Bach Goldberg Variations 127 Versions Surveyed, March 2013
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Bach Goldberg Variations 127 versions surveyed, March 2013 With this survey I’ve changed the format somewhat by foregoing the review of what other critics have said and the section-by-section interpretative analysis (with illustrative samples of the score), and I’ve simplified the table of recordings. Instead, I’ve focused on the really nitty-gritty issue of differing philosophical approaches and why the same recording would illicit rave reviews from one listener while proving to be utter anathema to another listener. I’ll also disclose my own listening biases which may or may not align with the reader’s own point of view. Historical Overview Reviewer’s Disclaimer Identifying Listener Preferences Interpretive Decisions Recommended Recordings Reviewer’s Discography © Graham Reid 2014. All Rights Reserved www.PianoEnthusiast.com Historical Overview In the last few decades the Goldbergs have become a veritable icon for what Western musical culture is. Glen Gould’s rendering was sent to the stars aboard Voyager. Popular movies use it as background music whenever there’s a need to represent the positive and optimistic aspects of humanity. The work has been realized by virtually every type of keyboard instrument—piano, harpsichord, organ, synthesizer, accordion—as well as versions for various chamber ensembles. And numerous new releases and re-imaginings continue to sell well across all age groups. Prominent musicologists have cited the Goldbergs along with Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations as the finest exemplar of this form. I would also have to add Brahms as a master of the variation form (on themes by Haydn, Handel, and Paganini), and Reger’s under- appreciated contributions to the form (on themes by Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Telemann). Strictly speaking, the Goldbergs aren’t really in variation form but based more on chaconne form flowing from the bass line and harmonic progression outlined in the aria. There is some evidence that Bach’s keyboard and harmony pupil, Johann Goldberg, wrote the basic outline of the aria as part of his studies and Bach subsequently showed him the ‟through composition” and ornamental process. By now the amusing story of Bach hastily throwing together the variations for his student Johann Goldberg to perform has been disproved. The legend goes that the young Goldberg used to play the harpsichord in the evenings for an insomniac diplomat Herman von Keyserlingk (ambassador to the Czar). It is said that Bach took the simple Aria and in a flight of fancy whipped off 30 variations on the theme. Firstly, his 15-year old student, while showing some improvisatory talent, was a novice performer at best and could in no way have attempted to perform a work as difficult as this. Secondly, the work was neither commissioned nor hastily thrown together on a lark, but carefully composed over some period of time and was included in an important oeuvre published along with the Six Partitas and Italian Concerto. Unlike the intellectual idealizations demonstrated in The Art of The Fugue, the Goldbergs always have an eye toward effectiveness in performance. Bach utilizes every compositional ‟trick of the trade” for striking virtuosic display. In this regard it goes well beyond anything Scarlatti ever penned, himself a noted virtuoso. Despite the peaceful nature of the aria, and few pensive moments within, the work as a whole is decidedly extroverted and virtuosic, with many striking textural effects. www.PianoEnthusiast.com Reviewer’s Disclaimer Often one can divine the hidden subjective biases of the reviewer by carefully reading between the lines. Other times their craft as writers is so professionally polished and subjectively neutered that it is impossible to tell anything beyond the most objectively observable facts. So I’ll come clean up front and share my own biases which I’ve had to guard against as I looked for a more balanced perspective from which to present this survey. First off, as a pianist (at one time on the fringes of what you’d call a professional concert pianist), I’ve never been tempted to learn or even dabble with the Goldbergs. That should tell you something right away, because pianists like to play music that they identify with. I do play a lot of Bach, the Partitas most active in my repertoire, but as a listener I’m very fussy about how Bach is performed. I go through countless recordings just to find a few that I can listen to. Generally, I prefer to hear Bach on the harpsichord, and not because I’m in love with the jingly-jangly sound of a harpsichord up close and personal. It’s because the musicians who perform on period instruments generally have a better understanding of how Baroque keyboard music works—its tempos, its articulations and its ornamentation. In short, most pianists seemed to have flunked the class on Baroque music at school. [After completing this survey and hearing many new performances I have a degree of optimism about the current generation of pianists and Baroque practice on the modern piano, but “breathing phrases” remains an issue – see below.] Here are some of my pet-peeves regarding the Goldbergs on the piano: the beloved aria taken at such a slow tempo, milked for all of its poignant expression and made too “precious” for mere mortals to even comprehend (we are not worthy). True, it’s not much of a real aria, but the tempo should at least mimic the natural arch of a singer’s breath. Of course, a few have pushed the tempo too far in the other direction, Bacchetti, for example, who really fails to convey any sense of the aria’s innate serenity. Another dislike: startling and jarring juxtapositions just for the shock and awe effect. I don’t know how many times I’ve had to endure a Saturnian slow aria followed by a presto furioso wake-up call in the first variation. I’d much rather hear how Gustav Leonhard gently works us from one mood to another with an organic progression of textures and registrations (changes in voicing on the harpsichord). Then there is the issue of motoric monotony. Very few pianists understand the importance of letting phrases breathe. Too many sound like frantic little rodents on an exercise treadmill. You’d never hear a solo violinist playing any of the great partitas at a fixed and inflexible tempo. Even so-called dance-imitative movements should draw down a bit at the end of major sections just as is evidenced by period dance performance where the rows of dancers are gracefully reconfigured or partners exchanged. As much as there is that is fascinating with Glenn Gould’s rendering I’d have to fault him on this very unnatural tendency for breathless (non-breathing) phrase groupings. Elastic phrasing is especially crucial in the more expressive minor-key variations. In Variation 15, a canon in the minor key, I marked down many performers on two accounts: Not recognizing the classic two- note slurs as representing the Christ figure staggering under the burden of the cross (an allegorical technique used by composers from Palestrina and Bach through to Messiean), and in general having inflexible phrase groups when this is clearly indicative of Bach’s most www.PianoEnthusiast.com poignant Passionsmusik. Just listen to the expressivity Leonhardt achieves on the harpsichord (’64 version); with proper phrasing one doesn’t need the dynamic gradations of the piano to achieve such expression (as Hewitt insists in her lectures). Consider the matter of “implied counterpoint” in Baroque music. This is where a single line pivoting over a range of a perfect fifth is usually meant to imply two separate instruments, and hence a concomitant variation in articulation, dynamics and phrasing. Just listen to Bach’s Partitas for solo flute or violin and you hear single-line counterpoint almost naturally: in the case of the flute the change in embouchure gives more overtones to the upper part of the line and a greater ratio of fundamental in the lower notes; on the violin it has to do with changes in strings, the thicker string at the crest of the bridge will have a different harmonic character than the thinner string. I can count on one hand the pianists who seem to grasp that concept. (As soon as I figure an easy way to incorporate sound samples in these surveys I’ll play some passages with different inflections to demonstrate these principles.) As for ornamentation, pianists seem to have become more informed in the last couple decades, but there are some high-profile recordings out there which still don’t seem to get it. And I’ve never once heard a pianist add a cadential flourish (okay, once: Bruno Fontaine in the Sixth Partita) but this is common practice with harpsichords and organists. However, while some non-specialist pianists still play with little understanding of the concept of embellishment (Perahia), a few have pushed the use of ornamentation to the very limits of structural cohesion (Chen and Bacchetti). Even so, while some of Bacchetti’s repeats are so abuzz with non-stop trills and mordents (especially irksome in the aria or the minor key variations where such busy work threatens to disrupt the underlying spiritual thread), I’d still take that over a performer who plays a repeat as an exact copy of the same sober, bare bones presentation we already heard. Another issue concerns repeats. Probably not the best idea in concert, but for a recording repeats allow the listener to sink into the experience more deeply. However, if the pianist is going to gives us the repeats they should demonstrate their ability to give us more than just one flavor.