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Re: Gould or not?

Posted by Christine Tham (R) on April 10, 2007 at 14:47:35

In Reply to: Re: Gould or not? posted by Dave Garretson on April 10, 2007 at 10:32:46:

*** Japanese anime-- which generally has mixed agendas polluted by commercialism. ***

Hmm, really? I doubt many would agree with your rather blunt stereotyping. And in any case, I was referring to a specific film, not a genre, which it seems you have not experienced, so the point I was trying to make is probably lost.

*** On this forum we usually speak of the absolute sound in terms faithfulness to the original performance. ***

Really? I think many on this forum do not want accuracy, what they are really looking for is euphony.

*** But in the case of the Disklavier, we are asked to accept a "recreated" performance ***

*Every* recording is a recreated performance. The Disklavier is simply another means of doing so. An arguably a Disklavier replaying a "performance" is far more faithful than a recording.

Furthermore (and you may realise this if you read the full article by Gould that I quoted from) a recording may in fact be a recreation of an synthetic or imaginary performance, through the magic of splicing and editing.

In fact, as Gould postulated, you could create a "performance" simply by assembling from a vast library of tape loops (each containing one note from one instrument) and then splicing and mixing everything together. And the result may well be more "musical" (or contain more "soul" if you like) than a human doing a bad rendition of Fur Elise on a Steinway.

That was the reason why Gould retired from the concert stage. He wanted to move to a different paradigm for making music, and he wanted to be free of the artificial "point in time" limitations imposed on him by a live performance, and the "pressure" of an audience (in his mind) waiting like vultures for him to make a mistake.

*** I would submit that the need for such a device says less about the limitations of traditional recording techology, than it does about our craving for simulation. ***

Again, I would not agree with you. Is it really simulation we are craving, or stimulation?

And I think you are continue to miss the rather subtle point I was trying to make in previous posts. The "soul" of music resides not in the performer (or even the composer) but in the listener. The whole evolution of music in the last century or so has been recognising and exploiting this: atonality, serialism, minimalism, process orientation, etc. etc. John Cage's 4'33" was the ultimate example that proved the point: in the absence of any specific influence from the composer or performer, *we* create the music from the background.

*** The question is not whether there are future Gould's among us, but rather whether we as a society no longer require them. ***

Again, I think you miss the point. As I've pointed out, there are lots of Goulds, and I dare say "society" as such probably appreciates their value to a greater extent, but you may not recognise them as such.

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