What do you mean when you say this? I mean: How can you hear this?
I'm serious. Thanks.
Well, I can't play the piano or read music, so you can safely assume that, to a certain extent, I am full of shit.
That said… basic technique, ie just getting the notes right in a reasonably proficient fashion, can be assumed most of the time – ya gotta be a pretty darned good piano player to get a recording contract with EMI, after all. When I say technique, I'm talking about something beyond that, actually a number of things that I can hear (at least
think I can hear them), and that generally separate the great from the so-so, IMO. Speed and articulation, for one; the ability to rattle off a finger-twisting passage swiftly, making it sound effortless -- think Horowitz, to take an obvious example, or Cziffra.
I'm also thinking of tonal quality, how they use all the tools at their disposal to give the piano a unique voice. Think of Gould playing a fugue from the WTC, and then think of Richter playing the same passage -- anybody who's listened to a lot of piano recordings could immediately tell which is which, yet there are hundreds of pianists where the distinction is much harder to detect. Sometimes technique in this sense can be used to artistically dubious purposes, of course (imagine if Gould recorded the Chopin Nocturnes – the mind boggles), but that’s another whole topic.
There are other qualities, that I could probably tease out if I had more time to reflect. For me it’s basically subjective – it really boils down to how much the pianist’s sheer piano-playing skill (to the limited extent that I’m able to ascertain it) blows me away, when compared to others that I’ve heard. Plus, it sounds more intelligent than merely saying “wow, that was really good!”
