Bach: Well-Tempered Clavier

[71 dB]

I have been watching Youtube videos about Fugue to learn how to write them and one video I saw was about how economically Bach uses the material in the Fugue of D Major Prelude and Fugue, BWV 874 of WTC II. I became a bit obsessed of this fugue.  The only recording I have is Jenő Jandó on Naxos played on piano. I think this Fugue works brilliantly on piano. I was curious to how to sounds like on harpsichord and sampled some performers on Spotify. Keith Jarrett and Kenneth Gilbert play it quite fast with similar tempi and the comforting feel of piano playing is completely missing while Wanda Landowska plays it really slow greating an almost religious/spiritual feel. However, for me piano is the optimal instrument for this Fugue for the comforting feeling it creates...

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

You may find some info here:

https://musica-mundana.jimdosite.com/

Also, if you send an email, somebody will answer your question. I think he is blind.

A particularly arresting piano performances of BWV 882 & 883 here, an old piano by the sound of it. Impossible for me to find any information on the instruments he's using in this series of four releases - Bk 1 on harpsichord, Bk 2 on piano I think, or mostly.  The recordings are conceived as concerts with a mix of Bk 1 and Bk 2 music; sometimes one piece is repeated on a different instrument. My feeling is that this is a very well thought through project indeed, such a shame so little information is available about Takehisa's thought processes.

The only source in the UK seems to be Apple.

[milk]

You may find some info here:

https://musica-mundana.jimdosite.com/

Also, if you send an email, somebody will answer your question. I think he is blind.

I love this series although I think it's unfinished.

[milk]

I'd never heard of her but these are worthwhile for a listen. I don't think she overdoes anything and you can hear a deep love of Bach. There are lots of little inventive details in her playing and ornamentation.

And here's something something interesting from the description of her life:
"This is not at all what I wrote, but play it like this. Do play it this way!" exclaimed Dmitri Shostakovich after Yudina performed the freshly written 24 Preludes and Fugues.

[vers la flamme]

^Yudina's Goldberg Variations is also excellent. She's my girlfriend's favorite pianist and she put me onto a lot of her stuff when I was first getting into Bach and classical music as a whole a few years ago.

[Mandryka]

I was just disappointed that the transfers in that new set in milk's image were no improvement on what was previously available.

[milk]

Not to be a downer but I listened to more of her today and have some questions about what she's doing. It's comparable to Feinberg in a way - and that's a good thing. On the other hand, she's fast and furious and often makes mistakes. She makes wild leaps in tempo and the sound quality doesn't help when things get really slurred. But, if y'all think there's brilliance, I'll listen more. Maybe I should look for her Goldbergs.

[Mandryka]

Not to be a downer but I listened to more of her today and have some questions about what she's doing. It's comparable to Feinberg in a way - and that's a good thing. On the other hand, she's fast and furious and often makes mistakes. She makes wild leaps in tempo and the sound quality doesn't help when things get really slurred. But, if y'all think there's brilliance, I'll listen more. Maybe I should look for her Goldbergs.

All that generation are when it comes to Bach -- Yudina, Feinberg, Gilels, Edwin Fischer, Gieseking, Weissenberg, even Richter most of the time.  It's as if they think that to produce a harpsichord effect they have to play the piano fast and with zero nuance or rubato. Probably they never had heard a real baroque harpsichord played by someone who can drive it properly.

[André]

Last week with a group of friends we compared approaches to various preludes/fugues by Fischer, Gieseking, Tureck (1955), Gould, Richter, Horszowski, Ashkenazy, Barenboim, De Maria, Poblocka (listed in chronological order of recording dates). We added Landowska (!) for good measure.

The range of approaches was of course very wide, and generally we found the more recent accounts in better accord with our tastes. We also found that sound issues did make a difference in our appreciation - more so than I would have imagined. 

I wouldn't venture to put them in order of preference, but I personally didn't care much for the first three, largely on account of the sound limitations. The most characterful and convincing accounts for me were by De Maria, Horszowski and Gould. Honourable mention to Richter and Barenboim, both of whom I found uneven - sometimes very engrossing, sometimes misjudged (mostly on account of tempi).

[Mandryka]

Tureck is the exception that proves the rule.

[milk]

Tureck is the exception that proves the rule.

I wonder if Tureck is a reaction to the others?

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Mie Miki, Well-Tempered Accordion.
A review is below.

http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2017/Aug/Bach_accordion_BIS2217.htm

[Mandryka]

I wonder if Tureck is a reaction to the others?

She claimed to have a direct communication channel with Bach's ghost. Landowska also is an exception, she's a pianist really, as far as I know she wasn't interested in harpsichord technique and she plays the playel as if it's a piano - piano touch. Arrau, who recorded the Goldberg Variations in 1945 and who knew and respected Landowska, is almost as fast and unnuanced as Edwin Fischer etc, he plays Bach as if he's playing Beethoven. I quite like Arrau's Bach.

[milk]

She claimed to have a direct communication channel with Bach's ghost. Landowska also is an exception, she's a pianist really, as far as I know she wasn't interested in harpsichord technique and she plays the playel as if it's a piano - piano touch. Arrau, who recorded the Goldberg Variations in 1945 and who knew and respected Landowska, is almost as fast and unnuanced as Edwin Fischer etc, he plays Bach as if he's playing Beethoven. I quite like Arrau's Bach.

I haven't listened to Tureck for a while but I used to think she was a kind of outlier. Isn't it true she breaks away from the tradition of those you mentioned and made the case for Bach's universe? I'm not saying she succeeded because I have a feeling there's a bit too much ego in her playing maybe. I'm just supposing; I have to listen to her again.

[aukhawk]

Downright distorted on the 2 CDs I own, recordings dating from the early '80s on an anonymous label with 'TROY' serial numbers (self-publied?).

[milk]

Just the opposite.  Since I avoid reading about recordings and artists, I was unaware of the stuff you guys are quoting.  I just listen to the recordings and to me, she is dedicated to presenting Bach as transparently as possible.  She might be thought of as the anti-Gould.  The only distraction for me is the recorded sound which is a dry studio acoustic.  But the playing is revelatory, IMO.

She always came out near the top in those comparisons by Don Satz. Did I get his name right? Is he still active here BTW? Maybe I'll give her a listen. I just remember her being unique. She certainly isn't like the generation before her that was being discussed.

[Mandryka]

She always came out near the top in those comparisons by Don Satz. Did I get his name right? Is he still active here BTW? Maybe I'll give her a listen. I just remember her being unique. She certainly isn't like the generation before her that was being discussed.

But she became like them. I think the later recordings are more mainstream than the earlier ones, and less special. Things like the BBC WTC is not as magic for me as the DG one, the early partitas recordings capture my imagination more than the later ones. I saw her once, do the Goldbergs.

[milk]

I do find this to be a very attractive recording. What an exceptionally beautiful sounding instrument! I like what Haas does, will he be recording BK 1, I wonder.

[staxomega]

Last week with a group of friends we compared approaches to various preludes/fugues by Fischer, Gieseking, Tureck (1955), Gould, Richter, Horszowski, Ashkenazy, Barenboim, De Maria, Poblocka (listed in chronological order of recording dates). We added Landowska (!) for good measure.

The range of approaches was of course very wide, and generally we found the more recent accounts in better accord with our tastes. We also found that sound issues did make a difference in our appreciation - more so than I would have imagined. 

I wouldn't venture to put them in order of preference, but I personally didn't care much for the first three, largely on account of the sound limitations. The most characterful and convincing accounts for me were by De Maria, Horszowski and Gould. Honourable mention to Richter and Barenboim, both of whom I found uneven - sometimes very engrossing, sometimes misjudged (mostly on account of tempi).

Your group might have liked Koroliov if you do that shootout again. It's among the most consistently even across both books that I've ever heard on piano and in the best sound quality too. I wish his performance of AoF was this good. The modern trend seems to be recording any JS Bach on piano in a reverberant acoustic but Tacet do a fine job of not doing that. Andrei Vieru is another really consistent one in terms of tempo choices but it is a bit reverberant.

[milk]

Your group might have liked Koroliov if you do that shootout again. It's among the most consistently even across both books that I've ever heard on piano and in the best sound quality too. I wish his performance of AoF was this good. The modern trend seems to be recording any JS Bach on piano in a reverberant acoustic but Tacet do a fine job of not doing that. Andrei Vieru is another really consistent one in terms of tempo choices but it is a bit reverberant.

What's the point of consistency?