Gould - Tumblr Posts
Hmm... Stickers? :D
(I apologize for the poor quality)
The Beginning
As a matter of honor, this first post really should in some way involve Glenn Gould. So I'm going to briefly take on a philosophical point of order, in the hopes that it not only satisfies honor but also sets forth some principle of approach so you can tell whether or not this is going to be something you're going to want to read going forward.
The philosophical point concerns the idea of "greatness" in created work, and since this is specifically about piano players and music, greatness qua such. I'll try to keep it simple for my own sake, so here: I don't think much of the idea.
Less simply, here's why. If we stack up 5 artists of any sort and set some categorical context, some criteria and so forth, that's all a bunch of muddle to me and misses what I consider most satisfying in many cases: not the historical moment but what a player means to ME. And in this regard, some unknown or some so-called minor work or some eccentric trajectory of a career may prove to be the most fascinating, the deepest creation of a moment. And as we all well know, having once upon a time been children, a moment can last your whole life.
So you won't, I hope, find me arguing much for Greatness around these parts, but rather for things of substance and positive provocation. And as a substitute, if one is needed, I would say what is more meaningful is to put forward artists of tremendous insight, unique in the je ne sais quoi and sine qua non of their approach and execution. For if there is one thing the 20th and 21st centuries do not need, it is more of the vanilla perfection of what is churned out by the piano academies and too much of the concert world. How many of these will we miss? Do we need more and more and ever more of the more or less same Chopin waltzes, Brahms intermezzi, Tchaikovsky concerti, and [substitute your own overplayed repertoire]?
Well, yes, it might be argued, we need more and more and infinitely more because you never know (and the artist him/herself surely does not know) when something unusual or remembrance-worthy is going to occur. But this is precisely where judgment enters the picture. Precisely where maturity and an editorial decision along the lines of: "Yes I will study that work, yes I will play it, but no I will not record it, no I will not concertize with it, unless I am firmly convinced that my voice is one that must be heard". Do current piano players make this conscious statement? Of course they do, alas.
Which brings me back round to Gould. Glenn Gould is my favorite piano player of all I've heard because his is the loss I would feel most (and have most felt since his death), his is the hole that would leave piano playing with a gap that would change it inconceivably had he never been. That he is Great is not the point, for we will speak of many things in these posts that are Great. I would not like to rank anyone with anything other than subjectivity, so that's all you'll find here. People I cannot do without, the objects of their making I cannot do without, or the people and their objects I can do without and why.
Much about much to come.
Possibly my favorite work of Schoenberg's, certainly right up there, and perfection in every way. I didn't altogether appreciate GG's performance when I first heard it 30 yrs ago or so. I was at that time under the spell of Charles Rosen's complete works performances. (And if I still had my copy of that out-of-print gem, I could talk more intelligently about it.) But I like this very much now, to say the least. Irrespective who you listen to, or play it yourself, this is 12-tone's apotheosis. Worth living for.
atonalitydotnet:
Glenn Gould - Schoenberg, suite Op. 25
Complete playlist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMhNcmmMn0A&feature=PlayList&p=B7EA5853D24983FF&playnext_from=PL&index=0&playnext=1
I first saw this recording a long time ago, this actual sleeve design, in a bookstore on Broadway, the Gryphon perhaps, a year or so after I first performed the Berg op. 1 myself. I wasn't crazy about the performance then but of course I am so now, and all the others (live) out there. The work is such a masterpiece. Hard to believe Schoenberg found it amateurish, or whatever his word was, I can't recall just now, but it had something to do with being a student production. But Schoenberg was so great himself, so capable, he was either 1) jealous, or 2) simply past such rich post-romantic, pre-atonal sonic vocabulary.
atonalitydotnet:
Glenn Gould, piano
iTunes: http://itunes.apple.com/no/album/berg-sonata-for-piano-op-1/id261347394
Spotify: http://open.spotify.com/album/3h78EwEuvW0cbemFJToyaT
Berg: Sonata for Piano, Op. 1 - Schoenberg: Three Piano Pieces - Krenek: Piano Sonata No. 3
Don't agree this is "Bach-like" but I have always loved it and wished he'd recorded more Scarlatti. The quality that runs through all Gould's playing is a sense of joy and fun, in sheer pleasure of the sounds coursing through the air, and of what is beyond the sound as it moves the abstractions of imagination. No one else ever did this so well, or in such a way.
i12bent:
And - there is Glenn’s way: Scarlatti as Bach…
Domenico Scarlatti: Sonata for Keyboard in D-major, K430
Glenn Gould - piano (1968)
Aw lovely! I didn't know about this! It's been in my queue for a while now but haven't gotten to it. Looks like another inspiration.
allthatclass:
An interesting animation of Glenn Gould as seen in the wonderful animated movie The Triplets of Belleville
People made so much of Gould's rituals, perhaps as much in hindsight as in the moment, but many/most/all of them made tremendous sense. I don't consider myself to have any particular body temperature anomalies, but I can't tell you the number of times before a performance my hands felt either like blocks of ice or too moist or sticky in the webbing or whatever else. Any time I could wet them down, warm them up, and dry them off, I felt much better.
mirroir:
Pianist Glenn Gould soaking his hands in the sink to limber up his fingers before performing. He starts with lukewarm water and gradually raises the temperature to hot. (by Gordon Parks for LIFE)
The thing I love about this above all (well, not above all but after many years of familiarity) is the smudgy, dirty, completely disheveled state of the piano-top. Can you imagine this being shot today in a modern television studio? So amusing, so endearing, so gone forever.
Glenn Gould - Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No.5
I could never pick a single Gould album. But if you absolutely forced me. Well. If you absolutely forced me, I would probably have to pick the Byrd-Gibbons album too.
In Anno 1630, un bel cd di Lorenzo Ghielmi spunta un pezzo per organo di Frescobaldi, Aria detto Balletto, che a me sembra molto molto simile, quasi identico alla Allemande (Italian Ground) di Orlando Gibbons immortalata da Glenn Gould nel suo celebre disco di virginalisti al pianoforte.
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