{"id":39346,"date":"2016-10-19T17:52:42","date_gmt":"2016-10-19T21:52:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=39346"},"modified":"2016-10-19T18:18:05","modified_gmt":"2016-10-19T22:18:05","slug":"glenn-goulds-variations-and-the-human-qualities-that-foster-remarkable-human-creativity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2016\/10\/19\/glenn-goulds-variations-and-the-human-qualities-that-foster-remarkable-human-creativity\/","title":{"rendered":"IDEAS | What Glenn Gould Taught Steve Jobs About Human Creativity"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Joshua
Joshua Cohen from Apple University\u00a0offers a brilliant lesson in the perception of musical detail in Glenn Gould’s iconic interpretation of The Goldberg Variations.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In a city that has a Glenn Gould School, a Glenn Gould Studio, a Glenn Gould Foundation, a Glenn Gould subway plaque, two Glenn Gould residential plaques, and a life-size statue of Glenn Gould, a speaker lecturing on this Toronto icon can expect an appreciative audience, especially when he presents him as a paragon of human creativity.\u00a0 Indeed, unreserved enthusiasm was the response to Professor Joshua Cohen\u2019s presentation: Glenn Gould\u2019s Variations and the Human Qualities that Foster Remarkable Human Creativity, delivered at the Rotman School of Management and co-sponsored by the Glenn Gould Foundation.<\/p>\n

This lecture, developed for executives who attend Apple University, a corporate training facility of Apple Inc, the world\u2019s largest technology company, is intended to support that late Steve Jobs\u2019 goal of studying what the best things are, so that the Apple culture will aspire to such heights. \u201cExpose yourself to the best things humans have done and bring it into what you do\u201d, was Jobs\u2019 advice. Cohen\u2019s task is to identify the best things and explicate them. Gould is on his list of the best things, along with Central Park in New York City.<\/p>\n

To facilitate an appreciation of Gould, Cohen begins by providing a grounding in Bach so that his pianistic achievements can be meaningfully perceived.\u00a0 It is not hard to enjoy and admire a fine performance of Bach, by Gould or other great Canadian pianists such as Angela Hewitt or David Jalbert, but to recognize the specificity, sensitivity and sophistication of Gould\u2019s achievement requires acute perception of fine points. Cohen\u2019s presentation was a pedagogic model of clarity and nuance that made Bach accessible to an audience of varying musical background without dumbing down by even an iota.\u00a0\u00a0 Structuring his talk around a comparison of Gould\u2019s 1955 and 1981 recordings of The Goldberg Variations,\u00a0 Cohen argued that the pianist\u2019s desire to improve upon a recording that established a musical standard that had not then been surpassed exemplified a vision of musical excellence so high that it contained an ethical dimension. Gould\u2019s stated goal, to create a feeling of ecstasy that can elevate and distance the listener from the mundane reality of everyday life, showed a profound concern for humans, according to Cohen.<\/p>\n

Cohen sees Gould\u2019s early and wholehearted embrace of technology to be part of that ethical vision.\u00a0 It enabled Gould\u2019s uncompromising standards by allowing him to record multiple takes of each variation and then splice together the parts that pleased him and served his vision of the overarching architecture of the Variations.\u00a0 This understanding that technology could produce something more sublime than real-time performance and permit the pianist to play without the need to please an audience in a concert hall was Gould\u2019s visionary realization and made him unique among the great pianists of the 20th\u2013<\/span>Century in Cohen\u2019s view.<\/p>\n

\"Joshua
Joshua Cohen Lecture On Glenn Gould\u2019s Variations and the Human Qualities that Foster Remarkable Human Creativity
Rotman School of Management on October 18. (Photo: Robin Roger)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cohen\u2019s beautifully explicated, examination of Gould\u2019s variation of tempo and dynamics in his two versions of Variation 18, which included asking the audience to identify the difference in the beat in two renderings, was a brilliant lesson in the perception of musical detail. That this proved that Gould perceived differences between versions of his playing of the smallest detectable sounds audible to the human ear powerfully demonstrated that he met Job\u2019s ideal of accomplishing \u201cthe best things humans have done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Convincing as Cohen is about Gould as an innovator and musical visionary it is hard to overlook the omission of any consideration of the darker aspects of his legacy.\u00a0 Gould didn\u2019t simply prefer the recording studio to the concert hall; he asserted that live performance was without value, and even repulsive, characterizing it as a vast assemblage of sweat glands.\u00a0 He dismissed the profound social benefits of communal musical experience, and seemed not to reflect on the evolutionary advantage that shared musical expression has given to humans.\u00a0 He looked at live performance from the point of view of the performer, which is understandable, but seemed to have no interest in the audience\u2019s experience, almost as if he\u2019d never attended a concert, but only performed in them. The world he envisioned was one of complete musical privacy in which people listen in sealed isolation, and are transported away from each other in a sublime state.\u00a0 That technology does allows us to experience music this way is indeed remarkable, and even transformative at times, but this does not mean that a world of people hoarding their aural pleasures inside their earphones or at home with their sound systems is an ideal.\u00a0 Solitude and reflective detachment is regenerating and necessary, but we deny our need to attach and share uplifting sensations at our peril.<\/p>\n

Gould\u2019s greatness is so indisputable that there is no need for an uncritical cult of personality.\u00a0 In Toronto, we run the risk of adulatory parochialism due to our pride in having produced this genius.\u00a0 No question, he was admired the world over by the greatest musicians of his day, not just here, but he also provoked negative reactions, such as\u00a0\u00a0 Seymour Bernstein\u2019s observations in the Globe and Mail in September 2014:\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWhen I listen to Glenn Gould play Bach, I\u2019m not aware that I\u2019m listening to Bach at all.\u00a0 I\u2019m only listening to Glenn Gould, who infuses the music with his own neurotic nature.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is not to say that Cohen\u2019s points are not valid and brilliantly well taken. But when it comes to Glenn Gould, it\u2019s fair to ask for counterpoint.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

#LUDWIGVAN<\/em><\/strong><\/h3>\n

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