Striking gold: some thoughts on performing Bach’s Goldberg Variations
Among iconic works for harpsichord, Bach’s masterful variation set BWV 988, published in 1742 as the fourth part of the composer’s Clavierübung series, is a culminating goal for those of us who revere and play the solo keyboard works of the Leipzig Cantor. Unique in its scope, variety of invention, and complex displays of variation techniques, as well as for the high level of keyboard skills required to perform this Aria with its thirty diverse variations, the “Goldbergs” remain a lofty destination on any harpsichordist’s “must-achieve” list.
Landowska and the first
recording of the Goldbergs
The most prominent 20th-century harpsichordist, Wanda Landowska, added these variations to her public performance repertoire in May 1933, just two months before her 54th birthday. She committed her interpretation to discs in November of that same year. This very recording, played on her signature Pleyel harpsichord equipped with 16-foot register and foot pedals for controlling registers, has been available in every successive recording format: 78-rpm vinyl; LP (331⁄3 rpm); and, ultimately, as a crown jewel in EMI’s 1987 “Great Recordings of the Century” series of compact discs. Like those of her contemporary, tenor Enrico Caruso, the pioneering harpsichordist’s recordings have survived each new technology, and their historic performances continue to delight each successive generation of listeners.
Landowska’s recording of the Goldbergs
Landowska recorded the complete work without repeats, but added idiosyncratic recapitulations of the first eight measures in variations 5, 7, and 18, resulting in a total duration just a few seconds shy of 47 minutes of music.
Also of compelling interest are Landowska’s commentaries on BVW 988. Originally written as program notes for the recording, they comprise 31 fascinating paragraphs, available in the book Landowska on Music (collected by Denise Restout, assisted by Robert Hawkins; New York: Stein and Day, paperback edition, 1969; pp. 209–220). They recount the tale of 14-year-old Danzig-born Bach student Johann Theophilus Goldberg who, as a protégé of Bach’s patron, the insomniac diplomat Count Kayserling, played the Variations for him (as chronicled by Bach’s first biographer Forkel), here embellished further by colorful imagery from Landowska. Brief descriptions of the individual movements of BWV 988 culminate in her evocative appreciation of Variation 25, third of the three variations in G minor, dubbed by the author as “the supreme pearl of this necklace—the black pearl.”
Concluding her essay, Landowska, who also was lauded by her contemporaries as a fine pianist, showed exquisite taste as she opined: “. . . the piano, which has no more than a single eight-foot-register, goes contrary to the needs and nature of overlapping voices. Besides, the bluntness of sound produced by the impact of hammers on the strings is alien to the transparency obtained with plucked strings, a transparency so necessary to poly-melodic writing. By interchanging parts on various registers of a two-keyboard harpsichord, we discover the secret of this foolproof writing which is similar to a hand-woven rug with no wrong side.”
[Comment by LP: It has always seemed strange, perhaps even perverse, that many pianists choose to play almost exclusively the pieces that Bach specifically designated for harpsichord with two keyboards—those major works found in parts two and four of his engraved/published keyboard works. To my ears, such performances are rarely successful. Perhaps the most bizarre of all such attempts was encountered during an undergraduate pianist’s audition for admission to a harpsichord degree program: the applicant attempted to play the slow movement of the Italian Concerto on a single keyboard (of a harpsichord). Admission was denied.]
A second thought-provoking set of program notes
Matthew Dirst, educated at the University of Illinois, Southern Methodist University, and Stanford University, now professor of music at the University of Houston, is well known as a Bach researcher who specializes in the reception history of the master’s works. He is also that ideal musicologist who is a virtuoso organist and harpsichordist, with multiple international prizes to support that affirmation. His writing is witty, lyrical, often thought provoking, and accurate! The seven paragraphs that he penned for the program of his complete Goldbergs, sponsored in 2005 by the Dallas Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, serve as representative examples. Dirst has played the complete set in many venues, but his thoughts on playing all the movements in one long program are both enlightening and liberating.
As one who has strayed quite often from the obligation to “play them all,” I applaud this more flexible stance: “Bach surely never intended—much less gave—such a [complete] performance. His purpose in assembling large collections was, as he writes in more than one title page, ‘for music lovers, to refresh their spirits. . . .’ But if we are to believe Forkel’s story about the insomniac count, it would seem that listening attentively to all these variations in one sitting is hardly what Bach had in mind . . . Fortunately, Bach’s music survives equally well in large helpings at prime time or as small courses during the wee hours.” Bravo, Matthew!
My first public Goldbergs
Elena Presser, the Argentinian-born American artist, has devoted much of her career to creating works of art inspired by the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. In June 1987 the Meadows Museum at Southern Methodist University hosted an exhibition of Presser’s 32 wall sculptures, The Goldberg Variations. Replete with number symbolism and specific colors often representing musical keys, this artist’s works share fascinating artistic insights that are inspiring and capable of expanding one’s understanding of Bach’s musical architecture. Each plexi-boxed creation depicts one movement: the basic Sarabande/Aria, the ensuing thirty variations, and the closing recapitulation of the Aria.
I was invited to perform the complete work as part of the opening festivities for this exhibition. It was my first complete traversal of Bach’s magnum opus. At age 48, I was only a few years younger than Landowska had been when she played her first complete set. At a special dinner following the concert I was seated next to Elena Presser. Thus began a friendship, abetted by my driving her to the airport for her return flight to Miami. During this trip I expressed an interest in commissioning one of her future art creations. Several years later, without any more discussion or correspondence, I received an invoice for a single piece inspired by Bach’s French Ouverture (in B minor), BWV 831. It took several years to pay for this commission, but the Presser piece remains a joyous highlight of the Palmer music room art collection.
Later in that summer of 1987 the museum director requested a second performance of the Goldbergs to mark the final week of the exhibition. This time we had a slide of each artwork to be shown simultaneously with the playing of the motivating movement: another successful expansion of artistic energies that made sense to the appreciative auditors/viewers.
It must have been something in the atmosphere that inspired more and more diverse Goldberg performances that year: from a far-away east coast, harpsichordist Igor Kipnis sent a program from his Connecticut Music Festival—and there was a listing of his solo performance of the entire piece, with another innovation: Kipnis prefaced Bach’s masterwork with three Polonaises from the pen of its first executant, the young Goldberg! Since Igor and I often exchanged newly discovered scores, I requested information about these pieces, to which he responded by sending copies. On several subsequent outings of the Goldberg Variations I have emulated his interest-generating prelude to the cycle.
For most of my Goldberg programs I have relied on the Landowska-inspired program notes written by her American student Putnam Aldrich (a faculty member at the University of Texas, Austin, and, subsequently, early music/harpsichord guru at Stanford University). Professor Aldrich’s cogent notes came to me through a close friendship with Putnam’s widow, Momo, who had been Landowska’s first secretary during the early years of her residence at St-Leu-la-Forêt. After Put’s death, Mrs. Aldrich moved to Hawaii to be near their only daughter and the grandchildren. It was during a treasured series of post-Christmas visits to Hawaii that I culled much information from her as I gathered materials for the book Harpsichord in America: so much, indeed, that the book is dedicated to her.
The ultimate luxury of two collaborators
That my final harpsichord student at SMU should be the Central American pianist José Luis Correa was a tremendous boon. Moving to Dallas for study with artist-in-residence Joaquin Achucarro, José also signed up for harpsichord lessons, and he bonded with this second instrument, the harpsichord, with intense devotion and dedication. Although I was on sabbatical leave during my final semester (his fourth of harpsichord study) I continued to give him lessons. My general absence from the harpsichord studio gave him much extra time to indulge his passion for the instrument—so all things worked out well. For his “final exam” I decided that we would divide the Goldberg Variations equally and perform them at the third house concert (Limited Editions) of the 2014–15 season. And so we did: I played the Aria, José the first variation; we then alternated back and forth through the whole cycle, with only two exceptions to this musical ying and yang: twice I performed two consecutive movements so I could play my favorites: Landowska’s “Black Pearl” and the rollicking Quodlibet. On the flip side, this allowed José to have the final glory of playing the Aria da Capo: fitting, it seemed, to pass a small torch to a new generation of harpsichordists.
And that is what Señor Correa has become! Back in his native Colombia he has positions as pianist and harpsichordist with a chamber orchestra—and the great joy (he wrote) that the instruments belonging to that group are now stored at his house, so he has a harpsichord (and a chamber organ) always available for practice.
I recommend highly the division of performing that alternating the variations provides. Sharing in this way gives each player an opportunity to recover from the intensity of his own performance before beginning the next assignment. As for the audience, hearing two differing harpsichord timbres helps to keep them focused on the music. Unfortunately, not everyone will have the luxury of a Richard Kingston Franco-Flemish double (played by LP) and a Willard Martin Saxon double (played by JC). I can only report that our concert was a great success: prefaced this time not by Goldberg’s Polonaises but by a much-loved and scintillating work for two harpsichords—Carillon (1967) by the British composer Stephen Dodgson (1924–2013).
