Schnabel or Hewitt?

[Scarpia]

I own every Bach disc she has made because I enjoy her playing.  It's simply that I find a few other pianists more compelling.

That may be the difference.  I don't really want a Bach pianist to be compelling, so much as transparent.  Hewitt is good at creating a texture of impressive clarity, and in bring out little details that might easily be missed.

[PaulSC]

That may be the difference.  I don't really want a Bach pianist to be compelling, so much as transparent.  Hewitt is good at creating a texture of impressive clarity, and in bring out little details that might easily be missed.

I find those two notions somewhat contradictory ("transparency" vs "bringing out details")

[Scarpia]

I find those two notions somewhat contradictory ("transparency" vs "bringing out details")

I don't.  Transparent means inner voices and details of voice-leading can be distinctly heard. 

[PaulSC]

I don't.  Transparent means inner voices and details of voice-leading can be distinctly heard.

Whereas, to me, "bringing them out" makes "hearing them distinctly" compulsory rather than possible.

Either alternative is fine, but I think music in general and Bach in particular benefits from a degree of ambiguity. There are many valid ways to hear the voice-leading, to parse the motivic structure, and to prioritize individual voices relative to the rest of the texture. Privileging one set of possibilities attenuates others. I don't mind this interpretive tendency if it's applied with a light hand; but the distinction is interesting to me.

[Scarpia]

Whereas, to me, "bringing them out" makes "hearing them distinctly" compulsory rather than possible.

Either alternative is fine, but I think music in general and Bach in particular benefits from a degree of ambiguity. There are many valid ways to hear the voice-leading, to parse the motivic structure, and to prioritize individual voices relative to the rest of the texture. Privileging one set of possibilities attenuates others. I don't mind this interpretive tendency if it's applied with a light hand; but the distinction is interesting to me.

What I don't like is when pianists make excessive use of dynamics to highlight what they have identified as key events in the music.  Bach wrote the keyboard music for an instrument which did not have this ability and he put the meaning into the melody and harmony, that's what I want to hear, not banging away every time the main theme returns or there is a modulation or a bit of dissonance.  I won't claim that Hewitt is the greatest pianist who ever lived, or other such nonsense, but she creates a transparent, nuanced texture in which I feel that I can hear what Bach has written, without being hammered over the head with it.

[PaulSC]

What I don't like is when pianists make excessive use of dynamics to highlight what they have identified as key events in the music.  Bach wrote the keyboard music for an instrument which did not have this ability and he put the meaning into the melody and harmony, that's what I want to hear, not banging away every time the main theme returns or there is a modulation or a bit of dissonance.  I won't claim that Hewitt is the greatest pianist who ever lived, or other such nonsense, but she creates a transparent, nuanced texture in which I feel that I can hear what Bach has written, without being hammered over the head with it.

Absolutely, I agree with all of this.

[DavidRoss]

I don't.  Transparent means inner voices and details of voice-leading can be distinctly heard.

You betcha!  Transparency means you can hear everything the composer put in there (as if he meant it to be heard!)--like looking at the world through a clear pane of glass--instead of having some details buried under a mass of, say, thick strings (think Herbie the K)--like looking at the world through tinted wax paper.  A quality some of us value highly in conductors, performers, recordings, and sound reproduction systems.  Abbado, Boulez, Berglund, Chailly, for instance, come to mind as conductors who value transparency and seek orchestral balances that allow details to be heard.   And the clarity of line in Hewitt's Bach is a thing of beauty to my ears.

[The Diner]

Schnabel!

Simply because I enjoy typing: "Schnabel!"

[Holden]

I'm one who does not find Hewitt's Bach to be quintessential. While there is nothing wrong with it there is nothing that excites me either. I will admit my exposure to her Bach is limited to 3 recordings, none of which have really inspired me. Yes, her playing is very good but there is something that is missing for me. (I feel the same way about Andras Schiff's Bach).

This same lack of excitement(?) comes across in the 2 recordings of her LvB PS cycle I've heard so I wonder if it is something about her approach to the music. There doesn't seem to be any passion and I am wondering if she is one of those very analytical musicians who are also great musicologists. They know a hell of a lot about the music they are playing but getting it across to people like me is another matter. I felt the same way about Schiff's LvB so maybe the two are very similar.

That said, some posters talk about some great concerts of her they have attended and maybe she is yet another of those musicians who only responds when engaged with an audience.

At the moment Hewitt's recording of the Toccatas is playing and already it has become just background music.

So obviously my vote is going to Schnabel

[Holden]

What I don't like is when pianists make excessive use of dynamics to highlight what they have identified as key events in the music.  Bach wrote the keyboard music for an instrument which did not have this ability and he put the meaning into the melody and harmony, that's what I want to hear, not banging away every time the main theme returns or there is a modulation or a bit of dissonance.  I won't claim that Hewitt is the greatest pianist who ever lived, or other such nonsense, but she creates a transparent, nuanced texture in which I feel that I can hear what Bach has written, without being hammered over the head with it.

Absolutely, I agree with all of this.

...and I don't. Bach frequently transcribed his music for many other combinations of instruments -which did have the ability to express dynamics - and I am sure that he would have really enjoyed making this music on a modern piano. To say that Bach was only thinking in terms of giving equal weight to 'voicing' and other musical dynamics is specious.

[PaulSC]

...and I don't. Bach frequently transcribed his music for many other combinations of instruments -which did have the ability to express dynamics - and I am sure that he would have really enjoyed making this music on a modern piano. To say that Bach was only thinking in terms of giving equal weight to 'voicing' and other musical dynamics is specious.

You've evidently understood Scarpia's words far diiferently than I have. After all, Scarpia's statement is coupled with a favorable assessment of Hewitt playing Bach on a modern piano. No one in the course of recent posts here has argued against idiomatic use of that instrument, as far as I can tell.

[Bulldog]

That may be the difference.  I don't really want a Bach pianist to be compelling, so much as transparent.  Hewitt is good at creating a texture of impressive clarity, and in bring out little details that might easily be missed.

Transparency, which I prefer to call "detail of every voice", is a very good thing.  However, for me, it's only one feature of a superb performance of Bach's music.

By the way, if you really want to hear this vaunted transparency, check out harpsichordist Edward Parmentier on the Wildboar label with a level of detail that easily surpasses Hewitt.  But even with Parmentier, I feel there's something missing that's very important - the full measure of emotional involvement.

I almost forgot to mention, since I started this poll, that I'm surprised at how well Hewitt is doing so far.  I thought that Schnabel was considered one of the piano legends, but maybe some here feel that Hewitt will at some future point be a legend.

[Scarpia]

Transparency, which I prefer to call "detail of every voice", is a very good thing.  However, for me, it's only one feature of a superb performance of Bach's music.

By the way, if you really want to hear this vaunted transparency, check out harpsichordist Edward Parmentier on the Wildboar label with a level of detail that easily surpasses Hewitt.  But even with Parmentier, I feel there's something missing that's very important - the full measure of emotional involvement.

I stopped reading when I encountered the word "harpsichord."   
[just kidding]

[PaulSC]

These remarks from Donald Tovey are interesting (bearing in mind they are addressed mainly to a generation of pianists steeped in romantic performance practice). They come from the preface to his edition of the WTC.

b.  Part-playing.  The nature of polyphony has been obscured rather than illuminated by Ouseley's famous definition of counterpoint as "the art of combining melodies."  Much "pianistic" fugue-playing of counterpoint has passed as "scholarly" when it even fails to realise that definition, inasmuch as it "brings out the subject" as if all the rest of the fugue were unfit for publication.  This notion is peculiar to pianists.  Organists, who perhaps play fugues more often than other people, do not find it necessary, whenever the subject enters in the inner parts, to pick it out with the thumb on another manual.  They and their listeners enjoy the polyphony because the inner parts can neither "stick out" nor fail to balance well in the harmony, so long as the notes are played at all.  On the pianoforte constant care is needed to prevent failure of tone; and certainly the subject of a fugue should not be liable to such a failure.  But neither should the counterpoints; indeed, the less often a characteristic subject recurs the more important it may be that it should be heard clearly (e.g. the clinching third countersubject of the F minor Fugue in Book I.) Most of Bach's counterpoint actually sounds best when the parts are evenly balanced.  It is never a mere combinations of melodies.  It is quite different, for instance, from the famous three-fold combination in the Meistersinger Vorspiel.  This has been by turns praised and blamed as a piece of three-part counterpoint; but the praise and blame are irrelevant, because Wagner achieves a classic fulness and smoothness by means of the humble inner parts of the woodwinds and horms, to which nobody is asked to listen, but which supply the really classical harmony-counterpoint into which the whole combination melts.

When Bach combines melodies, the combination forms full harmony as soon as two parts are present.  (Even a solitary part will be a melody which is its own bass.)  Each additional part adds new harmonic meaning, as well as its own melody and rhythm, and all are in transparent contrast with each other at every point.  No part needs "bringing out" at the expense of the others, but on the pianoforte care is most needed for that part which is most in danger of failure of tone.  Thus, one of Bach's standard types of triple counterpoint consists of a theme with wide intervals and lively rhythm, a countersubject flowing uniformly and in conjunct movement, and another countersubject consisting of a few long motes forming a chain of suspensions or a slow chromatic progression.  This third and simplest of themes will be the keystone of the harmonic arch.  On the organ it will dominate sublimely if the notes are played at all; chorus-singers will luxuriate in it; the clavichord will respond to it with a vibrato; the harpsichord will manage it quite satisfactorily; the pianoforte-?

[Bulldog]

I stopped reading when I encountered the word "harpsichord."   
[just kidding]

That reminds me of a situation with my teenage grandson, Ben.  Every time I drive him home from school or other locations, I have the WTC playing on the cd player.  I play different pianists as well as different harpsichord versions.  A couple of days ago, I asked him if he preferred the piano or harpsichord versions.  His answer - "I thought you were playing the same disc all these months".

[PaulSC]

That reminds me of a situation with my teenage grandson, Ben.  Every time I drive him home from school or other locations, I have the WTC playing on the cd player.  I play different pianists as well as different harpsichord versions.  A couple of days ago, I asked him if he preferred the piano or harpsichord versions.  His answer - "I thought you were playing the same disc all these months".

Haha! Time to cue up W. Carlos?

[Bulldog]

Haha! Time to cue up W. Carlos?

Good one, but it will never happen.  In my little musical world, Carlos is poison.

[DavidRoss]

Yes, her playing is very good but there is something that is missing for me. (I feel the same way about Andras Schiff's Bach).

This same lack of excitement(?) comes across in the 2 recordings of her LvB PS cycle I've heard so I wonder if it is something about her approach to the music. There doesn't seem to be any passion....

How wonderful our world is!  Both Schiff and Hewitt seem terrifically passionate to me, but the passion of a skilled, experienced, mature lover rich with nuance and subtlety--not the passion of a thirteen-year-old boy who's just watched the Dallas Cheerleaders work out live (or a stereotypical Russian!).

Haha! Time to cue up W. Carlos?

Speaking of passion...is it Walter or Wendy who makes your pulse pound? 

Edit: Ack! Cato-curdling typo corrected!

[Scarpia]

...and I don't. Bach frequently transcribed his music for many other combinations of instruments -which did have the ability to express dynamics - and I am sure that he would have really enjoyed making this music on a modern piano. To say that Bach was only thinking in terms of giving equal weight to 'voicing' and other musical dynamics is specious.

When he wrote the music for harpsichord or clavichord he was explicitly thinking of an instrument that was not capable of dynamic contrasts (other than alternating between two manuals).  There is nothing specious in this.  He wrote music that best suited the limitations and strengths of the clavier.  I would not claim that there is anything illegitimate of making use of the full dynamic capabilities of the piano, but I believe the most fruitful use of these capabilities is to making all of the voices audible.   Bach wrote the finest contrapuntal music ever conceived by man, and to use "pianistic" effects that obscure this strikes me as utterly pointless.   I agree Bach would have loved the piano, but he would have written different music for it.

[Scarpia]

At the moment Hewitt's recording of the Toccatas is playing and already it has become just background music.

Sounds like you don't like Bach much  (runs away).