I recommend to anyone interested in the life, work and thought of a
great artist that they view the video Richter the Enigma, a film by Bruno
Monsaingeon (pub.  NVC Arts).  At the age of 80, Pianist Sviatoslav Richter
agrees to be interviewed about his life, and his remarks (in Russian, with
subtitles) form the backdrop for an illuminating collection of archival
USSR footage (including some REALLY SCARY clips of Malenkov, Krushchev, et
al., at Stalin's funeral!), Richter performing in various venues (including
Schubert at Snape Maltings in 1977--see, now I know where that is!), and
clips from his personal life, all artfully dovetailed with the text.  There
are brief interviews with his wife, singer Nina Dorliac, Artur Rubinstein,
and Glenn Gould, who said he didn't appreciate Schubert until he heard
Richter play him.  When such disparate artists as Rubinstein and Gould
praise Richter to the skies you know he's good even if you didn't already
know by hearing him play.

He was truly a law unto himself--originally somewhat self-taught, always
more interested in the music than in the piano per se--he is shown testing
pianos and saying that he didn't like to do that because it always made
him not play well.  He didn't want to know about the piano, preferring to
take what he was given.  In the '80s he played recitals in nearly complete
darkness, and from music--shining a reading lamp on the music but keeping
himself shrouded from view.  When asked if it helped audiences to see the
pianist's facial expressions, he scoffed, saying that all that showed was
the work the pianist was doing.  He disliked America, except for "museums,
orchestras and cocktails" and preferred playing in hick towns in Siberia
to Carnegie Hall.  Quite a guy.  And a true colossus of the piano if there
ever was one.  The performance footage in this film is ABSOLUTELY AMAZING.
Trust me.

I was fortunate to hear him in Phoenix, at Phoenix Union High School
Auditorium, probably in the fall of 1960, the year he first visited
America (I frankly don't know if he came back--if so it could have been
later).  I was all of 18 and really could not have appreciated his playing
at the time.  I thought great playing was fast fingers, which he certainly
had, and power, which he also had.  The program consisted of 3 Beethoven
sonatas, the only one of which I remember was the Appassionata, since that
was one of the three sonatas I knew at the time.  The lid (Fluegel) of the
piano was flapping up and down in the finale.  I don't remember him playing
an encore.  He did come out for several curtain calls, and at one point a
man sitting near me yelled something in Russian, which Richter heard.  He
looked startled for a moment then broke out into a sheepish grin, which was
followed by more applause.  Was anyone on this list at that concert, by any
chance? Or saw him anywhere in America during that year? My sister-in-law
heard him play at Carnegie Hall--Ravel.  She thought it was '59 but it
couldn't have been.

Chris Bonds