Donald Satz wrote:

>John Dalmas wrote in response to me:
>
>>>If she isn't the "high priestess" of Bach keyboard playing, nobody
>>>is.
>>
>>Sheesh!  I haven't read anybody wax so profusely about Tureck since
>>Wiliam F. Buckley's frequent paeans for the artist.
>
>John appears to have a problem every time I write something very
>complimentary about an artist or composer. [etc.]

I've been listening to Tureck's recording of the Partitas on the "great
pianists" series.  I never gave her a lot of credit when i was in college
because a lot of my fellow students were swooning over her playing and
holding her up as a supreme authority.  I was then and am now suspicious of
any form of performer idolatry and so pretty much refused even to listen.
What little I did hear I don't remember what I thought of.  Now I can hear
the wonderful way in which she makes each strand of the counterpoint stand
out crystal clear.  Sometimes she articulates too much for my taste but her
vision and execution of the music is always consistent and the result of a
lifetime of thought about how the music should go.  That is what I admire
in a performer and I'm willing to set aside my personal preferences (which
change over the years just as I change and mature as a person) in order to
enjoy the spectacle of a great musical mind in action.  If one thinks of
great performers as the pinnacle of human achievement in music that is
preferable to thinking of them as gods and goddesses.  Who can rise to
the level of a god? But we're all human.  I don't like the idea of priests
and priestesses either (although some performers, Tureck included, have no
doubt tacitly encouraged the label).  It suggests too much that music is
an esoteric art the deepest secrets of which are revealed only to a select
few.  While it's no doubt true that there are only a few truly "great"
performers at any time, it can't be an exclusive club or no one would
ever be encouraged to give it a shot.

Chris Bonds