minor] doubts II
michael macelletti wrote:
> the point is that beethoven and mozart really have
> something to offer. when gg superimposes his
personality > on them it comes out in a
strange way. mozart appears > to be under the
influence of " fun-house " mirrors.
So does GG's Bach. :) It's such a stylistic
mash. He played it as if Bach's music follows
Schoenberg's rules. He deconstructed Bach's
music, similar to the way Rosalyn Tureck did
with it. It's interesting, of course, but it
doesn't really have anything to do with the
French and Italianate features of the music; he
stripped those out. GG's Bach certainly has
sold well, always. It still has next to nothing
to do with Baroque principles, though.
Eventually (and I've said this before, years
ago), GG's Bach became more "Glenn Gould's Bach"
or "GG's deconstructions of Bach as if
Schoenberg had written it" than "Bach as played
by Glenn Gould". I am aware that that's
probably a minority view in present company. :)
> beethoven and brahms appear manic-depressive , with the
> manic going to beethoven, and the depressive going to brahms.
> chopin appears to be transformed into wood.
Well said.
> with bach, it works. it works superbly. but
it really seems > to be limited to
there. ---- and the new works he comes up >
with ? well, that's obviously a contrarian approach.
> a very smart idea in a world full of pianists who can play > everything.
Canny marketing by GG; agreed.
> i mean , who would want to perform the tchaikovsky
> first concerto knowing that many have heard the greatest
> recordings of it already.----- but really !
> works like those of schoenberg and webern
are just good > for the colored pencil
industry. they come in very handy > trying to analyze them.
I have to disagree with this part. I think GG's
interpretations of Schoenberg's music are GG's
best work. He put it across directly as music,
making it warm and inviting INSTEAD OF
intellectual colored-pencil exercises. He
played Schoenberg's p 11, especially, as if it
were several more Brahms intermezzi (another of
his best recordings). That works. It
emphasizes Schoenberg's romanticism, and what
Schoenberg said about his own approach.
When GG then turned around and recorded Bach
suites as if they're dozens more "wanna-be"
examples of Schoenberg's Suite Op 25, just
having different notes...well, that doesn't work so well. Entertaining, yes.
Brilliant in a way that's _sui generis_. Marketable, too. "GG's Bach,"
reducing the music to the motivic level and
lining it up with great creativity and
clarity...not being content with merely playing
it for what it is. GG didn't allow Bach's music
to emerge on its own terms, or in its own
stylistic and historical contexts. It had to be
made "new", in terms of what was sort of new in
about 1950. It was Bach as seen through the
off-rose-colored neoclassicism of Hindemith,
Schoenberg, and Stravinsky. Oh yeah, Hindemith:
another of GG's strengths as an interpreter.
GG's own string quartet? The style of early
Schoenberg and Hindemith, warmed over, with a heavy dose of Reger.
Brad Lehman
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