Search - Johann Sebastian Bach, Maurizio Pollini :: The Well-Tempered Clavier I

At last, Pollini's long-awaited WTC...a revelatory performan

Nimitta | Boston, MA | 11/21/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I've been waiting for several decades to hear Pollini play the WTC, which he began to include on programs in the 1970s but has never played in my hometown of Boston. The thing about this WTC is that it is unlike any other you've ever heard, including Gould, Gulda, Richter, Schepkin, Schiff, Hewitt, Fellner, Ashkenazy, Aldwell, Barenboim, Tureck, and Fischer. There is a remarkable purity about it - a humility and directness borne of wisdom and utterly free of egoic adornment - that distinguishes it from other renderings. Pollini transcends any sort of technical limitation whatsoever in these pieces, yet is uncommonly spare both in ornament and artifice, allowing the almost unbearable intensity of Bach's vision to thrill, challenge, and astound. As one who has played and studied the 48 for many a decade, I must say that until hearing this recording I never came close to grasping many of Bach's inner structures, Pollini's subtly absorbing way with polyphony notwithstanding. Nothing is underlined or over-emphasized, but the clarity with which Bach's counterpoint unfolds is simply amazing. I realize now that the technical and expressive priorities of other interpreters have colored my sense of what these pieces are, and what they might have meant to Bach. Wait until you hear the austere grandeur of the E minor prelude & fugue...the ecstasy of the F and G majors...the desolation of the Bb minors! Regardless of the many treasures in the Bach keyboard catalogue, I can say with certainty that I will always cherish and return to this luminous achievement, another landmark in the testament of one of our greatest musical visionaries."

Well-tempered, in real flesh and blood.

Abel | Hong Kong | 11/23/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"There's a tendency these days to judge performances by `perfection' rather than by expressiveness, passion, or less measurable aspects. In terms of the Preludes and Fugues, as the pieces lend so much for analyses, it is easy to miss the key point. As indeed, those who cannot evaluate things by way of depth and breadth often use detail and other much more superficial and artificial ideas as their ideal of perfection and excellence. "Perfect" is that realm becomes science, not art.

The Well-tempered Claiver Book I of Maurizio Pollini blows away every accusation of his being `cool', `mechanical', `precise' (qualities that never had been his hallmark in the real sense). Pollini really makes the 12 pairs sing.

I began listening to these pieces with Ralph Kirkpatrick's harpsichord version. As a piano player, it did me much more harm than good for these works. To put it in simple terms, I disliked them: the clangy-bangy sound on the harpsichord coupled with Kirkpatrick's more Apollonian view of these works were quite enough to kill them for me.

Then follows Glenn Gould's and Friedrich Gulda's very `scientific' renditions, and S. Richter's rather uneven reading. They sounded some what better; then Angela Hewitt's first album did managed to alleviate the harm to some extent, but unfortunately her second volume is more willful and mannered. Indeed, Edwin Fischer had a much more appealing volume on his `historical' album dated back to the 1930's, but the sound quality could no way be matched with modern day hi-tech recordings.

It has always been a great shame that Wilhelm Kempff's set of "well-tempered clavier" has gone out of print on DG, and the great Bach expert organist Karl Richter had not, during his short life, recorded the well-tempered clavier on any keyboard instrument.

Luckily Pollini came to my aid in good time. His preludes and fugues are real joys to listen to. I don't care if they are `perfect' or not. Pollini's singing tone in the counterpoints is simply too beautiful for any distraction of a more inferior order. While you listen, you can imagine yourself sitting in a huge church, with a wonderful chorus singing out the contrapuntal melodies, and a small chamber orchestra making great accompaniment. Or more so still, you can imagine Bach's Brandenburg Concerti, his b Minor Mass, his Cantatas.... Pollini draws direct references to these other works of Bach in his performance. By far the most satisfying WTC I've encountered yet, largely because of the spontaneity and emotional depth manifested in these pieces.

The only question that remains is - will he record Volume 2?



ADDENDUM

Having by now listened to more rounds of Maestro Pollini's WTC Vol. 1, and having considered the review of MUI comparing Pollini's with Gulda's, I would perhaps add a word or two more on this new and revelatory interpretation of the WTC Vol I by Pollini.

I agree that the WTC in this performance sound much more 'vertical' or 'spherical' than most other great performances of the same work. What strikes me further, however, is how Pollini has dwelled into these works in real depth stylistically.

I have started to play the entire Vol. 1 since the age of 10. By now I have learned those pieces for decades. What sets Pollini's performance apart is his baroque style: grandiose and flambouyant. He weaves the phrases and counterpoints with real swerve and nuance. There is hardly any single idle phrase. This alarming state of concentration in performance is at the same time coupled with expressively beautiful touching, a hallmark of Pollini's since the earliest days he performs in public on the pianoforte. Listening to this set of WTC, the experience is akin to listening to a period baroque orchestra.

I emphasize 'period' here, because in comparison to Gulda's more modernist approach, Pollini's interpretation is more stylistically informed. It is more than evident that the Maestro has done extensive research into these compositions before putting them down in performance here. Not since Karl Richter have I heard more energised and nuanced Bach interpretation. Again, as I said, it is a great pity that Karl Richter did not leave any recording of the WTC.

Hats off to Maestro Pollini!

"

Another incomparable version of Bach's Well-tempered Clavier

A. F. S. Mui | HK | 01/06/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"If you ask me for THE `Well-tempered Clavier' experience, I would reply that Friedrich Gulda's reading used to be my ONLY experience. Not even Glenn Gould or Sviastolav Richter, let alone Hewitt.

For Gulda, his exquisite clarity, no-nonsense approach really set THE standard for these works for decades.



Here, like Gulda, Pollini's set really makes rubato a cheap trick. If Glenn Gould sounds dreamy while Gulda hits every note right on the head, Pollini never wastes a single note for expression. What makes Gulda's 48 less than ideal for a BEGINNER is how extreme it can be in all other dimensions while retaining those fixed tempi. Pollini's set has this concern done away with - he allows the music to breathe, though his tempi again are metronome-like strict. If it is strange that Gulda's strict tempi never sounded one drop robotic, Pollini's tempi achieved a virtual miracle.



You might say that Pollini comes out in a sense very unlike Gulda, yet on the other hand very much like Gulda's. Both pianists' Well-tempered Clavier make you think vertically, as much as some of the other great performances make you think thematically or horizontally, like Kempff or Fischer. While Gulda's has occasional aggressiveness and dryness, Pollini's succeeds in avoiding that little short-coming. His is pure elegance and beauty of tone, without a trace of mannerisms that beset the otherwise sterling sets of Angela Hewitt or Sviastoslav Richter.



Gulda's set has him humming if listened very carefully, so is Pollini's. There is absolutely nothing to be bothered about in both recordings.



In short, Pollini leaves me marvelled that after listening to Gulda's exalted version for years, there could come at this recent time another at least equally good version.

"