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In Reply to: RE: No, We did not need distance from the earlier generation. posted by Mel on November 15, 2014 at 08:44:07
You say that Rubinstein, Serkin, Horowitz, et al were recognized as giants in their own time. But we have critics (often of the British persuasion!) who recognize the "greatness" of Brendel, Uchida, Perahia, et al too! I still contend we need time to sort all this out.
As I said, it's also true that many pianists in the subsequent generation from Horowitz et al were operating under a different aesthetic: less flamboyance and more "humble servant of the composer" modesty. I guess I'm cynical enough to view some of this humility as "playing the role", although for other listeners, the change was a welcome relief from "personality" excesses of the earlier generation. BTW, I'd say that, by and large, Serkin falls into this "humble" category too.
In any case, it's certainly next to impossible to make such broad statements about entire generations. (One exhibited GREATNESS, the other, not so much!) And BTW, there's another generation wedged in there (Janis, Fleisher, Graffman, Katchen, Cliburn) that certainly displayed some greatness too - at least IMHO.
Follow Ups:
Well said, Chris.
Years ago I had a friend who was a very fine pianist and organist, who played atmy wedding. He studied at Curtis. He told me an interesting story obce. He said he was practicing one day and the person in the next room was working on a Chopin Étude, and making pretty ugly sounds and many basic mistakes. Turned out to be Rusolf Serkin...
That's a very interesting story!
My wife and I attended a solo recital by Serkin (late in his life), where he played (I kid you not) Schumann's Abegg Variations on the first half. We could not believe how tentative and amateurish his performance sounded. (He seemed almost scared - we were in the second row and could see his fingers shaking.) We were kind of scandalized and left at intermission. A couple of our friends who stayed told us later that it was like two different piano recitals: the first half was as if some mediocre student were playing, but the second half showed off the accomplished musicality that Serkin (at his best) was known for. Maybe he had a couple of drinks at intermission? ;-)
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