“13 Ways of Looking at the Goldberg” is a set of new pieces inspired by the aria of the Goldbergs, the piece that is the subject of the original variations themselves. Twelve composers were commissioned to write these solo piano works by the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival in 2004, where they were originally played by the pianist Gilbert Kalish.
No one variation exceeds 4 minutes. From baroque tinged to unmistakably Chopin to fugal, the variations on the Goldbergs take the listener’s lens on the iconic pieces and throw it into an entirely different realm. Pianist Gilbert Kalish then arranged the collection for its debut as a whole work, adding Bach’s theme to the beginning and to the end, and inserting Bach’s Variation 13 in the middle.
However, Kalish clearly states it is up to the pianist to decide how to perform these works, whether as a whole or specific movement(s) only.
In September 2011 Tritone Records announced the World Premiere release of 13 WAYS OF LOOKING AT THE GOLDBERG – new re-imaginings of Bach’s iconic Goldberg Variations by today’s most remarkable composers.
Hear pianist Lara Downes play and talk about the project:
Piano Street caught up with Lara Downes for six short questions on the project and album “13 Ways of Looking at the Goldberg”:
Patrick Jovell: As we have seen on the video, you were virtually raised on The Goldberg Variations. How is it that particularly this work has earned such historic landmark status in western art music?
Lara Downes: The Goldberg Variations are important in so many ways. For one thing, the piece is considered to be the most ambitious work ever composed for harpsichord, so it stands out as a monument of its own time, as the largest keyboard work produced during the Baroque period.
The piece exists on a level that is radically different from its contemporary compositions in terms of its structural expansiveness.
PJ: Isn’t it true that this work demonstrates not only Bach’s exceptional musical range but also his exceptional abilities as a performer?
LD: Ironically, it is exactly this virtuosic scope and breadth that may have condemned the work to relative obscurity for so many years. The work demands exceptional interpretive and technical skills from a performer, and the negotiations involved in transitioning a work originally composed for the harpsichord to the modern piano would have been particularly sensitive on this large scale.
PJ: Can you describe the work’s path from obscurity up to the grand concert stages?
LD: After Wanda Landowska’s pioneering revival of Bach’s keyboard music in the early part of the 20th century (during which she performed and recorded the Goldbergs on the harpsichord), it fell to Glenn Gould, who chose the variations for his sensational 1955 debut recording, to bring the work to its current place of truly iconic status within the piano repertoire as well as the larger cultural consciousness.
PJ: What actually happened to the work in the hands of Gould’s?
LD: Gould’s energetic, audacious and thoroughly unique interpretation generated a new kind of appreciation for Bach’s music by combining the sensibilities of the harpsichord with the romantic potential and expanded resources of the concert grand. His recording captured the imagination of an entire generation, and brought the Goldbergs, and classical music itself, to life for thousands of new listeners.
PJ: How would you sum up the potential of this masterpiece?
LD: I think it’s the capacity of this work for reinvention and rejuvenation that has earned the Goldbergs such landmark status in the classical tradition. This music seems to speak to generation after generation with a sustained purity, energy and sense of vastness. This is what captures me and keeps me coming back, time and again, to this one piece of music. When I listen to the Goldbergs, I forget about my individual concerns, troubles, perspectives – and I enter a sphere of infinite possibility and vision.
PJ: In this context the contributing composers were both historically inspired and thankful, I guess?
LD: 13 WAYS of Looking at the Goldberg is, to me, a wonderful acknowledgment of that possibility. This project celebrates the history of Bach’s monumental piece of music, its journeys across the centuries and the generations. In thirteen new voices, this music answers back across time and place to Bach, with all the gratitude and affection that
we musicians owe him, now and always.
The project was inspired by the poem “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a
Blackbird” by Wallace Stevens, a minimalist and mind-blowing portrait of
perspective. The fifth stanza of that poem includes the basic idea of
the “13 Ways” project:
I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.
The pieces:
Bach: Aria, from Goldberg Variations BWV 988
C. Curtis-Smith: Rube Goldberg Variation
Jennifer Higdon: The Gilmore Variation
Mischa Sarche Zupko: Ghost Variation
Stanley Walden: Fantasy Variation
Bright Sheng: Variation Fugato
Derek Bermel: Kontraphunktus
Bach: Variation 13 from Goldberg Variations
David Del Tredici: My Goldberg (Gymnopedie No. 1)
Fred Lerdahl: Chasing Goldberg
William Bolcom: Yet Another Goldberg Variation (for left hand alone)
(Canon Inversa)
Lukas Foss: Goldmore Variation
Ralf Gothoni: Variation on Variation with Variation
Fred Hersch: Melancholy Minuet
Bach: Aria (reprise) from Goldberg Variations
Imagine hearing great, departed pianists play again today, just as they would in person. John Q. Walker demonstrates how recordings can be analyzed for precise keystrokes and pedal motions, then played back on computer-controlled grand pianos.
What we focus on is representing exactly is how musicians perform, John Q. Walker, Ph.D., Founder of Zenph Sound Innovations said.
Using signal processing, artificial intelligence, and acoustics, Walker’s company developed new computer software that can dissect any recording – note by note.
“If they’re playing the piano, how would they have pressed the keys, where would the pedal have been, how long would they have held it?” Dr. Walker says.
Walker and his team wrote software to take a piano recording – even an old, scratchy one – and determine not only which keys were struck but exactly how they were played, including all the subtle nuances that distinguish great pianists. The result was simply amazing.
“We saw it as a very hard signal-processing problem: Can we get backwards from recordings to the notes? We all know how to go forwards, but can we go backwards? And if we can crack that problem, the whole industry changes” Dr. Walker continues.
Walker’s group indeed cracked that problem. And with their software, they were able to re-create great piano performances of the past. “Reperformance” is the word Walker uses. It may seem like remastering on steroids – but in fact it’s a lot more. Think about turning a mono recording into stereo, for example, changing the acoustics of the room and positioning the microphones differently from where they were placed during the original recording session – even letting the listener experience what the pianist heard sitting on the bench. The commercial value was obvious, which is why Walker’s company was able to strike a deal with Sony Music.
Bach - Goldberg Variations
The Goldberg Variations was the first album we recorded with Sony, and it’s the Canadian pianist Glenn Gould. This was the first recording he made. He was 22 years old. He had had a very successful recital in New York, and Columbia Records said, “Let’s sign him up.” And normally when you sign up a young pianist, the first recording is, maybe, some Chopin or Beethoven sonatas or something. He picked a piece called the Bach Goldberg Variations, which had been rarely recorded on piano at all. It was thought you couldn’t play it on one manual. And he said, “No, I want to do this piece” and made a phenomenal recording in 1955 that has been one of the best continuous piano recordings in classical music history.
Dr. Walker has already staged robotic piano performances in front of some pretty big live audiences, recreating classic recordings at places like Carnegie hall. He’ll be performing at the Newport music festival in July. The first consumer software for piano files from Walker’s company Zenph sound innovations is set for release this summer.
The series of recordings of Bach’s Well Tempered Clavier with pianist Martin Sturfält continues. This new installment includes the masterful opening of the second set, Prelude and Fugue no 1 in C major, along with two from the first set; the expressive and introspective no. 18 in G-sharp minor and the large scale “concertante” Prelude and Fugue no. 20 in A minor.
Maurizio Pollini, appearing as part of the International Piano Series at London’s South Bank, will perform five recitals between January and May of music from Bach to modernism, described as “personal journey through four centuries of piano repertoire”.
28 January
Bach: The Well-tempered Clavier, book 1
15 Fabruary
Piano Sonata in E, Op.109
Piano Sonata in A flat, Op.110
Piano Sonata in C minor, Op.111
26 February
Schubert:
Piano Sonata in C minor, D.958
Piano Sonata in A, D.959
Piano Sonata in B flat, D.960
19 April
Chopin: 24 Preludes, Op.28
Debussy: Etudes, Book 2 (Nos.7-12)
Boulez: Piano Sonata No.2
25 May
Stockhausen: Klavierstuck VII & IX
Schumann: Concert sans orchestre (First version of Piano Sonata in F minor, Op.14)
Chopin: Prelude in C sharp minor, Op.45
Barcarolle in F sharp, Op.60
Ballade No.4 in F minor, Op.52
Berceuse in D flat, Op.57
Scherzo No.2 in B flat minor, Op.31
Maurizio Pollini Hong Kong interview by RTHK – The Works, 14 April 2009:
Maurizio Pollini was born in Milan on 5 January 1942. His father was the famous architect Gino Pollini, one of the leading representatives of Italian rationalism and also an expert violinist. His mother, Renata Melotti, studied piano and singing and was the sister of the well-known sculptor Fausto Melotti, who had a lasting influence on the young Pollini.
In 1948 Maurizio Pollini received his first piano lessons from Carlo Lonati. From 1955 until 1959 he continued his studies with Carlo Vidusso and in 1958 he began to study composition with Bruno Bettinelli. In 1960 he was awarded first prize at the International Chopin Competition in Warsaw and appeared at La Scala playing Chopin’s First Piano Concerto under Celibidache. Since then Pollini has become one of the most admired and respected pianists of our time and has appeared all over the world with leading orchestras and conductors. He is particularly renowned for his innovative concert programmes which champion works by contemporary composers and contrasts these with those of the Classical and Romantic eras. An exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist for four decades, his recordings have won innumerable awards, including Gramophone and Echo Awards, Diapason d’or, Record Academy Prize, Tokyo, and Stella d’oro as well as two Grammys®.
The familiar “Minuet in G” (BWV Anh. II. 114) and its partner piece, “Minuet in G minor” (BWV Anh. II. 115) were traditionally believed to have been composed by J. S. Bach. However, recent research, particularly on the part of Hans-Joachim Schulze, points to the German composer and organist Christian Petzold (1677-1733).
According to research conducted by Schulze and listed in the Peters Edition of the Notebook, the keyboard pieces were composed by J.S. Bach himself, Couperin, Hasse, Böhm, his sons J. C. Bach and C.P.E. Bach, and Petzold, while some nine pieces are anonymus.
Recent speculation suggests that Anna Magdalena Bach (1701-1760) may have been the composer of several pieces attributed to her husband. Johann Sebastian wrote a number of compositions dedicated to her, most notably the two NotenbĂĽchlein fĂĽr Anna Magdalena Bach. She regularly helped him transcribe his music.
In an article in The Telegraph (on April 22, 2006), Bach scholar Professor Martin Jarvis suggests – on the basis of having used police forensic science
techniques – that famous works attributed to Johann Sebastian Bach were not penned by the great composer himself, but by his second wife.
Follow discussions on various J.S. Bach-related subjects at the Bach-Cantatas website: www.bach-cantatas.com
A new instalment of two Preludes and Fugues from Bach’s WTC I, performed by Martin Sturfält, has been published today; the joyous and energetic C-sharp major set (which must surely be one of the most difficult to read on account of the extreme choice of key – seven sharps – taking you through keys such as B-sharp and E-sharp major!) and the simply remarkable work in B minor.
The prelude has received a wide range of interpretations in terms of tempo and articulation and also asks for an imaginative approach to the sensitive subject of ornamentation. The Fugue stands out as one of the most monumental among the 48, not least due to its length but also with its theme using all twelve pitch classes, thereby foreshadowing Arnold Schoenberg by some 180 years!
From the International Musicians’ Seminar, Prussia Cove, we here present a clip from a Masterclass on targeting characters between movements.
Schiff also works on the disposition of form in order to rightfully serve the rhetoric qualities in Bach playing. In this particular Masterclass, András Schiff works with a student on Bach’s Second Partita for Keyboard, one of a set of six and the last group of keyboard suites Bach composed. As with the earlier French Suites and the English Suites, the Partitas consist of a series of dance movements but Bach’s skill and originality have now elaborated the hitherto straightforward dance forms and given thema richly polyphonic, almost orchestral texture. In 1731 these Partitas were collectively published as Clavier-Ăśbung (”Keyboard Exercise”).
András Schiff is one of the great interpreters of Bach and a firm advocate of playing Bach’s keyboard works on the piano. As soloist he has performed and recorded many of Bach’s major keyboard works, and his recitals fill concert halls throughout the world.
During his Weimar period, Johann Sebastian Bach composed a wealth of works. Among them are the 22 solo keyboard transcriptions of concertos by his Italian and German contemporaries: six for organ (BWV 592–596) and 16 for single-manual keyboard (BWV 972–987). The latter includes many famous baroque concertos by for example Vivaldi, Marcello and Telemann.
This collection of 16 works is now available for download from Piano Street’s online sheet music library in editions by Ernst Naumann for Bach-Gesellschaft edition: Bach – Transcriptions of Baroque Concertos
Glenn Gould performs the transcription of Marcellos Oboe Concerto in D minor:
Each of the two volumes of Bach’s Well-tempered Clavier contains one prelude and one fugue in every major and minor key. Often called “the 48”, or the “Old Testament” of piano music (the new being Beethoven’s sonatas) it is perhaps the most important keyboard work of all time.
The preludes are very varied in style and often deal with a specific technical feature, while the fugues are remarkable for their wide range of contrapuntal techniques and modes of expression.
Interpreting these masterpieces is a great challenge and inspiration for every pianist and the sets of complete recordings available are numerous, displaying a wide range of interpretational approaches. Even more numerous are the unrecorded performances throughout history; it is indeed slightly annoying that, no matter how fast and far modern technology evolves, we will probably never be able to listen to performances by our 18th and 19th century masters. But we have at least some very detailed 19th century editions left, for example one by Beethoven’s student Carl Czerny (of which WTC book 1 is available from Piano Street’s online sheet music library) which is considered to give hints on how Beethoven played these pieces.
Returning to February 2010, pianist Martin Sturfält is starting an ambitious project in which he plans to record all 48 Preludes and Fugues for Piano Street. “In recording DWK I seek to fuse the prevailing neo-classical approach to playing Bach on the modern piano with the vitality of the period instrument movement. This enables me to make stylistically informed choices while keeping an undogmatic view on these masterpieces of the keyboard repertoire”, says Sturfält.
His new recording of seven of the Preludes & Fugues from Book 1 as well as two from Book 2 is now available from Piano Street for listening and downloading.
Listen and follow the project on this page: “Recording the 48″ – Preludes and Fugues by Bach
As a free sample we are happy to share with you the recording and Urtext score of the Prelude and Fugue no 7 in E-flat major from Book 2:
(click play button twice to start)
Please join us in welcoming pianist Martin Sturfält as the newest member of the Piano Street Team and enjoy these 18 new tracks!
In a live recording from the Amerikahaus, Munich, Friedrich Gulda reveals the versatility of his keyboard playing. On the clavichord he plays three preludes and fugues from Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier (in A minor BWV 889, in C major BWV 846, in A flat major BWV 886) on the piano; his own re-working of Schubert’s song Der Wanderer, ending with Debussy’s Reflets dans l’eau and a selection of his own compositions.
Watch the recital here: http://www.classicaltv.com/v530/friedrich-gulda-solo-flight
*** MUSICAL HOLIDAY GIFTS FROM PIANO STREET *** Free sheet music for the pieces in the above video
(click images to open in new window):
Bach: Prelude & Fugue WTC II no 20
Bach: Prelude & Fugue WTC I no 1
Bach: Prelude & Fugue WTC II no 17
Schubert: Der Wanderer
Debussy: Reflets dans l’eau
Friedrich Gulda (1930-2000) won first prize at the International Competition in Geneva in 1946. He began going on concert tours throughout the world.
Together with Jörg Demus and Paul Badura-Skoda, Gulda formed what became known as the “Viennese troika”.
Gulda had a strong dislike of authorities like the Vienna Academy, the Beethoven Ring of which he was offered in recognition of his performances but which he refused, and even faked his own death in 1999, cementing his status as the enfant terrible among pianists. Nevertheless, Gulda is widely
regarded as one of the most outstanding piano players of the 20th century.
His piano students included Martha Argerich and the conductor Claudio Abbado. He is also remembered as an accomplished jazz-pianist, musical thinker and avant-garde artist. Although most famous for his Beethoven
interpretations, Gulda also performed the music of J.S.Bach, Mozart, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Debussy and Ravel.
Piano Street caught up with Lara Downes for six short questions on the project and album “13 Ways of Looking at the Goldberg”:
The Pollini Project, program:
Interpreting these masterpieces is a great challenge and inspiration for every pianist and the sets of complete recordings available are numerous, displaying a wide range of interpretational approaches. Even more numerous are the unrecorded performances throughout history; it is indeed slightly annoying that, no matter how fast and far modern technology evolves, we will probably never be able to listen to performances by our 18th and 19th century masters. But we have at least some very detailed 19th century editions left, for example one by Beethoven’s student Carl Czerny (of which 
Returning to February 2010, pianist Martin Sturfält is starting an ambitious project in which he plans to record all 48 Preludes and Fugues for Piano Street.
