Search - Glenn Gould :: J.S. Bach: Well Tempered Clavier [Germany]

GOULD WELL TEMPERED

DAVID BRYSON | Glossop Derbyshire England | 07/26/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"One should not call a recording `epoch-making' unless it really marks some kind of epoch, but Gould's `48' is an epoch-making issue in the proper rigour of the term. What Gould achieved was to restore the art of playing Bach on the piano to full respectability after the over-long dominance of the purist school that insisted on the harpsichord. For me, Gould's career marks another kind of epoch too, the kind that can only be made by a player of exceptional genius and individuality.



Gould must surely have been one of the greatest players who ever laid a hand on the instrument. Even in an era of outstanding technical accomplishment, the extraordinary control and evenness of his touch and the phenomenal precision of his ornamentation mark him out to this day, 20 years and more after his abrupt demise at the age of not quite 50. He played a lot more than Bach, and his playing of Brahms or Ravel is not at all like his Bach-playing, but it is probably the latter that he will always be most associated with. There is a real frisson about this set from the very first bar - a sense of occasion, although the recordings here were not done on one occasion but span a period of 10 years. Book 1 was recorded in New York between 1962 and 1965; the first 16 numbers in Book 2 were done in the same New York studio between 1966 and 1969, the balance of the set at a new location in Toronto in 1971. The recorded sound in Book 2 is slightly fuller and richer, and at a slightly higher volume-level, than that in Book 1, but I noticed no significant difference in sound when the locus shifted to Canada. All four discs are distinguished by admirable clarity, which is what this playing demands - I should not be surprised to learn that Gould made no use of the pedals from start to finish.



If you have read a certain amount regarding supposed eccentricity in Gould's playing, I should say forget it. I can think of a couple of things he did that would fall into that category, but nothing here in the 48, and, really, not much elsewhere either. What you will certainly find is individuality and boldness, and I for one just lap it up. The very first prelude is famous, with the arpeggios given half legato and half staccato, and the second prelude has a relentless marching quality that I find riveting. He is not afraid, to say the least of it, to take tempi that are sometimes unusually slow (say in the F minor prelude from Book 1) but more often exceptionally fast, as in both the G major prelude and fugue in Book 2. His range of dynamics is not in fact particularly wide, but it is subtly inflected, and indeed it is an interesting question how he manages to suggest so much variety in the tone without resorting to obvious devices and in particular with little or no deployment of the pedals. There is very little tempo rubato either, but there is the occasional special effect. One such that I noticed in particular was a clever suggestion in the second F# minor prelude of a particular harpsichord stop that I had recently thought he over-used in his harpsichord performance of Handel's first 4 suites. He seems to have liked that particular effect, and it makes a brilliant impact used just once here.



I go further than just recommending this set to all lovers of Bach, I would say that whatever other accounts you may own you should not be without this one. Take no notice whatsoever of a certain type of commentary that one comes across now and then, the kind that could be paraphrased as `Mr Gould's playing lacks a certain quality of averageness' or `Mr Gould has failed to establish a common denominator with players possessed of less than one-tenth of his genius or insight'. This is Bach's 48, it contains some of the greatest music ever put on paper, it deserves and cries out for genius in its interpretation, and you will find that in a particularly undiluted form here."

Bach Mechanical II

Antti Keisala | Jyväskylä, Finland | 02/26/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This record could be the most celebrated Gould Bach available. I know several recordings, of which only that of the amazing Keith Jarrett comes close to Gould in its power. This is a small paradox I've been thinking about, for I've found Jarret as a passionate soul, which I would attach to Chopin easier than to Bach; and listen to his ECM jazz (especially "At The Deerhead Inn") to get a glimpse, if you haven't done it already.



Jarrett gives me a headache because he doesn't fill that certain

archetype as easily as Gould does. An archetype I think Gould helped to create, if inadvertly. That is the archetypal division of artists into the emotive and mathematical, into a Rubinstein/Chopin and Gould/Bach. Whereas Chopin is a melancholic, an open and naked soul, Bach adheres to a strict cosmology, to a function, as if his notes were written by the musical version of a Noah Chomsky. If you know about contrapuncts, you might smirk at the obvious reference.



But do not, dear reader, ever get me wrong. Comparing Bach to Chopin is useful only on a subjective level when comparing how they reach my soul, in my experience, and there my interest in comparisons ends. Yet do not, dear reader, ever get me wrong: I might speak of Chopin with a warmer tone in my voice, yet that's directly derivative from the nature of his music - I find it warmer and being closer to my heart than that of Bach, who stays in distance, doing his contrapuncts, and what we can do is immerse ourselves in his mathematics, and find beauty through our analytical self. This is, of course, only half the truth. The music is beautiful. My point is merely that it reaches the soul in a different way, that it raises emotions by being overtly self-conscious and appearing mechanically constructed, which in its part ascribes to its majesty. Canorous exaltation.



I talked of Bach being a mathematical soul mainly because I find Gould to be the same. A fact that's immensely ironic is that Gould disliked Chopin because he thought of him as too sentimental, and only confessed of playing his works once or twice a year. And he was in love with the contrapunct, and I believe had Bach lived to see the 21st century, he would find a brother in Gould. And to this I referred as a paradox, that in Jarrett we would find a chameleon capable of finding the distance of Bach and closeness of Chopin, the closedness and openness from the same soul.



Yet I still prefer the Gould recordings, of which my favourite is the "Art of Fugue", which contains the most beautiful piece Bach has written, the "Contrapunctus XIV". Yet these are all amazing records of glorious music. I've played some Bach on guitar (the transcriptions of his lute works) and they're amazing to play because of they technical beauty, and how they reach you. I think that if you are into Chopin, listening to Bach is mandatory, and this is a great place from where to start.



With best regards,

AK"