Ever heard Glenn Gould improvise?
mainThis is rarer than ducks’ nuts.
Daniel Poulin writes:
As an artist who privately enjoyed his own remarkable gifts as an improviser, Gould saw hidden dangers that others might never have noticed. “Not least among those dangers may be the hedonistic pursuit of improvisation as a way of life”, he wrote. Here are a few moments of Gould the improviser: the first two tracks recorded privately at home as a teenager; the third one while setting microphone levels in a CBC Radio Studio playing Richard Strauss “Ein Heldenleben”.
It’s oftentimes overlooked how classical artists may improvise more so than jazz artists, if you consider how the finest classical artists play the same written composition slightly differently each time – some more so than others – responding to inner and outer nuances of the moment, and having such mastery of the score as to allow such spontaneity. Conversely, jazz artists oftentimes play predetermined solos within known parameters almost in the manner of exercise etudes under the guise of improvisation.
http://www.azuremilesrecords.com/leekonitzinterview.html
Strauss and Gould – a double nightmare.
Intimidated by two white male geniuses?
Hell. OTT squared.
Gripping. Thank you very much for posting.
Fascinating. We’re really lucky to have this document.
These noodlings are revealing, Daniel Poulin; many thanks for them. The earlier ones are conventional and romantic.
Horowitz sometimes played snatches of pieces not in his usual repertoire while waiting to record.
Well I have never looked at the underside of a male duck to know how rare this is or should be considered.
Here by contrast is Czifffra improvising:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pf2accwGEaU
I think that might be Mike Nichols chatting with Gould during the CBC microphone setting fragment (No. 3). It sounds like him.