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Posted by chris howell on February 23, 2007, 6:05 pm, in reply to "Re: Hatto? Ha!" 30 March 2005 Dear Mr. Howell, 4 May 2005 Dear Mr.Howell,
213.215.159.55
In my article I mentioned that I remembered some further emails from WB-C which I didn't seem to have conserved, including one thanking me for appreciating the unusually fast tempo of the Hammerklavier slow movement.
Readers will understand that I was working at breakneck speed and in fact, looking through old emails I find I have a few more from WB-C, though no more from JH and I don't remember there being any others.
Most are minor matters though they may all find their way into a final version of the article.
However, I think the following are worth making public immediately. The first is a very long a detailed reaction to a very minor criticism that the booklet notes of a Bach-Liszt disc might not be perfect, and also the recorded sound. If I have stressed that JH had an obsession with "unwarranted criticism", this message tends to suggest that WB-C was like-minded.
The second message is notable for its many details of pianists, critics and so on. In fact, this letter considerably muddies the usually clear distinction between the two writers, suggesting that there may have been only one after all.
I have just read your review and you seem to give the impression that the purchaser is being short-changed in the matter of the inlay booklet. Actually, I personally think that it covers the ground of the TWO cd's very handsomely with an interesting introduction and covers quite detailed notes on all the works on the two. Albeit we do not as a matter of policy, waste money on printing booklets in four languages I really think that nobody could complain that the inlay is inadequate. The notes are informative and scholarly and are written for somebody buying the record who is obviously interested in Liszt, the piano, and those works inspired by Bach and not necessarily an organ lover who probably wouldn't touch the record with a bargepole! I found your comments on the mechanics of the organ interesting but I have yet to see any programme annotator presenting this depth of information in any programme note. Actually, I don't think many have your knowledge to do it! I bet it would give a few language translators cause for thought!
This is a two set issue but being made available separately. The purchaser gets the same inlay with each cd. There can be no question of confusion as the tray gives the complete information as to the individual contents of each record. Did you not get the second disc containing the other pieces? I am not in the office so I can't lay my hands on the docket. I believe that it was sent with Kilenyi & Cortot cd's [I never got any of this]. I will check it out.
I was disappointed that you didn't like the recorded sound this is, of course, always a matter of personal likes - I produced the recording and I don't happen to like the present day piano sound and I like to have a sound that I normally hear in a good concert hall with a good pianist playing on a first class instrument with my own ears. That isn't a very frequent event either!
I have only today read your very interesting review of the Brahms Piano Works Vol.5 and I hope that you will find time to review the others in due course. You were quite right in your surmising the reasons for three recordings of the same piece. How many reviewers would have worked that out! In passing, it happens that Joyce Hatto has recorded the 48 and these will be released in 2006.
With kind regards,
William
W.H.Barrington-Coupe
Concert Artist recordings
I am so sorry that I didn't get back to you but personal problems intervened. Firstly, Joyce has been through a bad patch but is recovering and I had some heart problems and these have responded to different pills! All signs of ageing I'm afraid.
A box of cd's has obviously gone astray and I will get a further parcel packed and sent off.
I have read your review of the Hammerklavier and I was deeply pleased that your observations accorded exactly to the philosophy behind the performance. I think Joyce was particularly pleased that you found a truth in the slow movement and felt convinced. She has suffered badly from critic's (and some pianist's have written to her quite rudely) over the faster tempo and have dismissed the clarity and momentum in the other movements without a thought. Her approach to the Schubert B flat Sonata has also been shunned simply because she sees it differently - quite differently to most other pianists. So it was interesting that you should bring Schubert into your equation when discussing Op.106. This comes I think from this extraordinary idea that to be English is to be placed automatically in a second division when making comparisons to German, Russian and Hungarian schools. Neville Cardus wrote two reviews of her playing of German classics and sent her a bouquet (floral) after hearing her Schubert B flat Sonata. He was thrilled that a young English girl could get up and throw down the gauntlet to "Herr Backhaus and Herr Kempf " - other critics over the years have resented it.
The problem with critics is that only a few really do listen to what they hear. Few sit down with a score because they have been brought up with Schnabel and have his performances in their ears. Many do not even consider that an English pianist is fit to dust the shoes of say -Alfred Brendel or Andras Schiff - both admirable pianists in many ways
but neither, in my opinion, dispense the oracle. I don't seek to flatter when I say that YOU DO listen and you appear to have no prejudice between your ears to prevent a sound opinion. Obviously, everyone is different -all criticism is opinion EXCEPT when it comes to comment on the actual technique. Here the critic clearly knows what he knows or he knows nothing.
I hope that I have not overstepped the line in saying these things.
Anyway, I am attending to dispatching the missing items and I will email you when they are actually sent off. I will send the Brahms First Concerto as you ask [I never got it] and the other things. I think that you might be interested in an issue of the Verdi-Liszt transcriptions (as you are virtually a Milanese) being steeped in the Scala tradition [nor these]. This is a small series of the Operatic transcriptions and I am sure that you will be interested just for enjoyment even if you don't find time to comment on them.
Finally, entre nous, the Mozart Sonata series is being released in America and Joyce has taken the opportunity to "move things along a little" in some of the tempi - I will send you copies when they are available. So, she does listen to good criticism - even at her age!
I will write about recorded sound in another letter.
With very best wishes,
William
W.H.Barrington-Coupe
Concert Artist Recordings
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