Gould Bash

The recording industry of the 20th century saw stars become legends and albums become icons of popular culture. Completed in a total of only four days and released in January 1956, Glenn Gould s début recording of Bach s Goldberg Variations is without doubt one of the most significant and successful classical recordings in the history of the gramophone record.

This remarkable set, culled from the archives of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation during the early years in which Glenn Gould emerged as a major classical pianist (1951–55), packages together five discs previously issued singly between 1994 and 1999. The only new CD in the collection is the second Bach disc, which features typically scintillating performances of the Partita No. 5, Three-Part Inventions, Italian Concerto , and the Concerto in D Minor. Of the various discs here, the only one to contain works not issued commercially by Columbia-CBS-Sony is the second Beethoven CD (originally released in 1997 as CBC 2013).

Am 14. Januar 1966 befand sich New York, unter einer Schneedecke, fest im Griff von Minus-Temperaturen. Doch als Elisabeth Schwarzkopf die Columbia-Studios betrat, um mit Glenn Gould Lieder von Richard Strauss aufzunehmen, war es nicht etwa nur mollig warm, es muss eine Bullenhitze geherrscht haben. Der dauerfröstelnde Kanadier Gould hatte die Thermostate aufdrehen lassen – und daran sollte sich zum Leidwesen der Stimmbänder der Schwarzkopf nichts ändern. So hört man die Sopranistin immer wieder mal kräftig durchkeuchen, mit den Worten „I´m full of Schleim!“

This program offers three lively, colorful, and captivating orchestral works by two United States composers, born almost a century apart. These pieces exhibit the fruitful exchange and flow of musical material between North and South America that has long played a role in popular music, apparent not only in commercial song and dance music using Latin American melodies and rhythms but also in early jazz and blues where tango rhythms are so often heard, as in W. C. Handy's St. Louis Blues. And both Gottschalk in the 1850s, close to the beginning of a creative American musical tradition, and Gould in the 1950s, when such a tradition had flowered considerably, show a combination of seriousness of approach with a popular touch.