Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Argerich has lost her touch?

I'm not saying that once I see a skimpy-dressed pianist, I immediately judge them as bad, but I feel people are emphasizing looks too much over the actual music making.

honestly, anyone at that age has earned the right to never be criticized for being old or "losing their touch". When you get old, you get old. Just a little rude considering what she had/has accomplished. It is not easy playing piano at that age. Very few can. Unless you have played with perfect technique all your life, you are bound to have some health issues that will make playing very painful. Not to mention your hearing is most likely down to 6 kHz.

+1

Agree, Bruce!

furthermore, the videos w/the gals inappropriately dressed--well
they are getting really obscene comments. If you are really
focused and serious about your art, why take such silly
side-trips...it just generates more offensiveness, poor taste,
entices kooks to post junk...

All part of the charm we love Bruce

Let's see, I am Asian myself and don't live in a pineapple under the sea.

This used to not be a problem with records and CDs! But a lot of the appeal in piano music is the presentation as well; which is why LL has a strong fanclub and Liszt was so popular.

Somebody mentioned the Bach Partitas? Her Bach is amazing; it truly sings. Her Partitas really show her musicality. She can play Bach as romantically as Chopin Nocturnes or as violently as certain Prokofiev. I applaud her!

Yes, we do love Bruce. He can be so unintentionally funny sometimes! (Just kidding.)

This is why I love this forum so much, all the colourful members here, pianoloverus, Kreisler, stores, bad orange, MarkC, liszt85, the 'other' Jason, Andromaque... never a dull moment.

BruceD-my favorite person.

Who cares if her technique is not what it was 30 years ago? Seriously, comparing YW or VL to MA is plain obscene. I guess Arrau recordings from his 30s are better than the ones from his 60s because his technique wasn t the same? Everybody blames the age of Argerich. There are a lot of examples of pianists with a flawless technique at 70 and older. Argerich probably has other issues. Watching her most recent videos , i can t see any flaws in her technique.

This whole technique thing ... kids go out of the conservatoire and we re supposed to believe they are Arraus or Richters or Marthas. It takes something more than fast fingers to become an artist of such stature. It s not the olympics, you know ... Meanwhile, there a re a ton of artists that remain obscure that are worth in my opinin much more than most of these young virtuosos.

There are plenty of pianists (and violinists) who keep performing in public well past their sell-by date, when their technique has gone into tatters - I actually attended a concert recently of one such pianist who I'd admired on his CD recordings (made over 20 years ago), and wished I hadn't....

If only he'd followed the example of Ashkenazy, who has long stopped playing piano in public because he couldn't rely on his fingers on the day anymore due to arthritis (though he still makes excellent recordings).

But I can't say that Argerich is in that category - her playing technically is still in the top drawer (based on recent concert broadcasts). She isn't one of my favorite pianists - her sudden impulsive spurts of tone and pace, which are present also in her earliest recordings - are still there, and remain disconcerting to me because they seem random and often misplaced (e.g. in a recent broadcast of Chopin's E minor Concerto). OK in a live concert, but disturbing on repeated hearings.

So if I'm Caucasian, I'll automatically know how three white pianists rank in popularity?

I really can't find anything wrong with Argerich's technique these days. Having a good technique at 70 - which really isn't all that old - is not remarkable in and of itself. Having the kind of stratospheric level of technique (not just mechanics, but real technique) that Argerich still posesses is noteworthy. And her musical insights have improved with age - for example, she's much more convincing in slow movements than she used to be.

Let's also remember that Argerich faced a life threatening illness about a decade ago. We're lucky she's still alive and blessing us with such great music making.

Can we make a BruceD appreciation thread?

OSK is the most colorful of all: ORANGE!

yeah, I kinda forgot to include him...

How do you know that all the attention they give to looks takes away attention from music? You feel that way though, and that's all I said. The fact that you think there is an inverse correlation is all I was commenting on. Btw, I wasn't commenting on just your post. This seems like a general view here on PW, one that I don't agree with. There very likely exists one (or more) shabbily dressed horrible pianist for every well dressed horrible pianist.

Also, all the "well dressed" and pianists people refer to in such threads are always the younger pianists (LL, YW, VL, etc). Have you ever considered the thought that it might actually be the case that you prefer older pianists to these younger pianists and so are misled into believing that choice of dress has an inverse relationship with musicality?

So I don't think people should even care about what dress or suit pianists choose to wear. Comment on the musicality, that's all fine. However, to say that focusing on looks takes away attention from the music (or "emphasize looks OVER the actual music making") is being unfair. I think they are all the more professional for taking the effort to look good on stage as well, to provide a complete experience to a live audience (visual as well as auditory).

You probably wanted to ask "So if I'm Caucasian, I'll automatically know how popular three (white) pianists are in the Caucasian community". Don't try to pull a fast one on slerk. When asked this question, it doesn't seem so very absurd anymore, does it (assuming that you get to talk to a lot of Caucasians, by virtue of having lived in places with lots of Caucasians for a majority of your life and having talked to piano enthusiasts over the years)?