Does anybody love Wanda Landowska these days?

[Lance]

Landowska, either as an harpsichordist or pianist. I am very fond of her, and especially her Pleyel harpsichords, which I once was able to place my hands on in her Connecticut home.

[diegobueno]

If you want to see Wanda Landowska's harpsichord today, you can just walk into the Performing Arts Reading Room at the Library of Congress and see it on display, right next to Rachmaninoff's writing desk. The Library also has Landowska's papers.

The instrument is sometimes played, as in this video from the library's Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Auditorium. Music starts at the 36:30 mark.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nyoMNv0DsE

[neilnw]

Lance, I try to think of Landowska as little as possible....it's become kind of a personal vendetta.

Over forty years back, my fourth year in college, I had the biggest shot at making it into the finals in their annual concerto competition (piano division). I worked on the first movement of Bach's first concerto, d minor. I really administered the all-out treatment when I studied, memorized and worked up the piece. I'd even be fingering out away from the keyboard. Even the most critical of the three piano professors, Daniel Graham (a real bastard to anyone who studied with him), complimented me on my stylistic sense and clean articulation when doing it several weeks before the big run-off.

At the actual run-off, I was up against three female students who all worked on romantic movements. One of the three judges was the resident harpsichord instructor. She must've really pulled strings to eliminate me--despite (according to my own coach, several students, and another head instructor) that my performance was the only solid, technically flawless one, no memory lapses (and believe me, brother, if you experience a single lapse in Bach--you've had it).

Ever since then, I've stuck to hearing nothing but piano performances--Glenn Gould & Co.--of this work when I listen to it, or any of Bach's solo works.

[diegobueno]

Neil, sorry about your experience with the concerto competition, but unless Landowska was actually one of the judges, you have no basis to hold any grudge against her.

[Lance]

I always remember the Landowska line when discussing the performance of Bach's keyboard music with (I think) Sylvia Marlowe: "You play Bach your way and I'll play him his way!"

[barney]

I always remember the Landowska line when discussing the performance of Bach's keyboard music with (I think) Sylvia Marlowe: "You play Bach your way and I'll play him his way!"

Great quote.

Thanks for this thread, Lance. I haven't listen to Landowska for maybe 20 years. Time to revisit perhaps.

[Rach3]

I always remember the Landowska line when discussing the performance of Bach's keyboard music with (I think) Sylvia Marlowe: "You play Bach your way and I'll play him his way!"

I also remember Beecham’s line about harpsichord music.

[Lance]

Yes. Right about Beecham. Why not tell us the story?

I always remember the Landowska line when discussing the performance of Bach's keyboard music with (I think) Sylvia Marlowe: "You play Bach your way and I'll play him his way!"

I also remember Beecham’s line about harpsichord music.

[maestrob]

I always remember the Landowska line when discussing the performance of Bach's keyboard music with (I think) Sylvia Marlowe: "You play Bach your way and I'll play him his way!"

It's been too long since I heard that quote.

Thanks, Lance!

I, too, will revisit her outstanding recordings of Bach.

[barney]

Yes. Right about Beecham. Why not tell us the story?

I always remember the Landowska line when discussing the performance of Bach's keyboard music with (I think) Sylvia Marlowe: "You play Bach your way and I'll play him his way!"

I also remember Beecham’s line about harpsichord music.

I'm presuming it's the line, from memory, of the harpsichord sounding like two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. And he's right!

[Lance]

Yes, that's the line, but I never had an opportunity to appraise two skeletons in that situation. And, when you say "he's right," is that how the harpsichord sounds to you?

I'm presuming it's the line, from memory, of the harpsichord sounding like two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. And he's right!

[barney]

Yes, that's the line, but I never had an opportunity to appraise two skeletons in that situation. And, when you say "he's right," is that how the harpsichord sounds to you?

I'm presuming it's the line, from memory, of the harpsichord sounding like two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. And he's right!

Absolutely. But I like it anyway! Perhaps I'm some sort of sociopath?
PS, just as well Belle is no longer with us to second the motion.

[diegobueno]

Landowska's Pleyel harpsichord, with its cast-iron frame, is no longer considered an authentic instrument for baroque music. But it is the instrument that De Falla and Poulenc wrote for

Here is Landowska's performance of Poulenc's Concert Champetre

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ld0MrO_iBao

[Lance]

BELLE? Why, what happened? She was a fairly regular poster on CMG. She didn't pass on did she?

Yes, that's the line, but I never had an opportunity to appraise two skeletons in that situation. And, when you say "he's right," is that how the harpsichord sounds to you?

I'm presuming it's the line, from memory, of the harpsichord sounding like two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. And he's right!

Absolutely. But I like it anyway! Perhaps I'm some sort of sociopath?
PS, just as well Belle is no longer with us to second the motion.

[barney]

BELLE? Why, what happened? She was a fairly regular poster on CMG. She didn't pass on did she?

Yes, that's the line, but I never had an opportunity to appraise two skeletons in that situation. And, when you say "he's right," is that how the harpsichord sounds to you?

I'm presuming it's the line, from memory, of the harpsichord sounding like two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. And he's right!

Absolutely. But I like it anyway! Perhaps I'm some sort of sociopath?
PS, just as well Belle is no longer with us to second the motion.

No Lance. If I remember correctly she said she could no longer be associated with such "vile people" (presumably as Joe, Steve, Brian and me, her main interlocutors) and would not be back. She did return once, generously, to "educate" us.

[CharmNewton]

Yes, that's the line, but I never had an opportunity to appraise two skeletons in that situation. And, when you say "he's right," is that how the harpsichord sounds to you?

I'm presuming it's the line, from memory, of the harpsichord sounding like two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. And he's right!

Not to pick a bone, But how do skeletons copulate?

A couple of years ago, I played some of her RCA recording of the Goldberg Variations (LP, LM-1080) and found it quickly unlistenable. I'll have to listen to some of her harpischord recordings originally recorded on tape.

But I love her late piano recordings of Mozart and Haydn, recorded in her home in the late 1950s.

John

[barney]

Yes, that's the line, but I never had an opportunity to appraise two skeletons in that situation. And, when you say "he's right," is that how the harpsichord sounds to you?

I'm presuming it's the line, from memory, of the harpsichord sounding like two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. And he's right!

Not to pick a bone, But how do skeletons copulate?

A couple of years ago, I played some of her RCA recording of the Goldberg Variations (LP, LM-1080) and found it quickly unlistenable. I'll have to listen to some of her harpischord recordings originally recorded on tape.

But I love her late piano recordings of Mozart and Haydn, recorded in her home in the late 1950s.

John

Well, John, you are picking a bone most delightfully. This is not Beecham's point of course, but could you not say skeletons copulate when people do? People without skeletons probably can't copulate. But you are taking us a long way off track...

[CharmNewton]

Well, John, you are picking a bone most delightfully. This is not Beecham's point of course, but could you not say skeletons copulate when people do? People without skeletons probably can't copulate. But you are taking us a long way off track...

To move a a bit back on topic, I listened to the first 12 Preludes/Fugues of WTC I with Ms. Landowska. It's the only CD I have of her playing her harpsichord. I do not like the sound it produces. The recordings date from March, 1949 through February, 1951 and the recorded sound does improve. Perhaps Book II has even better sound. There is no denying the powerful conception she has of these works. Her playing of these works has a grip that never wavers or loses concentration. Wonderful clarity of voices in the fugues.

I've come to prefer the harpsichord to the modern grand piano in Baroque music as the harpsichords, whether restorations of older instruments or new replicas, have a wide coloristic palette of sounds. I suspect that the original makers cultivated the overall tonal sound of their instruments and this was probablt true for the early pianofortes as well. Not that modern pianos don't sound beautiful--if you have Friedrich Gulda's recoridng for Edel (licensed by Philips and still available on Decca, but not part of the big Decca Gulda box), listen to the beauty of his instrument. The engineers apparently worked with him to get the best position for the piano in the recording studio and then marked that floor location with tape. But the coloristic differences between makes of grand pianos is more subtle than that of harpsichords or organs.

It would be good to hear J.S. Bach or Baroque keyboard music in general on really good examples of fortepianos. I'll have to do some digging to see what may already be available.

John