Frank Fogliati writes:

>After completing the following comparisons, you'll appreciate
>that a non-HIP recording rarely  does justice to Bach's
>compositional genius.
>
>Bach
>Sonatas & Partitas for solo violin
>van Dael (Naxos)/Grumiaux (Philips)
>
>Gamba sonata
>Savall & Koopman (Alia Vox)/Maisky & Argerich (DG)
>
>Goldberg Variations
>Hantai (Opus 111)/Schiff (Decca)

And Roberto Strappafelci suggests:

>Bach's Mass in B minor - Karajan vs.  Koopman (Oh, I really
>wish all wars were fought this way!)

I think we need to tread carefully here.  This choices here have not
been selected to show the pre-musicologically guided lot in the best
light.  I like both old and new approaches.  I don't think that these
'HIP' lot supercede the older generation of musicians automatically.  I
like listening to Menuhin's later recording of the Sonatas and Partitas but
I also like listening to Kuijken.  I wouldn't pretend that either sounded
like what a contemporary like Pisendel sounded.  Nonetheless they are good
performances with interesting things to say, and that's what counts.  Also
I didn't enjoy Huggett's performances just as I can't stand Milstein.
Similarly I like both Fournier and Bylsmer in the Suites, each in their own
unique way.  I imagine a comparison of Klemperer and Herreweghe in the St
Mathew Passion would also be interesting.  I wouldn't even mind comparing
the new Herreweghe recording to the famous mono Mengelberg recording,
neither of which I have heard yet.

I remember an interview with Baroque violinist Andrew Manze in Gramophone
who said he refused to be snobbish at all in these matters, and just
loved listening to ancient recordings of the likes of Busch, Kreisler and
Huberman play Bach.  All of them play Bach with a portamento-laden old
world string playing style which would be laughed at if anyone tried it
today, but in its own way it is really fascinating.  These recordings bring
home just how much music playing style evolve with time, and force you to
look at things in a new light.

One thing I always like to keep in mind is what Harnoncourt, widely
regarded as the father of the HIP movement, stated in an interview:
"authenticism is stupid!  (sic)".  He went on to say that he doesn't waste
his time pretending for one moment that the sound he makes sounds anything
like the one they made in the composer's day, and that the only way to have
'authentic' music making would be to dig up the old musicians out of their
graves to play their old instruments again.  Even then he says that because
the musical 'language' of the past had its own rhetorical characteristics
that were really only fully appreciated by the period audiences, that our
modern audiences whose ears probably hear the music quite differently, will
not listen to the music in an 'authentic' fashion.  So to correct this we
would have to dig the old audiences out of their graves as well, who with
ears unadulterated by Bartok etc would appreciate the music in a fully
historically informed manner.  Then there you would have it:  'authentic'
music making.

This is not to deny that asking how the musicians of the time thought
about their musical language, as well as what inspired them, to go back
to that original fountain of inspiration, is a desirable thing.  It is
just to say that this is something that must contribute to deepening our
understanding of that music, rather than be a mere academic exercise.  Or
to put it another way the HIP way is not the easy path to instant success
its more childishly over-enthusiastic proponents imagine.

I guess the question then to ask yourself is whether you would still
listen to a recording even once musicological ideas move on, so that
the once fashionable ideas in the performance have now been discredited.
This is probably going to happen in some measure with just about all 'HIP'
performances, just as Landowska's harpsichord renditions of Bach are no
longer considered 'HIP'.  After all modern musicologists would laugh at
her suggestion that she played Bach "His way".  Then you are left with
the question as to whether there is still something magical about the
performance which still makes it worthwhile.  There is nothing wrong with
insisting that there be something magical about a performance.  After all
that's probably why C.P.E.  Bach insists over and over in his oft quoted
treatise on keyboard playing to 'play from the heart'.

The bottom line is to enjoy performances for their own intrinsic virtues,
irrespective of whether the musicians are historically informed or not.
To set the one up against the other - that is a game meant for fools.

Satoshi Akima
Sydney, Australia
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