I became interested in Glenn Gould for the same reason most do: I wanted to play the piano the way that he did. Though his polarizing, eccentric personality does not appeal to everyone who is familiar with him and his work, I do not think anyone can with any degree of legitimacy deny the beauty of his work. I have been somewhat frustrated to learn that I lack both the talent and the passion necessary to play the piano the way Glenn Gould did, but I take solace in knowing that I am not alone. A novel by the German author Thomas Bernhard (aptly called The Loser) describes a similar situation, though in significantly more detail. In the novel, the narrator describes a series of events that begins with he and his partner, both renowned pianists, meeting a young Canadian piano prodigy named Glenn Gould. The story then describes the descent of both the narrator and his partner into crushing depression as a horrible reality grips them both: though they had spent far longer than Gould perfecting their craft, neither could even fathom playing the instrument with the groundbreaking beauty that Gould could. This realization would have a far more pronounced affect on the characters in Bernhard's book than it has on me. The narrator eventually suffered a nervous breakdown, sold his piano and would never play again. His partner was so distraught, he committed suicide.
Like all who possess true genius, Glenn Gould strikes many as a man with great talent and an even greater desire to showcase it. When asked about him, many contemporary pianists have less than flattering words for Gould. Almost without exception, professional pianists train rigorously to play the notes in front of them, and sometimes to interpret how they should be played. Significant departures from what is on the page are rare. Gould saw little need for such fettered musicianship, although his technique and ability to control every sound his instrument made was and still is the envy of every serious pianist. His willingness to depart from traditional interpretations of classical standards is legendary, if not infamous. When questioned about his choice of tempo or dynamics for a given work, Gould would almost invariably crack a wry smile, look about in obviously contrived contemplation, and lead the interviewer on a sort of journey to nothing of significance. He was a living, breathing, and incalculably frustrating contradiction. "What's the point of playing a piece the same way everyone else does?" he once asked. He was a man committed to innovation and constant improvement, and he was a man committed to either ignoring or intentionally opposing traditional attitudes towards music.
Born in Canada to middle class parents, Gould was exposed to a great deal of music at a very early age, mostly by his doting mother. He was influenced by the great Polish pianist Josef Hofmann, who was the first musician Gould ever saw play publicly. In listening to and watching Hofmann's work (the unfortunately small amount that is available), the relation between the two can easily be seen: clear, gripping, beautiful music, and incredible virtuosity. Gould would graduate from the Royal Conservatory for Music at age twelve, and at that time became, for all intents and purposes, a professional pianist. He would continue to amaze live audiences from that time until 1964, when he abandoned touring altogether (for reasons I will explain later). He would devote the remainder of his life to recording and other other projects, such as radio broadcasts, conducting, and a small amount of composition. His death at the age of fifty was no doubt a result of his hypochondria, which would become far more pronounced later in his life.
Of course one cannot fully understand Glenn Gould without discussing his eccentricities. Like many musicians, to hear and to see him perform are two entirely different experiences. His most noticeable physical trait was his tendency to wear heavy clothing regardless of the temperature. He is so associated with this look that a statue made in his honor in his hometown depicts him in his scarf, hat and overcoat. His hands were also striking, as he often would soak them in scalding water for long periods of time before performances, turning them bright red. His playing technique, however effective, is still considered unorthodox. He almost always played while sitting in a small, custom-made chair that he would use at every one of his performances and recordings during his career. The chair, barely a foot off the ground, placed Gould far lower at the keyboard than most other pianists. This allowed him to "pull down" on the keys rather than push them. A both visibly and audibly unusual trait of Gould's work is the fact that he can often be heard vocalizing the music, or "humming" along to what he is playing. He claims this is came about during his childhood when his mother encouraged him to sing while he played, thus the habit was born.
His home life fostered a love of being alone, as he was an only child of a family that lived in a relatively secluded area of Canada. This environment fostered not only a remarkable ability to focus, but a need for extremely particular working conditions. Gould's obsession over every aspect of his recording sessions (everything from placements of microphones to the exact humidity of the recording space) often created tense moments between himself and those he worked with. Later in his life, his anxiety regarding public presentation caused him to demand that all of his appearances before camera or microphone be rigidly scripted. All of these traits were exacerbated by Gould's hypochondria, which he closely documented in a journal which was discovered after his death. He would obsessively take his own blood pressure at all hours of the day and would receive prescriptions for medications for many illnesses from many doctors, obviously a very destructive and ultimately fatal behavior.
In any case, it would turn out that I had come to hear the music and would stay to learn about the man. Many have tried, and perhaps all have failed, to find what truly made Gould who he was. He is an example of someone who was given a talent which most can only imagine and used in a way he felt he should use it, rather than how others might have liked that he use it. This was apparently a sticking point in his personal and professional development. Despite his aversion to concert performance, he reluctantly toured often during his early years. This can be seen in many with unorthodox perspectives on well established fields: one must first conquer the traditional route in order to gain credibility for more adventurous and fulfilling endeavors. Credibility, as I will later touch on, bore some significance with Gould.
Even his traditional foray into concerts was done in his own style, as he often cancelled tours for such reasons as his hotel being too drafty or his suffering from some real or imagined illness. He was known to wake late in the afternoon and call one of many people who were willing to listen to him and speak to them about whatever struck his fancy that day, sometimes for hours. This was indicative of both his desire to communicate and reach an audience while still keeping his distance, as well as his lack of regard for the time and interests of others, which I believe is typical of most people blessed with both talent and passion. One of the most daring moments of his career was his tour of Russia during the 1957, during which he brazenly played mostly the work of German composers. The Soviet public obviously put aside their misgivings about all things German, as the large and enthusiastic crowds for which he played often demanded multiple encores. Anyone who could make Soviet citizens in 1957 demand more of something that is explicitly German obviously transcends our typical interpretation of a musician.
Though he is generally known most for his talents at the piano, Gould considered himself a "musician who sometimes expressed himself through the piano." Later in his life, he would devote a great deal of his effort to other projects, an example of which is an oral tone poem called "The Idea of North." This recording used the voices of several people describing their personal experiences in the isolated northern parts of Canada. Using each separate recording, Gould created a symphony of voices that are describing similar experiences in different ways and in different tones, and yet in harmony. He obviously takes this contrapuntal approach from Bach, whose polyphonic work intertwined two or more melodies that could perhaps stand apart from each other as separate pieces, but create incredible harmony when combined, much like the voices in Gould's work.
Gould's decision to stop performing publicly is one that to most today obviously needs a good deal of explanation. Concert pianists, in the 1950's as they are now, were in an enviable financial situation. Gould, however, had philosophical misgivings about the modern concert, saying that there seemed to be a great barrier between the performer and the audience. This, he believed, was a great tragedy in the history of music, as the distance between performer and audience, which was far less pronounced in the early days of musical performance, has only grown since Gould's time. Of course one could easily claim that his anxiety towards public performance (and his anxiety in general) contributed greatly to this decision. He also cited what he considered the "blood-sport" of audiences only attending to witness a catastrophic lapse in the performer's concentration. Whatever the reason, Gould would devote the rest of his career to a more user-friendly form of music: mass produced recordings, which he predicted would evolve into platforms which would allow listeners to either create their own music using pre-recorded parts (garageband?) or listen to any recording they wished at any time they wished (YouTube, Itunes, Pandora, etc.). Clearly, the man had the mind and talent to be an incredibly well-known and influential figure in modern music, but perhaps lacked the technology. Though he was influential, he was relegated to physically snipping and pasting reels of recordings. One can only imagine what Gould might be able to accomplish with the tools available to any one of us today.
Glenn Gould's life and work have continued to fascinate me since the day I first listened to his recording of Bach's French Suites on the internet. The more I learned about the man, the more I realized that he, like his music, was a great piece of art, able to be described in many different ways by many different observers. Many have tried, but none have succeeded in definitively pinpointing what was most exceptional about his life and career. He seems to me to have been a man with his finger firmly on the pulse of not only the tastes of his time, but also the tastes of times to come. And yet, he is also blessed with the foresight to ignore immediate personal gain and strive for something more meaningful to music. This is not to say that this decision was altogether charitable. He stated several years after his departure from concert performance that he had only delved into it in order to gain credibility and notoriety for his recordings.
However, it is this desire to reach the common person, rather than those who are able to afford a ticket to the show, that I find admirable. I have found that people, though they strive for independence, will always seek a way to raise a person or group of people above themselves in admiration (like writing a lengthy essay about them). I believe that though it is perhaps natural to do this, a separation between the performer and the audience creates a separation between the music and the audience. How many of us who attend concerts and idolize musicians understand (or even care to understand) the process and inspiration behind what we are listening to? This of course can be applied to other aspects of our lives, such as politics or sports. Immense success and talent often create a seemingly unbridgeable divide between those who are talented and successful in particular arenas and those who are not. When we stop believing that we can achieve a level of success in areas (especially the arts) where extremely talented people have excelled, we stop understanding what they are doing and become fixated on the talented person, rather than the craft that most have dedicated their lives to in ways we do not fully understand. This is to say that in regarding a person, however talented, as more than human, we unwittingly imply that there exist some who are less than human, which is unacceptable. Of course, I do not know for certain if this is what Gould was really striving for by choosing the career path that he did, but I like to believe it is.
My personal love of Gould's music lies in a correlation between the nature of a work like "The Idea of North" and the nature of human interaction: our lives (and indeed the lives of all things, living or otherwise) are all invariably intertwined on some degree, creating any number of interactions and harmonies. But of course any life can stand as its own narrative, its own melody, so to speak. One of the most meaningful things Gould said about Bach's music is that it flows, undulates, moves constantly, often without creating a discernible melody. Though its harmonic brilliance is heard throughout, Bach's music lacks the iconic passages and flourishes typical of Mozart or Beethoven's music. In this, one can see Gould's aversion to the public's attachment to singular performances, or an individual's ability to perform. Performances are but tiny glimpses into the complexity of the what is being conveyed, be it music, sports, or anything in which perfection is the goal, though it is never truly attained. I feel, as perhaps Gould felt, that Bach's music is an allegory for the flow of time itself: it is not the singular moments and sudden flourishes that constitute it, but rather its continuity; its entirety. It emulates the incredibly methodical rhythms of the universe through relentless motion and change. Bach, Glenn Gould, and truly moving music will continue to inspire and fascinate us in ways one single performance never will. Indeed, even after the last piano is built and the last pianist is long dead, Glenn Gould's interpretation of Bach will continue to entertain and inspire the stars: a recording of Gould playing a section of Bach's "Well-Tempered Clavier" was selected to be included on the musical recordings on the Voyager 1 spacecraft, which will continue to travel unguided to the distant reaches of space for eternity.
