Glenn Gould

May 12th, 2008 | Musical life | No Response | By Pierre-Arnaud

Illustration Article

Among fascinating pianists, Glenn Gould holds for me a special place. By his play and his personality, the Canadian pianist captivated me.

I first heard him in his goldberg variations in the 1981 version. I say “his” because Gould has been able to make them his while respecting the text of Bach. Then, I progressively fell in love with his vision of things and music. Multi-faceted character , he made documentaries for radio, television, moderated programs, and of course recorded for CBS a huge repertoire.

Lone, Gould prefered the atmosphere of the studio to the stages which he totaly left after 1964. Perfectionist, the concert could not fit him, with its imperfect nature and its obligations to compromise. In the studio he could think, redo, choose options and deliver a perfect product without compromise.

Also composer, his works are not so famous. These include the fugue for choir and four mixed voices entitled So You Want to Write a Fugue? and his String Quartet Opus 1, inspiration close to the music of Arnold Schoenberg. He also wrote several transcriptions for solo piano from works by Wagner and Ravel.

He suffered a stroke on 27 September 1982. He was admitted to hospital and his condition rapidly deteriorated. He was taken off life support on October 4. He is buried in Toronto’s Mount Pleasant Cemetery.

Let’s listen to music with this video of the master interpreting the aria of the Golberg Variations in 1981.