Glenn Gould, Oscar Peterson, and New World Virtuosities The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Mok, Lucille Yehan. 2014. Glenn Gould, Oscar Peterson, and New World Virtuosities. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:13064972 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA © 2014 Lucille Yehan Mok All rights reserved. Dissertation Advisor: Professor Carol J. Oja Lucille Yehan Mok Glenn Gould, Oscar Peterson, and New World Virtuosities Abstract This dissertation centers on virtuosity as a source of creative genesis, boundary-pushing, and musical debate. Focusing on the careers and works of pianists Oscar Peterson (1925-2007) and Glenn Gould (1932-1982), I examine the role of the virtuoso in twentieth-century music- making, and his encounter with Canadian national identity. Gould and Peterson were contemporaries, and despite their differences - Gould was a white classical musician from Toronto, and Peterson, an African Canadian jazz artist from Montréal - their career paths share points of connection. Using archival material from the Glenn Gould fonds and the Oscar Peterson fonds at Library and Archives Canada, I analyze the work of both figures as sources of musical creativity through musical performance and composition. The first part of this dissertation demonstrates how Gould’s and Peterson’s respective performances sparked furor through their contestation of musical boundaries. In the first chapter, my analysis of outtakes from Gould’s 1955 recording session of the Goldberg Variations illuminates how his radical musical philosophies emerged from his early recording practices. In chapter two, I examine critiques of Peterson’s performance aesthetic from an extensive collection of reviews, and argue that his style of virtuosic jazz allowed him to push back against musical expectations. In the third chapter, I examine the work of Canadian filmmaker Norman McLaren whose experimental animation provided opportunities for partnerships with both musicians; with Peterson in 1949 and with Gould in 1969. iii The second part of my dissertation takes the reader outside the realm of performance and demonstrates how Gould and Peterson engaged with landscape through sound composition. The fourth chapter investigates the spatial and sonic interpretation of Canadian locales in Gould’s Solitude Trilogy, a series of three experimental radio documentaries. In the final chapter, I unravel the biographical and musical influences in Peterson’s multi-movement suite for jazz trio, Canadiana Suite. By studying these iconic virtuosos side-by-side, my dissertation illuminates the significance of the performer in Canada’s cultural life in the second half of the twentieth-century and yields a new understanding of how Gould and Peterson exploded expectations in their respective musical communities. iv Table of Contents Abstract iii Table of Contents v Acknowledgments vi Introduction 1 Part One Chapter 1 36 Take Twenty-One: Technological Virtuosity and Glenn Gould’s Goldberg Variations, 1954 to 1959 Chapter 2 91 Oscar’s Paradox: Oscar Peterson in the Mainstream and at the Margins, 1950 -1969 Interlude Chapter 3 130 Performance as Narrative in Two McLaren Animated Shorts Part Two Chapter 4 174 Sound, Silence, Solitude; Glenn Gould’s Solitude Trilogy and the Canadian Sound Chapter 5 230 “The Iron Road in the Garden”: Musical Hybridity and Dual Identity in Oscar Peterson’s Canadiana Suite Conclusion 263 Bibliography 268 v Acknowledgements As I reflect on the past six years I am overwhelmed with emotion and gratitude for the many people who have made the completion of my dissertation possible. I thank my partner, Owen, for his endless support and love. I thank my parents, Lou and Doris, and my sisters, Leanne and Laura, for their unconditional acceptance during the good times and the bad. And I thank my daughter Leyla, who forced me to keep it all in perspective. I have benefited from the generosity of several individuals and organizations during my doctoral program and I am grateful for their support: John B. Lawson, the Faculty of Music at the University of Toronto, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Oscar S. Schafer, the Harvard Department of Music, the Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the Sosland family, and the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs Canada Program at Harvard University. My research could not have progressed without the help of several individuals. I thank my undergraduate mentors at the University of Toronto - Mark Sallmen and Gregory Johnston - who helped me build the foundation for my graduate research. Thanks also to Jim Kippen, whose suggestion that I apply to Harvard University set me on this path in the first place. I would like to express my gratitude to Judith Tick who has been an ardent supporter of my work from the beginning of this project. Thanks to our discussions about Ella Fitzgerald and Oscar Peterson, she planted the seed that blossomed into my dissertation topic. I am grateful for Tad Hershorn’s guidance at the Institute for Jazz Studies at Rutgers University and for his generosity in allowing me to access his treasure trove of research materials from his scholarship on Norman Granz. Deepest thanks to Kelly Peterson for her warmth and friendship, and for welcoming me into her home. I would also like to thank Mark Miller and Phil Nimmons who vi both, in the early stages of my dissertation, provided useful information about Oscar Peterson’s reception and Canadian jazz. My research on Glenn Gould relied heavily on the help of Faye Perkins of the Glenn Gould Estate. To her I am grateful for access to the CBC Radio Archives and material at Sony Music. I wish to express thanks to Ken Puley at the CBC Radio Archives for helping me locate items pertaining to my research on Gould’s radio work. I thank Joe Auner for encouraging me to pursue a line of inquiry into Gould’s use of technology that set me on a path to his outtakes. In August 2013, I spent an exhilarating morning with Anthony Fountain and Matt Cavaluzzo at Sony Music’s Battery Studios in Manhattan. I am tremendously grateful to them for sharing that high point in my journey. Their time and enthusiasm contributed a great deal to a conceptual turning point in my dissertation research. I would also like to express gratitude to the many librarians and archivists at Library and Archives Canada who provided help and support during my two summers of research there. I am also indebted to the members of Carol Oja’s Americanist dissertation writing group who have been incredibly generous with their time and feedback over the past three years. Writing a dissertation is so often discussed as a solitary endeavor, but my experience has been anything but lonely. I have met many dear friends while studying at Harvard University whose love and support I have relied on to get me through the ups and downs of graduate school. Thank you to Gav Williams for always being up for a French press (or something stronger) during that inevitable lull in the day, Sarah Wright Sussman for huffing and puffing through road races and getting me through generals summer, Hannah Lewis for weekly Sauvignon blanc, Elizabeth Craft for study breaks and always good conversation, Michael Uy for the Asian invasion, Peter McMurray for Sac Sac and heart to hearts, Will Cheng for food adventures and reassurance that vii it is ok to love zombies and vampires, Sarah Hankins for debauchery abroad and dance parties, Rowland Moseley for NEW YORK CITY, and to the members of Somerville’s premiere brass band Hornography (“with an H”), for reviving the music fun-times I thought I’d left behind in high school. I would like to express sincere thanks to Niti Seth, whose dedication and encouragement was crucial to my personal growth during my time at Harvard. I’m also appreciative of friends from the past who have stood by me during this time: Steve Liu, Mike Czajka, Carol Choi, Scott Tanaka, Meredith Szewchuk, and S. Trimble. I could not have completed this journey without the everyday encouragement of the faculty members and staff at the Harvard Department of Music. I am deeply appreciative of the staff at the Loeb Music Library for their patience through all stages of my doctoral research. I am confident that the administrative staff at the Department of Music remain unmatched on any university campus with respect to the energy and verve they bring to work everyday. Although they are frequently surrounded by tired and undernourished graduate students, they never fail to make us smile. Many thanks go to Lesley Bannatyne, Eva Kim, Mary Gerbi, Karen Rynne, and Fernando Viesca. Special thank yous to Nancy Shafman for impromptu chats and always- excellent advice, to Charles Stillman and Kaye Denny for their obvious and contagious zest for life, and to Jean Moncrieff for always being up for talking about Canada and everything else. I love you all. I would especially like to acknowledge the support I’ve received from the members of my dissertation committee. Alexander Rehding always welcomed me to his office for discussion and guidance. Robin Elliott has remained involved in my work since serving as my undergraduate thesis advisor and although he is hundreds of kilometres away at the University of Toronto, viii generously offered his time to meet and read chapter drafts. Kay Kaufman Shelemay is a force to be reckoned with both as a scholar and as an advisor; she challenged me as only the most effective and loving mentor could.