It’s a Mozart broadcast from 1967.
There is some legal history to this track. Apparently it was taken by a CBC technician to a US label, which was then sued by CBC and had to return all physical copies of the recording.
Anyone know more?
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The Berlin State Opera communicated tonight that its…
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Awesome. Hammerklavier too, please.
My favourite Mozart from GG is live from Salzburg (Sonata in Bflat). Most of the CBS recordings have a petulant streak about them.
I like this up to the scales in 3rds. As ever with GG, It all carries complete conviction of course.
How does he manage to find hints of Piazzola in Mozart?
This so-called “Super-rare Glenn Gould” is available since 1989 (!).
Yes, I’ve owned it since then and seen it for sale a number of times at normal prices
Good recording
A rarity indeed.
I know that this article was the lamest thing that I have read all day. One paragraph? And the recording is probably ruined thanks to the sound of a lunatic humming throughout.
That “lunatic” is Glenn Gould himself.
Whoosh!
This interchange reminds me of a wonderful memory I have of the one year I taught piano, many decades ago (in Canada). All my students were kids in school but I had one adult student whose lesson was during the day and so the lessons were much longer and more relaxed and conversational about her personal exploration of music and the joy it brought her. In addition to practicing the piano, she also spent time listening to recordings of piano-playing, likely borrowed from the library. I will never forget the lesson after she had first listened to a recording done by Gould. She was SO confused: she knew that Gould was world-famous and so appeared almost embarrassed to report that she couldn’t understand why a record label would permit the release of a studio recording with all those strange sounds. When I told her that Gould was famous for humming/singing/gesticulating along, she almost fell off the piano bench.
What a wonderful find. I just compared this recording to other major artists (Edwin Fisher and Mikhail Pletnev) and find it more satisfying. Gleen Gould plays each note more distinctly and there is more feeling in this recording in my opinion.
I would like to propose Gould as the most over-rated pianist of all time. Whatever his technical facility, anyone who can get through the sublime Goldberg Variations in 38 minutes surely cannot be taken seriously. I haven’t heard this recording, but his few official Mozart recordings suggest that this a pianist who hates Mozart.
I would propose rick as the most over-rated critic in this string.
Not only did he hate Mozart, he hated music! GG was a twisted genius, gifted for many things, but he decided to use music as his plaything; he could manage almost anything technically so revelled in the blind (and deaf) cult-worship he inspired. Bach was the only composer who came out intact (Bach survives always!). In anything else…Hateful Hindemith, Grimly Grinding Grieg, Skimped Sketchy Scriabin, (lots of mis-readings there too!)…. he was laughing at all the worshippers, and is doubtless still laughing now. Overrated? Musically, yes. As a phenomenal personality, he’s certainly unique (thank god for that!).
I have 6 Gould cds that were issued between 1987 and 1991 by Music and Arts which published numerous “live and rare” performances by famous conductors and instrumentalists. The five I own are;
1. CD-663-Glenn Gould “In Romantic Repetoire, including Chopin-Sonata 3, Scriabin-Sonata 5 and Beethoven-32 Variations;
2. CD-297 Mozart K 396 and Beethoven opus 106 from a broadcast in 1967;
3 CD-298 Glenn Gould-The Chamber Musician-Beethoven, Schoenberg and Bach with Menuhin and Bach-Brandenburg 5;
4. CD-617 Glenn Gould-Previously Unreleased Peformances-Brahms Piano Concerto 1 and Strauss Burleske with the Baltimore SO 1962;
5. CD-683 Glenn Gould-Previously Unreleased Broadcast-1968-Beethoven opus 78, CPE Bach, Scarlatti and Scriabin-Sonata 3;
6. CD-659 Glenn Gould-Broadcast Recital 1968-Gibbons, Haydn sonata 52 and Hindemith Sonata 3.
Columbia?/Sony subsequently released most of the same cuts. I guess they missed the Mozart K 396, but I am sure many out there own the same discs I do.
I own a copy of this CD, and all the Music & Arts series of Glenn Gould radio broadcast recordings. What’s interesting about this recording is the “explanation” of the source given on the back cover of the CD, which I would reproduce here if image uploads were allowed, but I will transcribe it: “TECHNICAL NOTE: This CD was mastered from a copy of what is believed to be the only extent tape recording of this broadcast recital. Made by an amateur on home equipment, the original off-the-air recording has slight flutter, wow, peak distortion , and an occasional very slight dropout. Every effort was made to improve the source tape with state-of-the-art technology, but some flaws could not be eliminated. This CD is therefore recommended only for its documentary and artistic value, and is not for sound enthusiasts.
And before “Music & Arts” was Music & Arts, it was known as the Bruno Walter Society. Then it was Discocorp. Fred Moroth ran all three. Old radio broadcasts were his specialty, and he did what he could with the sound.
Just found two more M & A discs-CD-272-The Legendary Broadcast Recitals 1956 and 1967-Gibbons, Bach-Partita 6 Toccata in d, English Suite 1 and Selections from Art of the Fugue, and CD-284-Beethoven Piano Concertos 2 and 3 from 1951 and 1955 and an unknown date recording of the 32 Vars. There are numerous other labels that published Gould discs, such as Frequenz, Nuova Era, BIS and Melogram to name a few.
This so-called Fantasia was originally intended for a Violin & Piano Sonata that Mozart left incomplete. It was eventually completed by Maximilian Stadler who obtained the document from Mozart’s wife. The first three minutes (3:02 to be exact) of this Gould performance are the only original Mozart material. The rest is added by Stadler.
The Fantasy you’re referring to is the c minor K.396, not the d minor Fantasy for which August Eberhard Muller (1767- 1817, added the final 10 measures.
Stadler completed 3 Violin Sonatas: No.29 (A major) K.402; No.30 (C major) K.403 and No.34 (B-flat major) K.372.
An inimitable sublime interpretation by Glenn Gould. We can all hear Mozart experts play Mozart’s music with Mozartian authority in Mozartian traditions. Here is a fresh take, something new. Not for everyone, but Real Gouldians will love it.
I admire the honesty and courge of posters not uncritical of Glenn Gould,whom I saw play the Goldbergs and something else, Sweelinck or Gibbons.
His articulation is always, er, interesting — I like his Bach Toccatas and the D-minor concerto from Russia; Mozart 24th C-minor concerto with Golschmann, even Brahm! and much else besides. Some things are wilfull, incomprehensible, the humming irresponsible and distracting. I also don’t understand my own favorites sometimes, but saints and a half-dozen immortals seem to m eto do everything well, for whom I can only be grateful.
Then there are the bourrees in the second English suite, when Glenn can’t shake one ornament off his fingers, vis a vis Pogorelich and Landowska, and the extra “Nature Boy” melody he findS, and sings, in Brahms’s C#-minor Intermezzo, which Rubinstein, Pogorelich, and, almost, Kempff get right, though with a 100% tempo variation.