Re: GG: misc.

[Jim Morrison <jim_morrison@sprynet.com>]

Thanks for the recommendations, Daniel.

If I may make one of my own, I'd like to put forth Gieseking's
1930's recordings of the Debussy Preludes, the only versions I have,
though there's a 50's set out there as well.

 I bought them
the other day and have been stunned by them. I don't think outside
of Richter that I've ever heard such control of the piano's tones/colors
on the pianissimos volume level.  In his own, though radically different
way, he seems to have a command of the keyboard as great as our hero.

One critic at Gramophone says "All those critical expostulations over the
ravishing quality of sound, the control and shading of pianissimos, the
subtlety of pedaling, the ability to individualize and yet blend the strands
of texture are vindicated."

A bit like Gould there, but instead of using his powers in the service
of polyphony, Gieseking uses his skills to revel in the full exploitation
of his instruments "peculiar resources."

And also from Gramophone, Bryce Morrison, the great Gould-appreciator
from that magazine says of the EMI complete Debussy solo piano music set:

"So here is that peerless palette of colour and texture, of a light and
shade used with a nonchalantly deployed but precise expertise to illuminate
every facet of Debussy's teeming and insinuating imagination. An added
bonus, a 1951 performance of the Fantaisie for piano and orchestra (an
ecstatic and scintillating work, played here with a life-affirming
chiaroscuro) completes an incomparable set of discs. Andrew Walter's
transfers are a triumph, with an immediacy much less obvious in the
originals. These records should be in every musician's library, be they
singer or conductor, violinist or pianist, etc. If Gramophone believed in a
starring system they would deserve a heavenful of stars."

I tell you, the more I listen to these "older" generation players, the more
I like
them: Rachmaninov, Richter, Schnabel (whose Beethoven I also just bought)
Tureck,
Cortot, and now Gieseking.

Play me a pre-60's recording in mono and I'm a sucker for it.
Call me a fool, but I actually like the sort of soft sound they capture.
I think many modern recordings (some of Gould's even) are too
bright and compressed.

That comes from musically growing up on the 55 Goldbergs, I guess,
not to mention the fifth and sixth partitas, some of the Bach concertos,
the Italian concerto, the live Goldbergs and inventions.

Gould recorded some of his best Bach in mono.


Jim