Anyone see the special on Horowitz on PBS last night? Did you watch closely at his left hand when he was playing those jumping octaves at the big climax of the Scriabin Etude in D# minor during the Moscow concert? He was leaving off the last eighth in every group of four!!!! In effect, he was making quarter notes out every second and fourth beat. Obviously, it was to make the music easier to play because of the rapid tempo. What a guy!!!

i refuse to believe it!!!!

Muh ha ha

bump

Let's see. You had to actually watch his hands to figure that out. What a master.

Brendan: Your graphics never cease to amuse me.

(BTW:This is post #600 for me)

And Joe: No offense, but unless you can play any better than Horowitz yourself, you shouldn't criticize his level of professionalism.

Jgoo,
I admit I don't play up to Horowitz's standard but does that make changing the music to suit one's needs okay for the professional and not for the amateur? I recall Brendan calling me on the carpet for that (rightly so) a few weeks back.

i was just wondering if you recorded and watched it a few times to figure that out. even if you were completely sure of it, i'd still have to go get it and see for myself because it's so preposterous.

Rodion,

Yes, i did record it and watched it three times just to make absolutely certain, but it's obvious to anyone who's played the piece. And I don't mean to knock Horowitz in a general sense. He possessed the greatest facility of anyone. But I don't agree w/ a number of his interpretations. This just came a kind of shock. He wants speed for the climax and he just cannot play the jumping octaves that fast at his age. When he was younger I'm sure he left them intact.

Joe,

This is the cheapest way to attack a great legend. It makes one wonder who would read your writing?

Kin

why kill the messenger? why attack joe for pointing out that the emperor has no clothes? it isn't any secret that horowitz was, above all, a great showman, not a great musician.

Pique,

It is ok to point out whoever's error in music making. No great musicians
would excape this kind of scrutiny. It is just the way Joe expressed his
'discovery'. Why he called Horowiz 'a cheat'. I would say that is artistic
creation. Music is for listening, rather than watching. If Joe can tell
the difference by listening to it, he would certainly get some credits.
Nobody wants to kill anybody. Don't you be panic!

Kin

I don't think anyone ever accused Horowitz of being a great showman, until now. He hardly moves at all when he plays, other than his arms, hands and fingers. He's like a statue. That doesn't sound like your typical showman. And I thought he was supposed to be a great musician. What's going on here?

Rick

A great showman does not flail their arms all over the place. A great showman performs technical feats that leave the audience astounded. That is what Horowitz did. I heard a great quote (sorry I can't remember the source) that Horowitz played the octaves in Tchaikovsky's 1st Piano Concerto faster than he could. In other words he would pull off great technical stunts by playing things faster than normal, louder than normal, adding extra notes, etc.

Kin,

I can hear the difference by listening to it. In fact, it messed me up when I went to learn that etude because I had listened to this performance first. And that was not the first time - there were other pieces that I had listened to him perform to get an idea of how to interpret them only to discover later things in the pieces that were written differently than they way he played them. At first I thought it was artistic creation but I later came to view it as more of a hack job.

I think that Horowitz played some things beautifully and had some great moments. And he could be electrifying in concert. But some of his interpretations simply lacked depth and were not very musical in that they lacked line, direction, and depth of emotion. Loud and crashy does not equal emotional.

Ryan

[ March 14, 2002: Message edited by: ryan ]

Joe is correct in pointing out that Horowitz simplified several passage in Scriabin's D# minor Etude, during the 1986 Moscow concert. Of all of his recordings of that work this is my least favorite. There is less sense of proportion than in his 1962 studio recording of the piece. The live version from 1968, which was videotaped, demonstrated how Horowitz in his prime could really play the work.

But, if Horowitz was a cheat for simplifying a difficult passage in extreme old age, then there are numerous other pianists who could be called cheats as well. Arthur Rubinstein simplified passages and dropped notes throughout his career, not just during his reckless youth, but also in middle and old age--as anyone who has ever watched his "Last Recital for Isreal" video will know. Schnabel simplified several of the more difficult Beethoven Sonatas, and Paderewski would slow down if the going got rough. I distinctly remember a attending Claudio Arrau recital where there were more notes dropped than left in.

As for the comment that Horowitz was not a great musician, one would have to ignore Horowitz' many contributions to make that statement. Can anyone in their right musical mind honestly state that Horowitz' 1969 Schumann Kreisleriana, Clementi Sonatas (which he rescued from obscurity), Scarlatti Sonatas (which were almost unknown when he began playing them in the 1930s), and Barber Sonata (World Premiere) are the result of an inferior musical mind?

It's funny how we become known for the last thing that we've done rather than the best. It seems Horowitz has taken quite a beating here today.

Horowitz was supposed to have an incredible charisma and power when on stage (despite the fact that he suffered terribly from nerves); mesmerizing, I am told. Maybe this is what is meant by his showmanship?

As far as his playing goes, I've heard some recordings that sound like we all do on a bad day. He certainly had his ups and downs. But I don't think there is any disputing his energy level and brilliance of sound and virtuosity.

It's just my opinion, but saying Horowitz was a great showman and not a great musician is ludicrous. Apart from the fact that both are not mutually exclusive this is simply a narrow minded take on the man and his music.

His B Minor Sonata is unequalled in my opinion.

...then again I haven't heard Brendan yet

[ March 14, 2002: Message edited by: Diarmuid ]

what about horowitz's scriabin sonatas? especially 10 as an example of musicianship...i would be afraid to play them if i ever reached superstar pianist status because of what he's done with them.

No. But think of it like this. It would be like if I went into your house and said "WHAT A MESS!" despite that fact that my house would be much worse.

And No. I'm not saying that criticizing ones playing is not okay, but when you completely attack their entire proffesion in the manner that you did, that is not okay. There is a fine line. I can't explain.

sorry, jgoo, it is not like that at all. you don't have to be horowitz's peer as a pianist to be qualified to criticize his playing. anyone is allowed to have an opinion. and it is fully possible to have a highly informed and educated opinion, even if you don't play a note of the piano.



you must be referring to the attacks on horowitz as a person off-stage. you are right, that that has nothing to do with his standing as a pianist or a musician. he could be a human monster off-stage, and i agree, it really isn't relevant to his musicianship or pianism.

however, having said that, horowitz was not a saint, he was a human being like the rest of us, and it is not some sort of religious desecration to speak ill of him.

joe's tone invites people to take his criticism of horowitz personally. it is like saying that if you like horowitz you are a fool. joe, i think that is more the problem than the actual factual content of your post.

Horowitz was certainly no saint. He was a deeply conflicted and insecure person, just as were a number of other pianists.

Arthur Rubinstein had a number of extramarital affairs, and even had an illegitimate child. During the 1970s, he even kept one of his mistresses at his home with his wife--who apparently had no idea what was going on. Because of the rotten way he treated his wife, he was on very bad terms with his children.

Glenn Gould was neurotic in the extreme, self-medicating his body almost as an experiment, and he paid the price with a premature death.

There are a few other pianists, beloved artists who I won't mention by name, whose behavior would make Horowitz's worst foibles pale in comparison. You would be shocked...

Rudolf Serkin--now HE was a saint!

I'm not 100% with you on this one. I know what you mean, but for me if you don't play a single note on the piano then there is a second hand quality to some of your judgements. In short I don't think you'd be judging from a position of huge strength.

Yes anyone can criticise a great pianist, but even if you don't like him/her a measure of respect is surely due to someone who is capable of things most of us can only dream of?

IMO, it's impossible to make "highly informed and educated opinions" about Horowitz/other pianists, unless you yourself are beyond intermediate levels...not to mention having given recitals too. Again, just my $.02

If I may be allowed to post my diatribe just one last time: I didn't make myself clear in many posts because it took some insightful comments by others to get my vision a little more focused on my feelings about Horowitz.
No one can deny his talent as a pianist. We can question his interpretations in many cases, which calls into question his musicianship. But the real core of my problem w/ Horowitz was his monumental ego, which he covered up w/ false humility. Rubinstein once said that that he was flattered that Horowitz courted him as a friend, until he found out that Horowitz was doing nothing more than trying to add him to Horowitz's stable of fawning groupies. When Rubinstein politely dismissed himself from Horowitz's company that's when the relationship entered the deep freeze. It was this ego that Horowitz put on display on the concert stage, which is why very often he was promoting not the music, but himself in concert - maybe trying to add further to the legend he knew he'd already built in his heyday. That is why his musicianship is often called into question. Probably why Rubinstein was the real "pianist" between the two because he served the music when on stage. Perhaps it was a blessing that Rubinstein was not the technician Horowitz was or he might have fallen into the same trap. Talent, like the beauty of a model, can be a blessing AND a curse. Horowitz is our best example of that, I think.

well, this presumes that what is under scrutiny is the pianist's technical skill, and probably if that is the critic's main focus, it would make sense for them to have some experience of what playing feels like.

however, if you are talking about the total effect of the performance, one need only have a highly trained ear. what matters is the making of the music, and that is something for which technical knowledge is pretty much irrelevant when it comes to making a judgment.

i would take a wild guess that pianists who are big horowitz fans are probably in awe of technical mastery. but technical mastery is a hollow tool if one does not hear.

being able to play but not hear is a lot more common than you might think. just as common as those who can hear but can't play.

i'd rather have the opinion of the latter than the former.

Yes, that was a wild guess. And a presumptuous one at that.

No it doesn't. Offering a performer's perspective, the most neutral grounds for criticism is technique. If someone gets on stage and plays with their fists, then it's obvious that their technical limitations are getting in the way of the music. On the opposite side of the spectrum, there are people who can play every note precisely but play in a rather flat manner simply because they are only interested in playing every note (which is the growing trend in international pianism today).

It's very interesting how most people only hear the technique in Horowitz's playing. They never hear the way thick chordal passages in Rachmaninoff sound so full and well voiced like a choir, how he never ignores his left hand and he beauty of lines other than the top voice, and his exquisite pedal effects. All I ever hear is comments on how fast the octaves are and what a diva he was.

And yes, I am amazed by his technique because there aren't a whole lot of people who could accomplish what he could with such ease. Again, this is coming from a performer who knows what it's like to have to work at something for hours and see one person pull it off in half the time.

pique, please don't try to lecture pianists about how you don't need to be a pianist to have an educated opinion on piano performance. Not to condescend, but this is something that we've been doing all of our lives and can appreciate at a higher level of sophistication than other musicians or critics. If you asked me to criticize (not used pejoratively) a cello recital, I would only be able to comment on more general things and would surely miss out on all of the subtlties that cellists notice.