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- Harry Mount, the London Telegraph
MusicMay 1998 Alicia de Larrocha at Carnegie Hall On a recent performance by the Spanish pianist The rise of the virtuoso pianist during the Romantic period led to a serious decline in the public’s appreciation of quiet musicianship. As a result, so much of the best music from the nineteenth century and earlier did not appeal to audiences, who had come to expect the cannonading and empty pyrotechnics of the worst (though often the most admired) demonstrative virtuosos. It was a problem that persisted well into this century in the playing of Ignace Paderewski and Josef Hofmann, and culminated in the highly charged performances of Vladimir Horowitz. There is an anecdote from César Saerchinger’s biography Artur Schnabel (1957) that illustrates the difference between mere virtuosity and genuine musicianship. After the eleven-year-old Schnabel began studying with the famed Viennese pedagogue Theodor Leschetizky in 1893, the teacher quickly took stock of the pupil and uttered a judgment ... This article is available to subscribers and for individual purchaseSubscribe to TNC (Print and Online editions) Subscribe to TNC (Online only) This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 16 May 1998, on page 43 Copyright © 2012 The New Criterion | www.newcriterion.com http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/aliciadelarrocha-coleman-3055
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