Leonard Bernstein's Amazing Disclaimer About Glenn Gould's Brahms Piano Concerto #1, Performed by the NY Philharmonic in 1962

[DonRocks]

It's pretty amazing that one single concert from over 50 years ago has its own Wikipedia entry, but this was no ordinary concert.

The New York Philharmonic Concert of Apr 6, 1962

Here's a 4-minute video with all the controversy encapsulated:

And here's the whole thing:

I listened to it all, and I was interested in the 3rd movement in particular. There's a good interview with Gould at about the 57:30 point that's well-worth listening to. Gould is noted for dismissing virtuoso pianists who "show off" as opposed to honoring the composer's intentions to the letter, which makes it doubly interesting. Is he having his cake and eating it too? I know experts who would answer on both sides of that question. The first minute of this video gets to the heart of the matter (after the first minute, it becomes a separate topic, and a beautiful one, to be discussed in another thread - however, at about the 3-minute mark, Gould chimes in with a comment directly relevant to this issue. He also inserts a comment at about 6:10 perhaps even more relevant - if you can stomach a slow Schubert movement (which takes patience), this is worth watching, and even studying - you know, even though this thread has nothing to do with Richter, this entire video is very much on-topic because it really gets into "why" Gould did what he did):

Gould, by the way, was "eccentric" to say the least, and people have gone so far as to wonder whether or not he had Asperger's Syndrome.

[darkstar965]

Fascinating.  And, on a tangentially-related point, I remember being surprised when I learned there was no familial relationship between Leonard and Seymour.  The film about the latter Bernstein, is a wonderful documentary btw.