Search - Johann Sebastian Bach, Wanda Landowska :: Bach: Goldberg Variations; Italian Concerto

Take the plunge!

DAVID BRYSON | Glossop Derbyshire England | 08/17/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Anyone dubious about buying the Goldberg variations, or the Goldberg variations on the harpsichord, is not likely to regret the risk in picking up a copy of this marvellous classic performance for next to nothing.From comments I have read there seems to be a belief in some quarters that the instrument Landowska uses is too high-powered to be authentic, but without having any specialised knowledge of the matter I shall risk putting a different view. I have some Couperin, who was a generation ahead of Bach, played by Blandine Verlet, and the first and striking impression you will get comes from the startling power and 'weight' of the instruments she uses. These instruments are contemporary with Couperin, they are if anything more powerful in tone than the seemingly contentious beast used by Landowska, so I have to be sceptical regarding the challenges to its authenticity.What ought to be beyond any challenge is the performance itself. For majesty, poise, rhythmic bite, clarity of fingerwork, grasp of the baroque style and sheer enthusiasm I doubt we are ever likely to hear better than this. The recording is very respectable too, for its age. What we have here is one great and inspired intellectual interpreting an even greater. To gain the maximum pleasure and edification from this particular work, I have found it helpful to educate myself about it. What I have done is to follow the performance with Tovey's analytical notes, not the sort of thing I would do as a rule. Tovey can be patronising and supercilious, he can be hectoring and he can be downright childish at times, but his command of the technicalities combined with his transparent and shining love for the music make it easy to ignore all that. (In passing, I am pleased to have his scholarly endorsement of my own view, obviously shared by Landowska as well, that it is neither necessary nor desirable to play all repeats.) Bach expressed himself through intellectual devices, the expression he achieved through them ranks with the most sublime in the history of the art of music, and I doubt that any of us will get the most out of the Goldberg variations without going to some pains ourselves. 'Delightful is the prize without the effort' says Horace ironically. The prize here is great, and the effort does not amount to much anyway."